This thesis considers China’s rural financial system and its impact on rural economy.  It explores three specific aspects, i.e. the relationship between agricultural growth and finance; agricultural banking efficiency and financial reforms; and the impact of lack of access to credit on production. The results of the general finance-growth relationship over 1992 to 2003 indicate no evidence of a positive relationship between state finance and agricultural or overall growth, although, perhaps as a result of the reforms, this negative impact seemed to disappear when the later sub-period was considered.  The results also suggest that the impact of the lagged state credit variable on growth is positive.  There is also weak evidence that agriculture growth was less negatively affected by state lending than in the economy overall.  There is also some indication that the changes which occurred after the 1993 financial reform were less in agriculture than for the wider economy. Examination on the performance of the Agricultural Bank of China (ABC) over the period 1979 to 1992 and 2002 to 2005 show that ABCs’ performance fluctuated over years.  However, the overall comparison between the beginning and end of the period indicates an improvement in banking performance in the long-term.

M.Com. (Economics) / The objective of this study, as stated in the hypothesis, was to study the role played by the South African long-term insurance industry in the market for loanable funds. The collectivization of personal savings by the long-term insurance industry and the growth of the industry since the Second World War are factors of great importance for economic growth in South Africa. The high priority given to employment, the specific characteristics of the country's natural resources, the infrastructural requirements and the socio-economic policy of the country make it essential to give every incentive to capital formation and to use such capital as may be available in the most economic manner ...

Does efficient internal investment generally translate into successful external investment activities? In this research we use the internal capital allocation efficiency as a proxy for the efficiency of internal investment, and study whether firms that are internally efficient also make efficient external investment decisions. Our sample consists of multi-segment acquirers that announce acquisitions between 1986 and 2003 (only completed deals are included). We estimate short-term and long-term abnormal performance, excess value and operating performance around mergers in order to measure the success of acquisitions (external investment decisions). Our results indicate that internal capital allocation efficiency is indeed a significant factor in the success of acquisition. Firms that are internally efficient also make efficient external investment decisions. Conversely, internally inefficient firms are also externally inefficient. Thus, our results indicate that internal efficiency can be used as a predictor of the success and efficiency of external investment decisions.

Thesis (J.S.D.)--Stanford University, 1997. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 101-105). Also available online.

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We consider two risk-averse financial agents who negotiate the price of an illiquid indivisible contingent claim in an incomplete semimartingale market environment. Under the assumption that the agents are exponential utility maximizers with non-traded random endowments, we provide necessary and sufficient conditions for the negotiation to be successful, i.e., for the trade to occur. We, also, study the asymptotic case where the size of the claim is small compared to the random endowments and give a full characterization in this case. We, then, study a partial-equilibrium problem for a bundle of divisible claims and establish its existence and uniqueness. A number of technical results on conditional indifference prices are provided. Finally, we generalize the notion of partial-equilibrium pricing in the case where the agents' risk preferences are modelled by convex capital requirements. / text

published_or_final_version / abstract / toc / Economics and Finance / Master / Master of Philosophy

No description available.

The current research was undertaken to assess if the prices in the South African capital market imply a risk free rate that is not equal to the theoretical risk free rate. The research was conducted by means of a literature review and desktop-research-based analysis of the market price based yield curve. The literature review was conducted to establish the importance of the risk free rate in the financial systems dynamics. The literature review highlighted that all the portfolio theories and performance-measure indicators have the risk free rate at the core of their methodology. This implies that the risk free rate is the most important concept that determines the market demand of different instruments. Next, a comparison has been drawn between the BESA published bond yield curve and a market-price-based yield curve developed by the researcher. The findings establish that the market price derived risk free rate is higher than the theoretical risk free rate. It was also found that the shape of the yield curve is different from the BESA projected yield curve, and that it is indicative of future problems in the South African capital market. The implications of investors‟ perceptions of the higher risk free rate are discussed and it is revealed that the foreign investors consider the country risk and the default risk associated with the South African government as higher than the BESA may perceive it to be. / Thesis (MCom (Risk Management))--North-West University, Vaal Triangle Campus, 2013

Recent research observed in a number of countries with developed capital markets, including the US and the UK, have produced inconclusive evidence on the presence of gains to acquiring company shareholders and indeed to the existing of net wealth gains. Thus, the current study aims to contribute to the debate on takeover activity by examining whether operational gains arise, using operating cash flow to measure operating performance of Malaysian companies involved in takeover activity between the period 1988-1992. Rather than investigating the distribution of shareholder wealth changes, however, the focus is whether takeover in Malaysia lead to an improvement in corporate performance. Consistent with the characteristics of private acquisitions in the sample of 97 quoted acquiring and 117 target companies (comprising of 113 private, 3 public listed and 1 non-public listed), acquisitions in Malaysia appear to be non-disciplinary. Despite the non-disciplinary motives, the overall results reported in the current study suggest that acquisitions in Malaysia during the period 1988-1992 lead to operating cash flow improvements in the long run. The improvement in performance results from both increases in return on sales (operating cash flow per dollar of sales) and in asset turnover (sales per dollar of assets). These improvements are not achieved at the expense of the long-term viability of the combined firms nor does it appear to be driven by cost-cutting strategies. In addition, empirical evidence in the thesis indicates that the major source of operating gains is the acquisition of companies with a high overlap of product market relatedness. In addition acquisitions that are financed by equity produce higher operating gains. Acquirers who make no immediate change to the management team of the target company following the acquisition also achieve a greater increase in post acquisition performance, reinforcing the likelihood that this sample does not consist of disciplinary acquisitions. Further, the significant positive correlation between the share price market revaluation of acquiring firms around the bid period, the change in post acquisition operating performance and the premium paid for the target indicate that managers who anticipate post acquisition operating cash flow improvements will pay a premium to acquire the targets. The findings can also be viewed as evidence that cash flow data and market value data can capture real economic phenomena which explain a substantial proportion of the market's reaction to takeovers around the announcement period. The results demonstrate that Malaysian acquisitions do lead to improvements in operating performance that provide potential for benefits to both the economy as a whole and bidding company shareholders. However, as the majority of target companies in the current study were previously privately owned businesses, researchers and policy makers should be wary before generalising from these results.