The elusive effect of bank size on profits

This study investigates the determinants of bank profit while paying particular attention to the influence of market share on profit, referred as the market share effect. The research seeks to answer the question whether the market share effect is conditional upon four country institutional factors including concentration ratio, bank regulations, the government's governance and country wealth, and is thus better in explaining the mixed results in the literature. This study employs comprehensive data of 44 countries from 1998 to 2004. The results show that market share positively influences profit when no country institutional factors are considered, but further strengthened in countries that are characterized by high concentration ratios, high restrictions on bank activities in insurance and real estate, good investor protection and a strong rule of law.     

Environmental regulation and profitability: An application to Swedish pulp and paper mills

In this paper we analyze the impact on firm profits of the environmental regulations in the Swedish pulp and paper industry. The approach taken is a non-parametric programming model of the technology. A feature of this industry is that environmental regulations are determined individually for each mill. A question, then, is if these individual regulations have a similar impact on firm profits. The approach in this paper allows us to calculate both the regulated and unregulated profits, which means that the severity of the regulations, in terms of foregone profits, can be calculated for each mill. The empirical result shows that the impact on the mills varies substantially, and that the burden from the regulations is less severe in 1990 than in 1989.     

中国会计标准与国际会计标准的差异研究

经过十多年的会计改革，中国会计国际化进程取得了令人瞩目的成绩，在重大问题上基本实现了与国际会计惯例的一致，但差距仍然存在。通过对比研究和实证分析可以发现，中国会计标准与国际会计标准还存在着系统的差异，差异对样本公司净利润和净资产等指标能够产生显著影响，其中对净利润的影响尤为明显。对样本公司影响较大的差异项目包括：资产摊销及减值、重估价及折旧、所得税、投资收益、企业合并及合并报表、长期股权投资和股利政策等。     

基于更新理论的产品保修策略模型

产品价格的确定不仅取决于生产成本 ,还应包涵服务成本。非价格竞争下 ,产品保修是售后服务的主要内容。本文运用更新报酬理论 ,建立了产品保修策略模型。模型表明 :在消费转型时代 ,只有引入产品的差异性、降低生产成本、提高产品质量、延长产品寿命、制订合适的保修策略 ,才能保障合理的厂商利润 ,有效刺激需求。     

我国粮食市场价格波动及应对措施——基于物流成本的视角

造成我国粮价波动的影响因素很多,包括国际粮食市场环境、国家粮食政策、国内粮食产量、粮食生产和流通成本等.在粮食行业中,物流成本的“效益背反”存在于企业物流活动的方方面面,如物流成本与服务水平“效益背反”、物流各功能之间(运输、储存、包装、装卸等)“效益背反”、全社会物流资源“效益背反”.针对目前我国粮食物流成本占粮食销售价格比重过大且一直居高不下的情况,必须制订科学合理的方案,对我国粮食仓储节点布局和粮食物流过程进行优化,通过信息共享平台削弱粮食供应链中的“牛鞭效应”,整合资源降低“效益背反”对粮食物流成本的负面影响,积极推广第三方粮食物流外包,完善基础性建设,以稳定粮食市场价格波动.     

Trading Behavior on Expiration Days and Quarter-End Days: The Effect of a New Closing Method

On July 1, 2002, the Taiwan Stock Exchange changed its closing price procedure to a five-minute call auction. This paper examines different types of trader behavior at the close before and after institution of the new mechanism. The results show that, since the new mechanism was introduced, individuals have shifted their trades away from the closing interval to the preclosing interval, which worsens market liquidity at the close. This paper also finds that institutional investors try to influence closing prices for window dressing at quarter ends, whereas foreign institutions attempt to influence closing prices on the expiration days of index futures. After the new mechanism's introduction, neither the expiration-day effect nor the quarter-end-day effect disappeared. Despite this finding, the new mechanism does make it more difficult and costly for traders to attempt to influence the stock price.     

Keeping Up with the Joneses: A Model and a Test of Collective Accounting Fraud

This paper explains the variations in incidence of accounting fraud across economic settings by putting the behaviour and motivation of managers under the microscope. To safeguard their reputation in the managerial labour market, managers of firms that perform poorly are prone to fraudulently inflate earnings if they expect the economy to be strong, since that raises the likelihood of peers reporting high performance. A realised level of economic activity, on the other hand, counteracts this tendency on the part of managers to overstate earnings, by reducing the number of firms that actually perform poorly. We term these two effects the incentive effect and the need effect, respectively. The two effects yield a distinctive relationship between the incidence of accounting fraud and macroeconomic conditions. Specifically, the fraction of firms fraudulently over-reporting earnings is positively related to expected economic performance and negatively related to realised economic performance.
The incentive and need effects on collective fraud are examined empirically by relating proxies of the aggregate incidence of accounting fraud to expected and realised GDP growth rates. The results unambiguously support the predicted influence of macroeconomic performance.     

企业不同控制权状态下监督成本研究

在不同的控制权状态下,监督者、被监督对象以及监督成本也会发生相应的变化。企业的利益相关者在实施监督行为时,应在付出的监督成本与可能引起的收益之间进行权衡。     

商业模式创新途径探讨

如今商业环境变化迅速,持续地获得利润已经成为企业关注的焦点,商业模式给企业提供了参考的思维方法与实践框架。商业模式的组成要素包括:为谁,做什么,如何做,如何盈利四部分。其创新的途径主要有重新定义顾客,提供特别的产品/服务,改变提供产品/服务的路径,改变收入模式,改变对顾客的支持体系和发展独特的价值网络。企业有必要适时创新自身的商业模式,保证持续地盈利,获得竞争优势。     

Expert systems and land development expertise

Summary

Expert systems are a product of the new technology. They provide the means for computerizing human expertise. This necessitates a more explicit understanding of the latter, provides an additional source of it and presents the possibility of enhancing the competence of that expertise. The paper argues that in the face of increased competition for investment funds the development industry needs to adopt a more sophisticated approach to project assessment. Two examples, with respect to planning law and retail investment appraisal, are developed to indicate the potential of the expert system approach. Ultimately expert systems challenge appeals to ‘feel’, ‘experience’ and judgement’ in human decision‐making; if successful, however, they promise improved profitability.