四川古蔺河水质的生物毒性评价

随着工农业的快速发展和人类活动的日益增加,大量废水随之产生,这些经过或未经过处理的废水最终排入河流等水体中,对水体水质造成极大的负面影响.该实验应用玉米种子萌发毒性检测和蚕豆根尖微核实验,对四川省泸州市古蔺河8个采水点的水样进行了生物毒性测试.结果显示,沙坝等8个采样点的水样均会导致蚕豆产生一定程度的微核,显示出一定的遗传毒性效应,其中4个采样点的水质达到中污染的水平.玉米种子萌发毒性试验结果表明,永乐镇等5个采样点的水样对于玉米种子的发芽率和根生长有比较明显的抑制作用.这表明古蔺河下游水质受到污染,有潜在生物毒性.     

The effect of climate change on the fall foliage vacation in China

Fall foliage season has been a favorite time for sightseeing activity for centuries around the world. The dates of fall foliage coloration for Acer mono maxim at two stations (Beijing and Xi'an) with more than 30 years of records were collected. Time-series analysis showed a strong overall delay of the timing of the fall foliage vacation season. The trend for later fall foliage vacation season averaged 4–5 days/decade. Regression analysis revealed that the air temperature in September or October is decisive for the annual timing of the fall foliage vacation season. A warming of 1 °C led to a delayed beginning, best date and the end of fall foliage vacation of 5.3 days, 3.5 days and 3.7 days respectively. The beginning of fall foliage vacation season started to delay in the 1990s. Sudden delay in the best date of fall foliage vacation season of Beijing and Xi'an took place in the early 2000s and 1990s respectively. For the end of fall foliage vacation season, an abrupt delay occurred in the early 2000s. This has implications for tourists and the tourism industry with reference to the timing of trips and their promotion.     

Curriculum assessment through a capstone course: a case study in hospitality and tourism programs

The purpose of this study was to develop a systematic process that other educational institutions and programs could follow to establish a consistent and accurate evaluation method for a capstone course. Hospitality industry professionals and hospitality management faculty were interviewed through focus-group discussions, and a post-focus-group survey was conducted to determine a weighted percentage for each of the nine determined content domains. A test blueprint for a hospitality management capstone course was developed to measure programmatic student learning outcomes based on the weighted domains determined through this study. The results provide a usable instrument for hospitality and tourism management programs to enhance their current assessment methodology.     

Can tourism be a key sector in reducing income inequality? An empirical investigation for Turkey

The aim of the study is to investigate the nexus between tourism and income inequality by employing the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) test cover the period 1974–2015 in Turkey. Findings indicated that the variables are cointegrated and an increase in tourism has a positive effect on income inequality, while economic growth and trade openness have a negative effect both in the long-run and short-run. Results also denote that tourism will decrease income inequality with the expansion of tourism activities and the spread of tourism throughout society. In other words, the tourism-related Kuznets Curve hypothesis is valid for Turkey.     

Can Warren Buffett forecast equity market corrections?

Warren Buffett suggested that the ratio of the market value of all publicly traded stocks to the Gross National Product could identify potential overvaluations and undervaluations in the US equity market when this ratio deviates above 120% or below 80%. We investigate whether this ratio is a statistically significant predictor of equity market corrections and rallies. We find that Buffett's decision rule does not deliver satisfactory forecasts. However, when we adopt a time-varying decision rule, the ratio becomes a statistically significant predictor of equity market corrections. The two time-varying decision rules are: (i) predict an equity market correction when the ratio exceeds a 95% one-tail confidence interval based on a normal distribution, and (ii) predict an equity market correction when the ratio exceeds a threshold computed using Cantelli's inequality. These new decision rules are robust to changes in the two key parameters: the confidence level and the forecasting horizon. This paper also shows that the MV/GNP ratio performs relatively well against the four most popular equity market correction models, but the ratio is not a particularly useful predictor of equity market rallies.     

The Coordination Role of Stress Tests in Bank Risk‐Taking

We examine whether stress tests distort banks' risk‐taking decisions. We study a model in which a regulator may choose to rescue banks in the event of concurrent bank failures. Our analysis reveals a novel coordination role of stress tests. Disclosure of stress‐test results informs banks of the failure likelihood of other banks, which can reduce welfare by facilitating banks' coordination in risk‐taking. However, conducting stress tests also enables the regulator to more effectively intervene banks, coordinating them preemptively into taking lower risks. We find that, if the regulator has a strong incentive to bail out, stress tests improve welfare, whereas if the regulator's incentive to bail out is weak, stress tests impair welfare.     

The use of open source internet to analysis and predict stock market trading volume

The objective of this paper is to evaluate the impact of information demand and supply on stock market trading volume. Few studies have demonstrated the role of Google search data in analyzing trading volume activity. In this study, we employ a proxy for information demand which is derived from weekly internet search volume. The latest is from Google Trends database, for 25 of the largest stocks traded on CAC40 index, between April 2007 and March 2014. We use news headlines as a proxy for information supply. We use Garch model to analyze and predict trading volume.The empirical results present new evidences. First, information supply has an impact on trading volume but information demand's impact is much more important. Secondly, by applying MCA to results found, it could be concluded that the impact of public information on transaction volume is conditioned by two elements: the firm and market news disclosure and the second element relates to the characteristics of the market participants, more precisely their news interpretations and their risk aversion. Thirdly, we used Chow structural break test to verify the stability of our model. We found that for securities with structural changes, information demand is the responsible variable of the change in our model. Finally, we found that information variables have a predictive power on transaction volume.This paper contributes to existing literature by incorporating open source internet-based data into the analysis and prediction of transaction volume. Using internet information about the stock market, which has appeared recently as an interesting research for financial empiricists, computer scientists and practitioners, will have a very important utility because quantifying demand and supply of information becomes possible.     

CAPM对我国封闭式基金定价的实证检验

本文以上证封闭式基金为样本,选取2007年12至2010年11月的月度数据,采用单指数模型、BJS两步法和横截面检验实证分析了我国基金市场对CAPM的适用性。CAPM并不适用于我国基金市场,原因在于基金市场的不成熟以及投资主体投资理念的非理性。同时CAPM条件过于苛刻,在对资本市场进行检验时应谨慎对待。     

Does Medical Equipment Expansion Lead to More Diagnostic Services? Evidence from China’s Sichuan Province

A major goal of China’s healthcare reform is to control the increasing healthcare spending, much of which can be attributed to the overuse of diagnostic tests and has been relatively less studied in the literature. This article analyzes the correlation between medical equipment expansion and the increase in diagnostic test expenditure in China, using Sichuan Province as an example. County-level data aggregated from hospitals’ annual reports in Sichuan Province from 2008 to 2012 were used. The results show a positive correlation between the expansion of medical equipment and the increase in diagnostic test expenditure. Our study provides implications on reforming China’s healthcare delivery system and medical equipment regulation policies.