Can fiat currencies really hedge Bitcoin? Evidence from dynamic short-term perspective

Decisions in Economics and Finance - Whereas much research has largely investigated the safe haven, diversifier and hedge proprieties of cryptocurrency, very few papers have analyzed the hedging...     

A bottom-up re-estimation of global fisheries subsidies

Using a recently developed database of fisheries subsidies for 148 maritime countries spanning 1989 to the present, total fisheries subsidies for the year 2003 is computed. A key feature of our estimation approach is that it explicitly deals with missing data from official sources, and includes estimates of subsidies to developing country fisheries. Our analysis suggests that global fisheries subsidies for 2003 are between US25 and 29 billion, which is higher than an earlier World Bank estimate of between US 25 and 29 billion, which is higher than an earlier World Bank estimate of between US 14–20 billion. This new estimate is lower than our 2000 global subsidies estimate of US$ 30–34 billion. We find that fuel subsidies compose about 15–30% of total global fishing subsidies, and that capacity enhancing subsidies sum to US$ 30–34 billion. We find that fuel subsidies compose about 15–30% of total global fishing subsidies, and that capacity enhancing subsidies sum to US 16 billion or about 60% of the total. These results imply that the global community is paying the fishing industry billions each year to continue fishing even when it would not be profitable otherwise—effectively funding the over-exploitation of marine resources.     

A global estimate of benefits from ecosystem-based marine recreation: potential impacts and implications for management

Participation in ecosystem-based marine recreational activities (MRAs) has increased around the world, adding a new dimension to human use of the marine ecosystem and another good reason to strengthen effective management measures. A first step in studying the effects of MRAs at a global scale is to estimate their socioeconomic benefits, which are captured here by three indicators: the amount of participation, employment and direct expenditure by users. A database of reported expenditure on MRAs was compiled for 144 coastal countries. A meta-analysis was then performed to calculate the yearly global benefits of MRAs in terms of expenditure, participation and employment. It is estimated that 121 million people a year participate in MRAs, generating 47 billion USD (2003) in expenditures and supporting one million jobs. The results of this study have several implications for resource managers and for the tourism industry. Aside from offering the first estimation of the global socioeconomic benefits of MRAs, this work provides insights on the drivers of participation and possible ecological impacts of these activities. Our results could also help direct efforts to promote adequate implementation of MRAs. Furthermore, we hope this work will provide a template for data collection on MRAs worldwide.     

Managerial Ownership and Agency Cost: Evidence from Bangladesh

This study examines the influence of managerial ownership on firm agency costs among listed firms in Bangladesh. This is an institutional setting that features a mixture of agency costs. This institutional setting has a concentration of ownership by managers, but the firms are not solely owned by managers. The extant literature suggests that the sacrifice of wealth by the principal and potential costs associated with monitoring the agents is known as the agency cost. This study uses three measures of agency cost: the ‘expense ratio’, the ‘Q-free cash flow interaction’, and the ‘asset utilisation ratio’. The finding of the study is that managerial ownership reduces the firm agency cost only under the ‘asset utilisation ratio’ measure of agency cost; this is robust with regard to a number of robustness tests. Furthermore, the non-linearity tests suggest that the convergence of interest is evident with very high and low levels of managerial ownership. The entrenchment effect by the owners is evident at moderate levels of managerial ownership. Although there has been great scepticism among management researchers on the validity of agency theory, overall, the findings of this study do not reject the validity of agency theory. Given that the entrenchment by managers is evident at certain levels of ownership and that the agency problem may still exist between insiders and outsiders, legislative guidelines for controlling share ownership may be required.     

An analysis of highway work zone safety practices in Pakistan

Highway Work Zones (HWZs) present a major hazard for road users, construction workers and equipment, and significantly contribute to occurrence of road crashes worldwide. The present study focuses on analysing the current state of safety measures at HWZs in Pakistan. A more direct approach is adopted by comparing safety measures at randomly selected HWZs in Pakistan with well-established safety procedures in Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD). HWZ safety measures such as traffic signs, markings, safety measures for pedestrians, workers and construction machinery, police enforcement, speed control measures, provision of advance warning area, buffer spaces, transition areas, and tapers for eight different HWZs were studied and compared with MUTCD standards. The results revealed that majority of the HWZs in Pakistan do not conform to any standard layout especially for safety and speed control measures. An enhanced need for special efforts towards improving safety at HWZs in Pakistan is highlighted.     

INCENTIVES FOR COMPETITIVE RESPONSES IN REPLICATED ECONOMIES: A GENERALIZATION

A simple proof is presented of a theorem of Roberts and Postlewaite on truthful revelation of preferences for replicated economies. The proof provides some generalizations of the earlier result using the strict definition of feasibility. First, to economies with an infinity of agents but with a finite number of types; secondly, to economies with a countable number of commodities.     

A more general class of biased estimators of the co-efficients in linear regression

In a recent paper, Ullah and Ullah (1978) proposed a class of biased estimators, namely double k-class (k₁, k₂) for the coefficients in a linear regression model. Even though, this set of estimators contains James and Stein (1961) as a special case, in its present form, it does not contain the ridge type estimators. The aim of this note is to extend Ullah and Ullah set of estimators and then establish a relationship with the various operational ridge estimators. The conditions under which the extended set of estimators dominates the ordinary least squares estimator are analyzed.     

Telemedicine in the USA: An overview

The authors examine the development and use of telecommunications technology in the provision of health services and in that context discuss policy formulation relating to technological innovation in health care. In the course of their examination, they consider the nature of the major challenges facing health care delivery that are amenable to responses in telecommunications technology, present selected findings from telemedicine studies in the light of these challenges, and offer a set of policy recommendations.     

Do retail gasoline prices rise more readily than they fall?: A threshold cointegration approach

This paper revisits the controversy over whether retail gasoline prices respond to increases in upstream prices more rapidly than decreases. Using threshold and momentum models of cointegration and daily data at different stages in the distribution chain, we find that transmission between upstream and downstream prices is mostly asymmetric in the momentum model: increases in upstream prices are passed on to downstream prices more quickly than decreases. We distinguish between small and large shocks and show that the asymmetry is more pronounced for small shocks, which may be due to consumer search costs.