The efficiency of the Scandinavian banking sector – a wavelet quantile regression analysis

In this article, the Scandinavian housing financing market is analysed in order to determine whether the interest rate price-discovery processes of Denmark, Norway and Sweden are efficient. Based on wavelet quantile regression analysis, we find systematic positive asymmetric price transmission (APT) inefficiencies. We conclude that there is a very high propensity for mortgage lenders to directly increase its customers’ mortgage interest rates subsequently to an increase in its borrowing costs. However, after a corresponding borrowing cost decrease, the same mortgage lenders are very slow to decrease its customers’ mortgage rates. These positive coefficients for so-called APT effects are found in all Scandinavian countries, even if the coefficients for Norway were not statistically significant. Wavelet quantile regression analysis, with a focus on the relevant higher percentiles, is easily motivated since the mortgage rates are adjusted very infrequently. Moreover, wavelet decomposition allows a robust analysis at different time frequency scales, while simultaneously controlling for nonstationary trends, autocorrelation and structural breaks. Except for the still positive but yet insignificant and inconclusive coefficients for Norway, the result is very clear-cut. Regardless of which wavelet scaling decomposition or quantile coefficient that is studied – positive APT effects are clearly identified and confirmed on the Scandinavian mortgage market.     

An alternative approach to the monitoring of technological diffusion via foreign direct investment: evidence from the Greek manufacturing sector

The existing studies of foreign direct investment and the corresponding technological diffusion process that they generate, focus either on specific parameters of the production process in isolation, or they combine certain parameters to construct indices that are not consistent across studies. The present analysis proposes an alternative approach that captures the entire production process and multinational firms are viewed as the platform that transfers more advanced technologies to the host countries. As multinational firms are able to utilise more efficiently the available production process, an efficiency gap ensues between the domestically owned firms of a country and the multinational firms that operate in it. We capture and provide a measure and a monitoring mechanism of the technological diffusion process via foreign direct investment through the evolution of the efficiency gap between the two groups of firms whilst controlling for other variables that might contribute to such a gap. We apply our approach to the manufacturing sector of the Greek economy that experiences a consistent presence of foreign direct investment inflows over the time period 2001–2007.     

Trading with Tigers: A Technical Analysis of Southeast Asian Stock Index Futures

ABSTRACT

Our paper examines the profitability of technical trading rules in Southeast Asian (SEA) ‘tiger cub’ stock index futures markets during and after the global financial crisis (GFC) of 2007/2008. Using daily closing price data from 2007 to 2012, we explore technical trading rules such as exponential moving averages (EMA (20), EMA (100), EMA (20,100)) and moving average convergence divergence (MACD) in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand. The findings reveal that after applying trading rules that account for transaction costs and risk, abnormal profits cannot be achieved above a naı¨ve ‘buy-and-hold’ strategy (with the exception of EMA (100) and EMA (20,100) in Indonesia, and EMA (20,100) in both the Philippines and Thailand). There appears to be some degree of success with the application of longer-term trading rules; however, unless transaction costs can be reduced, investors are best advised to pursue passive investment approaches. Despite the economic uncertainty associated with the GFC and ongoing market volatility, it appears that SEA tiger cub stock index futures markets are weak-form efficient.     

Determinants of total efficiency in water utilities in Mexico

By using panel data analysis across 368 water utilities in Mexico over the period 2010–2014, we find that small firms are more efficient than medium and large providers and that increasing production is associated with less efficiency. Billing, income collection and profitability are relevant factors to improve efficiency. Medium and large firms require to measure consumption by service with meters in order to increase efficiency, while small firms do not require it.     

Component efficient solutions in line-graph games with applications

Recently, applications of cooperative game theory to economic allocation problems have gained popularity. We investigate a class of cooperative games that generalizes some economic applications with a similar structure. These are the so-called line-graph games being cooperative TU-games in which the players are linearly ordered. Examples of situations that can be modeled like this are sequencing situations and water distribution problems. We define four properties with respect to deleting edges that each selects a unique component efficient solution on the class of line-graph games. We interpret these solutions and properties in terms of dividend distributions, and apply them to economic situations. This research has been done while the third author was visiting Tinbergen Institute at the Free University, Amsterdam. The research is part of the Research Programme “Strategic and Cooperative Decision Making” at the Department of Econometrics. Financial support from the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) in the framework of the Russian-Dutch programme for scientific cooperation, is gratefully acknowledged. The third author also appreciates partial financial support from the Russian Leading Scientific Schools Fund (grant 80.2003.6) and Russian Humanitarian Scientific Fund (grant 02-02-00189a). We thank three anonymous referees for their valuable comments.     

中国能源利用的经济效率、环境绩效与节能减排潜力

本文采用全要素方法,将环境污染(二氧化碳排放和二氧化硫排放)作为能源利用经济产出的环境成本纳入研究框架,运用2000～2007年中国省际面板数据,选取基于投入导向的CCR-DEA模型,测算了中国29个省份能源利用的经济效率并度量了其环境绩效,在此基础上计算得到中国各省份的节能减排潜力;分析了中国东、中、西部三大地区之间的效率差异并采用Tobit模型检验了中国节能减排能力的影响因素。得出的主要结论包括(1)当前中国能源利用的经济效率及其环境绩效整体水平都偏低,尚具有很大的提升空间;(2)中国各省份、三大地区的能效及其环境绩效发展都显著不平衡,节能减排潜力巨大;(3)经济发展水平对一个地区的节能减排能力有显著影响,而促进技术进步、优化经济结构和能源结构是当前提升中国节能减排能力的主要途径。     

区域要素规模效率及其影响因素的效应机理研究

利用随机前沿超越对数生产函数对我国区域要素规模效率的时变趋势、地域差异进行研究,并通过非效率函数对其宏观影响因素的效应进行了分析。总体看来,考虑影响因素后的效率估计值更为准确：1986—2005年的时变效率在外部环境因素变革的冲击下虽出现了波动情况,但总体上均呈现上升趋势;东部与中西部的效率变化趋势一致,但进入1990年代后东部的平均效率增长速度明显要快于中西部,且效率的东西部推移逐步扩大;另一方面,东西部区域内部的差异均呈现收敛趋势,且东部比中西部区域要显著的多。城市化、工业化、专业化、创新活动、人口素质等因素在不同地域不同发展时期对于效率均体现出不同的影响效应,因而,针对不同地区、发展阶段特征和区域特质其区域政策和发展模式的选择也要有所侧重。     

效率体现式技术进步对经济增长的贡献分析

要素生产率提升是技术进步的效用结果和完整体现。本文引入效率体现式技术进步概念,以资本生产率与劳动生产率的综合指数来体现总体技术进步水平,构建经济增长中资本规模、劳动力规模和总体技术进步三因素贡献的分解模型,并利用中国1980-2010年的时间序列数据,对期间的技术进步贡献及其结构进行了实证分析。本文研究结果表明,经济增长的动力主要源于资本规模增长,劳动力投入规模贡献不大,技术进步贡献不小。技术进步贡献主要源于生产技术质量和生产技术效率,产业间劳动力构成和其他管理技术进步贡献微小。     

The changing and relative efficiency of European emerging stock markets

The martingale hypothesis is tested for 15 European emerging stock markets located in Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Romania, Russia, the Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Turkey and the Ukraine. For comparative purposes, the developed stock markets in Greece, Portugal and the UK are also included. Rolling window variance ratio tests based on returns and signs and with wild bootstrapped p-values are used with daily data over the period beginning in February 2000 and ending in December 2009. The fixed-length rolling sub-period window captures changes in efficiency and is used to identify events which coincide with departures from weak-form efficiency and to rank markets by relative efficiency. Overall, return predictability varies widely. The most efficient are the Turkish, UK, Hungarian and Polish markets; the least efficient are the Ukrainian, Maltese and Estonian stock markets. The global financial market crisis of 2007–2008 coincides with return predictability in the Croatian, Hungarian, Polish, Portuguese, Slovakian and UK stock markets. However, not all markets were affected: the crisis had little effect on weak-form efficiency in stock markets located in Greece, Latvia, Romania, Russia and Turkey.     

中国海洋渔业空间生态格局探究——以我国沿海11个省市为例

海洋渔业是我国海洋强国的重要组成部分,但近年来全球气候变暖、海域环境污染等严重的资源问题和生态问题日益对我国海洋渔业生态文明建设提出新的挑战。本文选取 2006-2016年我国沿海11个省市海洋渔业相关面板数据,首先将海洋渔业二氧化碳排放量作为非期望产出纳入超效率 SBM-DEA窗口分析法中,测算出海洋渔业生态效率值并评价其有效性。然后进一步探究海洋渔业生态效率的空间效应并运用Tobit随机效应面板模型,分析了海洋渔业生态效率的影响因素。结果显示：（1）我国沿海 11个省市海洋渔业生态效率有效水平较低且存在区域差异。（2）我国 沿海 11个省市海洋渔业生态效率水平逐步由随机相异发展空间格局向聚集态势变动。（3）我国沿海 11个省市的海洋渔业经济发展水平对海洋渔业生态效率的影响呈现出显著的负相关关系;渔业产业结构、海洋环境政策与海洋渔业生态效率的影响呈现出 正相关关系。最后基于实证研究,提出建设海洋生态渔业,提升海洋渔业生态效率有效水平的建议。