The sharing of the terrestrial TV frequency spectrum with Secondary Users (SUs) is presently the focus point of numerous research efforts worldwide. In many regulatory domains, contiguous blocks of VHF and UHF spectrum are available for exclusive use by the terrestrial TV broadcasting incumbents. However, this notion is currently challenged by the spectrum management paradigm of Dynamic Spectrum Access (DSA), advocating that this spectrum may be shared on a dynamic basis with SUs. The migration of analogue terrestrial TV to Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) has also catalysed the notion that the terrestrial TV frequency spectrum will no longer be exclusively used for terrestrial broadcasting. Some administrations have already embraced this technology, reforming spectrum policy to allow unlicensed secondary access to the Spectral Opportunities (SOs) present in the terrestrial TV frequency bands. The Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA) has expressed early interest in the possibilities of TV white space technology and its possible utility in exploiting the SOs that exist in the terrestrial TV frequency bands. Core to the issues mentioned above is the quantification of the Spectral Opportunity (SO) available. To this end, the work presented in this thesis gives a quantified estimate of the SO available in South Africa. This work is the first of its kind for the South African environment and uncovers new knowledge regarding SO in South Africa. SO is analysed and quantified on provincial and national level for three discrete points in time: before the start of dual-illumination, during dual illumination and after analogue switch-off. A system model that is able to produce the required geo-referenced field strength coverage and SO maps is conceptualised and implemented. A complete standards compliant model is implemented from scratch, verified and validated, with design decisions specific to the South African context. The analysis methodology is developed with rigour. The construction of the TV transmitter database, definition of incumbent protection criteria and development of the required analysis metrics to quantify SO are presented. SO in the VHF and UHF terrestrial TV frequency bands is quantified by expressing SO in terms of the number of available channels, weighted respectively by land area and population density. The analysis results indicate that significant SO is available for exploitation by TV white space devices in the terrestrial TV spectrum in South Africa. The effects of radio astronomy advantage areas on the SO available are also investigated. The probability of finding contiguous channels in the Very High Frequency (VHF) and Ultra High Frequency (UHF) bands is also quantified. A comparative study, comparing the SO for South Africa with related work in Europe and the United States of America (USA), is also performed. Finally, maps that visualise the SO available are constructed for the three discrete time periods evaluated. / Thesis (PhD (Computer Engineering))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013

The sharing of the terrestrial TV frequency spectrum with Secondary Users (SUs) is presently the focus point of numerous research efforts worldwide. In many regulatory domains, contiguous blocks of VHF and UHF spectrum are available for exclusive use by the terrestrial TV broadcasting incumbents. However, this notion is currently challenged by the spectrum management paradigm of Dynamic Spectrum Access (DSA), advocating that this spectrum may be shared on a dynamic basis with SUs. The migration of analogue terrestrial TV to Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) has also catalysed the notion that the terrestrial TV frequency spectrum will no longer be exclusively used for terrestrial broadcasting. Some administrations have already embraced this technology, reforming spectrum policy to allow unlicensed secondary access to the Spectral Opportunities (SOs) present in the terrestrial TV frequency bands. The Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA) has expressed early interest in the possibilities of TV white space technology and its possible utility in exploiting the SOs that exist in the terrestrial TV frequency bands. Core to the issues mentioned above is the quantification of the Spectral Opportunity (SO) available. To this end, the work presented in this thesis gives a quantified estimate of the SO available in South Africa. This work is the first of its kind for the South African environment and uncovers new knowledge regarding SO in South Africa. SO is analysed and quantified on provincial and national level for three discrete points in time: before the start of dual-illumination, during dual illumination and after analogue switch-off. A system model that is able to produce the required geo-referenced field strength coverage and SO maps is conceptualised and implemented. A complete standards compliant model is implemented from scratch, verified and validated, with design decisions specific to the South African context. The analysis methodology is developed with rigour. The construction of the TV transmitter database, definition of incumbent protection criteria and development of the required analysis metrics to quantify SO are presented. SO in the VHF and UHF terrestrial TV frequency bands is quantified by expressing SO in terms of the number of available channels, weighted respectively by land area and population density. The analysis results indicate that significant SO is available for exploitation by TV white space devices in the terrestrial TV spectrum in South Africa. The effects of radio astronomy advantage areas on the SO available are also investigated. The probability of finding contiguous channels in the Very High Frequency (VHF) and Ultra High Frequency (UHF) bands is also quantified. A comparative study, comparing the SO for South Africa with related work in Europe and the United States of America (USA), is also performed. Finally, maps that visualise the SO available are constructed for the three discrete time periods evaluated. / Thesis (PhD (Computer Engineering))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013

In this paper we will be studying and backtesting a particular investment strategy by buying and holding dividend stocks. We think dividend stock is an important type of investment to investors and portfolio managers because of its cash implications, especially in a high volatility equity market. Furthermore, we think that consistency in a company’s ability and willingness in distributing dividends to its shareholders is a strong indicator of its financial strength and operational success. How portfolio managers should pick the best performing dividend stocks would then become an important issue. In this paper, we will be testing the historical performance of a portfolio of dividend stocks that we construct and adjust based on a list of parameters associated with companies’ operational performance, cash position, and dividend yield. Hence, the main way we select stocks in the portfolio is based on fundamental analysis. Our research is conducted relying exclusively on the Wharton Research Data Services database (WRDS). In addition to evaluating the investment attractiveness of our portfolio, the strategy may also have implications regarding several other topics including the semi-strong form market efficiency and active portfolio management. Therefore, this paper covers also potential benefits to be gained from the strategy other than its investment payoff.

In insurance risk theory, the surplus of an insurance company is modelled to monitor and quantify its risks. With the outgo of claims and inflow of premiums, the insurer needs to determine what financial portfolio ensures the soundness of the company’s future while satisfying the shareholders’ interests. It is usually assumed that the net profit condition (i.e. the expectation of the process is positive) is satisfied, which then implies that this process would drift towards infinity. To correct this unrealistic behaviour, the surplus process was modified to include the payout of dividends until the time of ruin. Under this more realistic surplus process, a topic of growing interest is determining which dividend strategy is optimal, where optimality is in the sense of maximizing the expected present value of dividend payments. This problem dates back to the work of Bruno De Finetti (1957) where it was shown that if the surplus process is modelled as a random walk with ± 1 step sizes, the optimal dividend payment strategy is a barrier strategy. Such a strategy pays as dividends any excess of the surplus above some threshold. Since then, other examples where a barrier strategy is optimal include the Brownian motion model (Gerber and Shiu (2004)) and the compound Poisson process model with exponential claims (Gerber and Shiu (2006)). In this thesis, we focus on the optimality of a barrier strategy in the more general Lévy risk models. The risk process will be formulated as a spectrally negative Lévy process, a continuous-time stochastic process with stationary increments which provides an extension of the classical Cramér-Lundberg model. This includes the Brownian and the compound Poisson risk processes as special cases. In this setting, results are expressed in terms of “scale functions”, a family of functions known only through their Laplace transform. In Loeffen (2008), we can find a sufficient condition on the jump distribution of the process for a barrier strategy to be optimal. This condition was then improved upon by Loeffen and Renaud (2010) while considering a more general control problem. The first chapter provides a brief review of theory of spectrally negative Lévy processes and scale functions. In chapter 2, we define the optimal dividends problem and provide existing results in the literature. When the surplus process is given by the Cramér-Lundberg process with a Brownian motion component, we provide a sufficient condition on the parameters of this process for the optimality of a dividend barrier strategy. Chapter 3 focuses on the case when the claims distribution is given by a univariate mixture of Erlang distributions with a common scale parameter. Analytical results for the Value-at-Risk and Tail-Value-at-Risk, and the Euler risk contribution to the Conditional Tail Expectation are provided. Additionally, we give some results for the scale function and the optimal dividends problem. In the final chapter, we propose an expectation maximization (EM) algorithm similar to that in Lee and Lin (2009) for fitting the univariate distribution to data. This algorithm is implemented and numerical results on the goodness of fit to sample data and on the optimal dividends problem are presented.

By using five measures of corporate governance, this paper sheds light on the relationship between corporate governance, firm performance and firm valuation in a sample of large Swedish firms between 2013-2016. The study is conducted on the grounds of the Agency Theory as proposed by Jensen and Meckling (1976) and influenced by corporate governance research by Bhagat and Bolton (2008). Using Tobin’s Q and return on assets (ROA) as estimates of firm valuation and firm performance respectively, we find mixed results compared to prior research concerning the effects of good corporate governance. Our study shows that greater equity holdings of board members are significantly and positively impactful on Tobin’s Q as well as ROA. Furthermore, we find that a larger board size has a significant inverse relationship with both Tobin’s Q and ROA, which is consistent with prior research suggesting that smaller boards are more effective. Interestingly and partly inconclusive with prior research however, we find that greater equity holdings of the CEO is significantly and negatively impactful on Tobin’s Q as well as ROA. These results are robust for multiple controls and various models.

Made available in DSpace on 2010-04-20T20:15:17Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2002-08-19T00:00:00Z / Analisamos, empiricamente, o comportamento dos preços das ações após o anúncio do pagamento de dividendos. Nossa amostra foi constituída de 163 eventos, incluindo as ações mais negociadas na Bolsa de Valores de São Paulo, no período de 1998 a 2000. Encontramos uma relação direta entre o dividend yield e o retomo anormal acumulado destas ações no período pós-pagamento de dividendos, dividindo a amostra em três subamostras, em função do dividend yield. Obtivemos um retomo anormal acumulado, nos 90 dias após o evento, de 21,97% para as empresas que pagaram dividendos mais altos, 5,16% para as companhias que pagaram dividendos intermediários, e -15,50% para as empresas que pagaram dividendos mais baixos. Isto demonstra a persistência dos retornos anormais das ações no período pós-evento. Esta relação foi confirmada quando analisamos os eventos por tipo de controlador da empresa (fundos, estatais ou fanu1ias) e as companhias privatizadas, e quando pesquisamos o retomo acumulado das ações em função do percentual do lucro líquido distribuído sob a forma de dividendos.

The present study has the objective of identifying the influence of the following factors: corporate governance, liquidity and dividend policy in the difference of prices between preferential and ordinary stocks of the Brazilian companies negotiated at Bovespa. To evaluate the corelation among the independent variables of each factor the monthly corelation among them was calculated. It was observed that the variables volume ant title are highly corelated. In order to avoid the multicolinearity problem the decision was to estimate regression models separated. The variable volume is also highly corelated to the variable business, which led to the decision of evaluating a third model with the variable business. However, for all the models the variable spread was maintained, since this hasn t presented high corelation with the other variables. The size of the company was also tested to analyse if there is a corelation with the difference of prices.Even not having a corelation it was found to be prudent to insert this measure in the models to be estimated. The analyses method is a monthly linear multiple regression. After the estimation of the coefficient of the regressions analysed between 1995 and 2006, 144 estimates of each b coefficient were obtained. Following the procedure suggested by Fama and MacBeth(1973) the average of regression coefficient for each factor was calculated. The t estatistical test was used to select the variables which reached significance in the test. The results show that model 3 is responsible for the three factors together. The liquidity is not the explanatory factor in the difference of prices neither for model 1 nor for 2. That is, the variables spread and volume or spread and title together are not capable to explain the influence of the prices. Therefore, the model that showed a higher efficiency is model 3 / O presente estudo tem como objetivo identificar a influência dos fatores governança corporativa, liquidez e política de dividendos na diferença de preços entre as ações ordinárias e preferenciais das empresas brasileiras negociadas na Bovespa. Esta pesquisa justifica-se pelo fato de as ações ordinárias e preferenciais apresentarem política de distribuição de dividendos distinta, bem como liquidez diferenciada e necessitarem cumprir exigências segundo as boas práticas de governança corporativa. Para avaliar a correlação entre as variáveis independentes de cada fator, a correlação mensal foi testada. Observou-se que as variáveis volume e títulos são altamente correlacionadas. Para evitar o problema de multicolinearidade optouse por estimar modelos de regressões separadas. A variável volume também é altamente correlacionada com a variável negócios. Entretanto, para todos os modelos a variável spread foi mantida, pois essa não apresentou alta correlação com as outras variáveis. Foi testado também se o tamanho da empresa apresenta correlação com a diferença de preços. Mesmo não tendo apresentado correlação, julgou-se prudente inserir tal medida nos modelos a serem estimados. O método de análise são regressões lineares múltiplas mensais. Após a estimação dos coeficientes de regressão analisados entre 1995 e 2006, foram obtidas 144 estimativas para cada coeficiente b. Seguindo os procedimentos sugeridos por Fama e MacBeth (1973) foram calculadas as médias dos coeficientes mensais de cada fator. O teste estatístico t foi usado para selecionar as variáveis que apresentaram significância em cada fator. Os resultados mostram que apenas o modelo 3, que contempla como fator de liquidez as variáveis negócios e spread, é responsável pela explicação dos três fatores conjuntamente. A liquidez não é fator explicativo na diferença de preços nem para o modelo 1 ou 2, isto é, as variáveis spread e volume ou spread e títulos, juntas, não são capazes de explicar a influência da liquidez na diferença de preços. Com isso, o modelo que apresentou maior eficiência na nossa pesquisa é o modelo 3

Datum:                    2018-01-15 Nivå:                        Kandidatuppsats Företagsekonomi, 15 hp Akademi:                Akademin för Ekonomi, Samhälle och Teknik, Mälardalens Högskola Författare:              Rami Abbas             Simon Issa                          Kevin Landenberg              92/03/26                                 92/02/02                                       94/08/11        Titel:                        Utdelning i fåmansbolag Nyckelord:                         Utdelning, kvalificerade aktier, slopade förslaget 2017, skattebeteende Forskningsfrågor: Vilka eventuella förändringar i beteenden har det slopade förslaget             genererat vid beslutfattande hos fåmansbolag?  Vilken påverkan har skattereformer på skattebeteende? Syfte:                       Syftet med undersökningen är att skapa förståelse över om, hur och varför fåmansbolagen har agerat utefter det slopade förslaget för förändringen på 3:12- reglerna. Utöver detta är syftet också att skapa en förståelse för vilken påverkan skattereformer har på skattebeteende. Metod:                     Regleringar kring fåmansbolagsutdelningsmöjligheter har samlats in och analyserats. Teoretisk datainsamling om reformers påverkan på skattebeteende har insamlats. Utöver detta har det genomförts intervjuer med ägare för fåmansbolag samt auktoriserade revisorer. Slutsats:        Förslaget till förändringar som slopades sommaren 2017 hade ingen nämnvärd påverkan på majoriteten av delägarna i fåmansbolagen. Detta på grund av för komplicerade regleringar. I särskilda fall, när reformer är för komplicerade kräver det för berörda parter en inlärningstid för att ta in ny kunskap och därför inte har varken tid eller kunskap att agera efter reformens krav. / Date:                        2018-01-15 Level:                       Bachelor thesis in Business Administration, 15 cr Institution:                         School of Business, Society and Engineering, Mälardalen University Authors:                  Rami Abbas             Simon Issa                          Kevin Landenberg              92/03/26                                 92/02/02                                       94/08/11 Title:                        Dividend in close companies Keywords:              Dividend, qualified shares, the canceled proposition 2017, tax behavior Research Questions:               What possible changes in behavior has the cancelled proposition generated at decision making in close companies?                                  What impact do tax reforms have on tax behavior? Purpose:                  The purpose of the survey is to create an understanding about if and how close companies have acted towards the rejected proposition of change in the 3:12 rules. In addition to this, the purpose is also to create an understanding of what impact tax reforms have on tax behavior. Method:                   Regulations regarding dividend opportunities in close companies, have been collected and analyzed. Theoretical data collection on reformers' impact on tax behavior has been collected. In addition, interviews have been conducted with owners of close companies and authorized auditors. Conclusion:              The proposition of change that were rejected in the summer of 2017 had no significant impact on majority of the shareholders at close companies. This is due to complicated regulations. In specific cases, when reforms are too complicated, it requires the involved partners a learning time to acquire new knowledge and therefore do not have the time or knowledge to respond to the reform requirements.

Toujours citée parmi les instruments économiques et financiers au service de la protection de l'environnement, très étudiée - notamment par les économistes de l'environnement - la fiscalité environnementale intéresse relativement peu les juristes et représente, en pratique, une part très faible des recettes fiscales des États. Ce paradoxe apparent tient, en grande partie, à la définition retenue de la notion de fiscalité environnementale. Souvent limitée aux écotaxes, cette notion est abordée de manière analytique, sur la base de critères a priori. Non seulement une telle approche ne permet pas d'embrasser les instruments fiscaux employés dans leur diversité, mais elle ne favorise pas l'émergence d'un véritable concept de fiscalité environnementale. Ce concept, que cette thèse se propose de définir, oscillant entre impératifs fiscaux et objectifs environnementaux, présente de multiples dimensions tant fiscales qu'économiques, tant politiques qu'écologiques. Une interrogation sur la pertinence des fondements (principes pollueur-payeur, de prévention, de précaution...) et des critères généralement proposés par la doctrine va révéler la nécessité de changer de paradigme, afin de parvenir à appréhender ce concept de fiscalité environnementale. Caractérisée par son efficience environnementale, la fiscalité environnementale n'a, en réalité, ni le champ d'application, ni la portée que lui prête le discours politique / Always mentioned amongst market based-instruments for cost-effective environmental policy, studied by many economists, environmental taxation is ignored by legal opinion and represent only a small amount of tax revenue. This paradox can mostly be explained by the way environnemental taxation is defined.Most of the time seen as exo-taxes, environmental taxation is tackled analytically, through the criteria established prima facie. Using this way of reasoning is not only insufficient to show all the ways the environment can be protected with environmental taxation, but is also preventing the emergence of a real concept of environmental taxation. This concept, that we are trying to define, is multidimensional ; it can be seen from different angles : legal, economic, political and/or scientific.Questioning the foundations of environmental taxation (principles such as the polluter-pay principle, the prevention principle, the precautionary principle...) and the way professors of law define it, will show that a paradigm shift is needed, to bring a concept of environmental taxation into light. Marked by its environmental efficiency, environmental taxation does not actually include the issues, nor has the beneficial consequences that politicians may imagine

First part of this graduation theses "Fundamental and technical analysis of the Telefonica O2 Czech Republic, a.s. equity" concern more about the teoretical approach of the characteristics of the company Telefonica O2, his competitors on the country level as well as on the regional level. This description should prepare the reader to know better the telecomunication sector. The second part is a empirical study. Primarily from the fundamental approach and then from the technical one. These two parts concern about discovering the "buy" os "sell" recommendation for a real investor. Each of the methods are first described and then a brief comment of the results is made.