Pricing of Mutual Fund Services in Retirement Plans: Evidence from Open-End Equity Funds

Management fees of mutual funds are more costly to investors than is often realized. Moreover, research indicates that in many cases, the fees are not related to performance, contrary to what might be expected from an efficient market. This study uses sample data to illustrate the consequences of inefficiency to an individual investor. It then turns to an empirical examination of the determinants of the ratio of management fees to total assets (MER), investigating market concentration, fund performance, and non-performance characteristics as explanatory variables. All of these classes of variables contributed to the variation of MERs . JEL Classification G23     

MEASURING THE OPERATIONAL EFFICIENCY OF COMMERCIAL BANKS IN NAMIBIA

This paper examines the efficiency of commercial banks in Namibia using the standard econometric frontier approach. Although two aspects of efficiency (scale and scope) receive our attention, the emphasis is on the latter which pertains to whether a firm produces as efficiently as it possibly can, given its size. Our results indicate that substantial economies of scale exist in commercial banking in Namibia. This will tend to suggest that commercial banks in Namibia can increase their efficiency by increasing their current scale of operation. The results for scope economies show that the current level of input combination does not make for maximum efficiency as sufficient scope exists for a more efficient combination of inputs. We believe this will reduce operating costs in the industry and stimulate efficiency.     

Capital structure and the control of managerial incentives

We present a theory of capital structure based on the power of shareholders, bondholders and managers to control the incentive conflicts in large corporations. The manager–owner conflict produces a trade-off between inefficiency in the low state and rents in the high state, and the shareholder–bondholder conflict produces under-investment as in Myers [Journal of Financial Economics 19 (1997) 147]. Since managers and bondholders both prefer more efficient actions in the low state, the two conflicts are interdependent. With risk-less levels of debt, there are no shareholder–bondholder agency costs, but managerial control over the incentive-setting process produces excessive rents. With risky debt, shareholders focus more on returns in the high state so that shareholder–bondholder agency costs increase but managerial rents decrease. Efficient levels of debt holder protection facilitate a reduction in manager–owner agency costs that outweighs shareholder–bondholder agency costs, and are decreasing in firm performance. The results are consistent with the separate empirical results relating control to both compensation and leverage, and suggest how future studies can be integrated.     

我国企业融资制度的现状及问题

细致分析了我国企业融资制度的现状,在此基础上指出我国企业融资制度存在的问题与缺陷,并提出了一些改善现有企业融资制度缺陷的建议和办法。     

Environmental protection versus economic growth

This paper presents and analyses the differences in the eco-models implemented worldwide （such as whether and how carbon taxes being ＂recycled＂）, or in their efficiency parameters （inconsistent parameter values that account for different results）. This is the assumption that a real tradeoff exists between the production of environmental goods. The present article empirically proves that something must be given up in order to gain something else, and once equations are specified to trace out the path of the economy over time, the natural economic formulation of such equations will embody the notion of economic and bio-tradeoffs.     

影子价格两种定义的统一性及其经济学含义

通过应用库恩-塔克定理,本文论证了线性规划对偶解和一般数学规划的拉格朗日乘子这两种影子价格定义的统一性。由于非线性规划比线性规划更具有普遍性,本文的结论为深入讨论影子价格的经济学意义提供了极大方便。完全竞争是影子价格等于机会成本和市场价格的充分条件。但在不完全竞争条件下,影子价格一般不等于机会成本和市场价格,也不代表资源的最优配置价格,它反映的只是企业的资源利用效率。     

峰荷需求、资本配置效率与中国网络型基础产业投融资机制改革——对阿弗奇-约翰逊模型的一个扩展

阿弗奇—约翰逊模型(A—J模型)表明规制对象具有过度使用资本倾向,相应的实证检验中同时存在肯定和否定的结果,但基本的A—J模型、已有扩展和实证检验都忽略了受规制行业的峰荷需求特征。本文从基本的A—J模型出发,假定生产要素单位使用成本与规制机构所认可的单位核算成本不同,考察了峰荷需求特征下受规制网络型基础产业的投资行为,提供了资本配置效率的衡量标准。本文的基本结论在于,峰荷需求条件下受规制企业不一定投资过多,这也解释了为何A—J效应的实证检验存在相互矛盾的结果。     

关于增加湖北省中等收入者比重的调查与分析(下)

我国中等收入阶层的形成和壮大，是同无数中等收入的形成和壮大联系在一起的，也与我国经济社会体制的不断跃迁、不断完善密切相关，特别是中等收入的特质及其影响力，是与我国经济社会体制改革的效率和整个社会的福利水平呈现一种正相关关系的。扩大中等收入比重，提高低收入收入水平，这是在新的历史条件下对我国传统收入分配制度的一个新的注解。     

Efficient Markets Hypothesis and the Emerging Capital Market in Sri Lanka: Evidence from the Colombo Stock Exchange – A Note

The behaviour of stock prices on the Colombo Stock Exchange (CSE) is examined with a view to determine its consistency with the weak form of the Efficient Markets Hypothesis (EMH). Runs, Autocorrelation and Cointegration tests are applied to daily, weekly and monthly CSE index data for the period of January 1991–November 1996. Results of Runs, Correlation and Cointegration tests overwhelmingly reject the serial independence hypothesis, leading to the conclusion that the behaviour of stock prices in the Colombo Stock Exchange is not consistent with the weak form of the Efficient Markets Hypothesis. Tests of the-day-of-the-week-effect, however, show that there is no evidence of such a phenomenon on the Colombo Stock Exchange stock prices. Results of the tests of the-month-of-the-year-effect lead to the conclusion that CSE prices do not display any month-specific behaviour.     

Economic analysis of the impact of adopting herd health control programs on smallholder dairy farms in Central Thailand

The economic impact of adopting herd health programs for mastitis and reproduction by small-scale dairy producers of Central Thailand was assessed using a policy analysis matrix (PAM). Following a reduction in the incidence of bovine disease on adopter farms, an increase in private net profits is observed. More importantly the social costs of supporting dairy farmers is reduced; the PAM effective protection coefficient was reduced by 35% for mastitis program adopters and by 44% for reproductive program adopters, indicating improved social efficiency of dairy policy. Other indicators of efficiency and policy implications are discussed.