Firm responses to secondary stakeholder action

In this paper, we explore the conditions under which secondary stakeholder groups are likely to elicit positive firm responses. To this end, we build upon and advance Mitchell, Agle, and Wood's (1997) stakeholder saliency and identification framework by defining saliency in terms of actions, not perceptions, and by proposing that power, legitimacy, and urgency arise out of the nature of stakeholder–request–firm triplets. To test this framework, we build a unique dataset of over 600 secondary stakeholder actions within the United States, all concerning environmental issues over the period 1971–2003. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Signaling Power of Open Market Share Repurchases in Germany

This paper shows that abnormal stock price returns around the date of open market repurchase announcements are four times higher in Germany than in the USA (12 ver. 3%). We hypothesize that this observation can be explained by national differences in repurchase regulations. Our empirical evidence indicates that German managers primarily buy back shares to signal an undervaluation of their firm. We demonstrate that the stringent repurchase process prescribed by German law attributes a higher credibility to undervaluation signals than do the lax US regulations, and thereby corroborates our hypothesis.Financial support from the E-Finance Lab, Frankfurt am Main, and from Freitag & Co., Frankfurt am Main, is gratefully acknowledged. We would like to thank two anonymous referees for their helpful comments     

Short-sale constraints and informational efficiency to private information: A natural experiment

Exploiting a regulatory change in short-sale constraints (Regulation SHO) as a natural experiment, this paper examines the effect of short-sale constraints on informational efficiency of stock prices to private information. I find that short-sellers act as informed traders prior to forthcoming analyst news and trade on negative private information. When short-sale constraints are relaxed for pilot stocks (treatment group), both trading volume and stock price sensitivity increase prior to the analyst announcement for bad news but not for good news, relative to that of nonpilot stocks (control group). The findings are consistent with the Diamond and Verrecchia model that predicts that short-selling increases the speed of adjustment of stock prices to private negative information. In the cross-section, the effect of Reg SHO is stronger in stocks of firms with weak and uncertain information environments (i.e., small firms and firms with high analyst forecast dispersion).     

Optimal mixed taxation,credit constraints,and the timing of income tax reporting

We study optimal income and commodity tax policy with credit‐constrained low‐income households. Workers receive an even flow of income during the tax year, but report their incomes and make tax payments (receive transfers) at the end of the year. They spend their disposable income on multiple commodities over the year. We show that differentiated subsidies on commodities can be optimal even if the Atkinson–Stiglitz Theorem conditions apply. When the optimal policy leaves low‐income households with binding credit constraints, it may be optimal to subsidize differentially the good that they consume in higher proportion. Uniform subsidies would also relax the credit constraint, but would be more costly to the government since they would equally benefit unconstrained households. Numerical examples suggest that commodity tax differentiation increases with basic needs and with the interest rate at which government borrows.     

发达国家解决中小企业融资难题的主要模式及借鉴意义

解决中小企业融资难问题必须以政府为核心,在突破现有政策的基础上,通过制度创新重新制定整体方案.其核心内容包括:建立以中央政府为核心,各级政府和企业参与的多层次社会的中小企业信用担保体系;深化中小企业改革,建立和完善中小企业法人治理结构和信用体系;深化金融体制改革,在引进国内外战略投资者的同时,通过对现有城市商业银行的重组,设立以中小企业服务为核心的中小企业银行;加快资本市场的制度创新,推出创业板市场,在增加中小企业对风险投资吸引力的同时,使更多合格的中小企业进入资本市场,打通中小企业的直接融资渠道.     

农户贷款证券化：结构设计与信用增级

农户贷款证券化为农户贷款经营机构健康持续从事农户信贷提供了一种可行的资本补充与风险管理工具,从传统的资产证券化结构设计看,农户贷款特质决定了它基于不脱离发起人信用的参与式交易结构,并需要通过独立于贷款本身的增级方式——通常是多种方式的组合——来增强债券保障程度,其中,政府机构可以通过提供低成本外部增级扶持和改善发起人的农户贷款经营行为。     

中水源热泵地板供暖运行策略分析

为研究中水源热泵地板供暖系统的节能策略,以石家庄市某实际运行小区的中水源热泵地板辐射供暖系统为对象,引入室外综合温度的概念,综合考虑室外气温、太阳辐射热与风速等环境因子的影响,推导得出了地板辐射供暖系统质调节情况下,保证热用户舒适度的二次网供、回水温度调节公式。经实际运行测试,由该调节公式计算得出的二次网供、回水温度作为地板辐射供暖系统分时段质调节的依据,可以在满足热用户舒适度要求的情况下,取得良好的节能效果。中水源热泵系统与地板辐射供暖系统的结合及推广为城市集中供热提供了新思路。     

The Workout of Banking Crises: A Macroeconomic Perspective

This paper provides a macroeconomic perspective for governmentinterventions in banking crisis. Such crisis occur when a largenumber of banks fail to meet capital requirements or are insolvent.Using a macroeconomic model with financial intermediation, ouranalyis suggests that strict enforcement of capital-adequaterules suffices in prosperous periods. Capital requirements serveas an indicator for crises interventions in critical stateswhich may require interest rate intervention and restructuringof the banking industry. These policies can be reinforced byrandom bailouts and temporary financial relief, with a largepercentage of the costs being covered by current and futureowners of banks. (JEL D41, E4, G2)     

华尔街“欺诈门”事件对中国衍生品市场制度完善的意义

2010年4月6日,美国证券交易委员会以涉嫌欺诈投资者对高盛公司提起民事诉讼,4月29日,SEC将高盛案移交美国司法部提起刑事侦查。随后,SEC联手美国司法部对华尔街更多大投资银行和评级机构展开了更大范围的调查,华尔街因此陷入＂欺诈门＂事件,并经受着前所未有的信用危机。华尔街＂欺诈门＂事件对中国衍生品市场制度完善具有非常重要的启示和意义,包括衍生品市场金融监管与金融创新应该同步协调、完善信息披露制度、加强对经纪商的行为规范、加强衍生品市场参与企业的内控机制建设以及要建立多元化的违法违规行为处理机制。     

On the Persistence of Labour Market Insecurity and Slow Growth in the US: Reckoning with the Waltonist Growth Regime

In this article I systematically incorporate empirical work on rising income inequality and wage stagnation into a regulation theoretic framework for analysing macroeconomic growth. The rise of job polarisation and income inequality coincides with a long period of macroeconomic stagnation, both continuing through to the present (with the exception of a brief period of strong growth and declining inequality in the second half of the 1990s). The corporate scramble to restore profit rates after the crisis of Fordism has transformed the institutional configuration of the political economy. In particular, institutions supporting upward mobility and middle-class incomes in the economy have been eroded by the twin forces of internationalisation (leading to the re-emergence of wage-based competition) and employment externalisation (outsourcing, downsizing, antiunionism, etc). The current growth regime, which may be characterised as Waltonist, based on the Wal-Mart model of buyer-driven global supply chains focused on cutthroat wage-based competition and deunionisation, is not transitional but rather embedded in apparently long-term institutional settlements that amount to a dysfunctional regime.