Accounting practices and professional power dynamics during a crisis

This paper examines how changes in accounting practices during a crisis can affect organisational dynamics between hospital managers and clinicians. Our theoretical framework applies a multi-dimensional concept of power (Hardy, 1996) – which distinguishes power over resources, processes and meaning – to a longitudinal case study of a public university hospital during a budgetary crisis. Based on interviews with managers and clinicians, three successive time intervals with distinct power constellations are identified. Initially, we identify a pre-crisis phase where management formally controls resources, which seems to have limited effects on clinician dominance because managers lack ‘processual power’ and ‘power of meaning’. Next, an implantation phase emerges whereby the introduction of mandated budget cuts triggers shifts in the distribution of power, such that managers acquire power by securing the collaboration of clinicians – a phenomenon which has tangible benefits in terms of enabling budget compliance and increased service provision. Finally, the third phase may be conceptualized as a fiscal pressure regimen whereby, when budgetary pressures intensify further, management's newly gained ‘power of meaning’ is eroded because management are now seen to pursue unrealistic demands. Drawing on research insights gleaned during each phase, our analysis contributes to extant literature in at least three ways. First, we present novel findings regarding the impact of crises-related applications of accounting practices on intra-organisational power constellations. Second, our work highlights how accounting practices help shape the understanding of crisis, which, in turn, impacts the distribution of organizational power and influences intra-organizational patterns of collaboration. Third, we find that awareness of the meaning power of accounting practices can help shape strategic action in crisis situations.     

我国国债规模的现状评价分析

当前，我国国债规模急剧扩张，这已引起社会各界的广泛关注。文章就此通过分析我国国债规模的衡量指标以及现状，提出了控制国债规模应从构建与市场经济相适应的财政收支制度着手的新举措。     

关于“债转股”的几点法律思考

政策性债转股包括国有商业银行与金融资产管理公司之间的债权转让和金融资产管理公司与国有企业间以债权换股权这两个法律关系,现阶段实行债转股可对国有企业产生诸如促进企业产权制度改革,减轻企业财务负担,优化企业法人治理结构及促使资产变现等方面的积极影响.但在实践过程中也存在着很多障碍和问题,从而限制了债转股功能的发挥.尽管如此,只要政府能给予支持,立法上能提供有效保护,债转股必然可以给东北国有企业带来一片生机.     

Forecasting recovery rates on non-performing loans with machine learning

We compare the performance of a wide set of regression techniques and machine-learning algorithms for predicting recovery rates on non-performing loans, using a private database from a European debt collection agency. We find that rule-based algorithms such as Cubist, boosted trees, and random forests perform significantly better than other approaches. In addition to loan contract specificities, predictors that refer to the bank recovery process — prior to the portfolio’s sale to a debt collector — are also shown to enhance forecasting performance. These variables, derived from the time series of contacts to defaulted clients and client reimbursements to the bank, help all algorithms better identify debtors with different repayment ability and/or commitment, and in general those with different recovery potential.     

从京东方负债扩张看我国的杠杆收购

20上世纪80年代风靡美国的杠杆收购方式以其巨大的溢价空间和较高的财务、经营风险引起理论学者的研究和实践人士的青睐。我国现阶段,实行杠杆收购有着非常深远的影响和广阔的空间,但仍存在许多制约因素,如法律不完善、资本市场弱式化、投资银行不发达、管理人员素质不高等。     

中国上市公司负债比率偏低的影响因素分析

本文在国外资本结构理论的基础上，将西方公司与中国公司的资本结构特点进行比较，从内因和外因两个方面解释了中国上市公司负债比率偏低的现象。     

Endogenous structural change and crisis in a multiple time-scales growth model

The slow and endogenous twist of economic macro-structure makes up an important evolutionary feature of capitalist economies, and may be at the root of structural crisis. In this line, a Goodwinian growth model with increasing returns and profit-sharing that tries to picture a simple scenario of the seventies crisis is considered. It is shown that the exhaustion of the Kaldor-Verdoorn “productivity law” can entail, in a nonlinear framework, a “catastrophic” bifurcation from a “high” to a “low” growth path. Slow/fast dynamical systems then allow one to formalize a multiple time-scales dynamics where the growth path is shaped by the structural framework in which it takes place, but has also a long -un feedback. Structural change and crisis appear as long term and endogenous outcomes.     

公司债务期限结构影响因素的实证分析

本文以上市公司板面数据及横截面数据为基础,利用混合时间序列回归、横截面回归和固定效果回归等方法,对影响我国上市公司债务期限结构的因素进行了实证检验。结果发现,除契约成本假说中成长机会外,绝大部分因素的检验结果与预期一致,进而验证了其适用性;经验证据不支持信息不对称假说;对税负假说相关因素的检验结果表现出不确定性;期限匹配假说得到了支持。研究还证明,具有较少自由现金流量、杠杆水平较高、规模大、受到管制和资产期限长的公司具有更多的长期债务。     

How to reform China’s fiscal system?

ABSTRACT

As the population aging, China’s government expenditures, including general fiscal expenditure, healthcare and social security expenditure, will grow more rapidly than government revenues, tending to elevate government debt. Local governments undertake overwhelming 85% of total general fiscal revenue and are responsible for healthcare and social security, and their debt has been growing. Fiscal reforms are imperative, including tax reforms, the structure of government spending reforms, social security reforms, healthcare reforms, local public finance reforms, and central and local government’s fiscal relationship reforms. This paper will explore the fiscal challenges China faces and discuss how to reform the fiscal system to cope with these challenges.     

Financial crisis in Southeast Asia: dispelling illusion the Minskyan way

This paper extends Minsky's financial instability hypothesisto the case of the open, ‘liberalised’, economy,making it possible to put forward a specifically Minskyan accountof the road to the financial crisis in Southeast Asia (1997/1998).The analysis suggests that the threats to growth and employmentemanating from the financial sector which Minsky identifiedin the closed economy setting are much intensified in open,liberalised, developing economies. Financial liberalisationis an important key factor in this process. Rival explanationsof the crisis are examined and rejected in favour of the extendedMinskyan explanation. The policy implications are derived anddiscussed.