This work concentrates on exploring the influence of social networks to financial markets. We have introduced a novel approach to Twitter sentiment analysis, in which we collect continuous stream of data and analyze it. Our original data set contains over 200 million English written Tweets from the period between July 1, 2014 and October 9, 2014. Twitter sentiment is used as a good representative of investors' mood. On hourly data we investigate how investors are influenced by basic emotions, moods and sentiment in their decision making processes as well as the influence of keywords related to specific securities and FOREX symbols. Particularly, we examine the relationships between Twitter-based variables and returns as well as volatility of several financial instruments on a wide range of data including commodities, currencies and S&P 500 Cash Index. We show that Twitter sentiment influences volatility of securities' returns, tested and shown on both conditional and realized volatility models. We also describe the effect of Twitter sentiment on securities' returns. Moreover, we reveal the influence of basic emotions on investors' decision making processes. Our results suggest that investors are influenced by emotions and moods, especially at longer investment horizons. The impact of emotions at shorter...

The thesis deals with electoral and partisan cycles in stock returns of nine CEE countries and checks consistency of observed cycles with efficient market hypothesis. The evidence mostly supports possibility of political influence on stock markets, but the effects often have opposite sign than hypothesized. Electoral cycle has been found in Estonia and Hungary, while returns in four other countries are significantly lower before elections. Markets more often exhibit left-wing premium, it is significant in the Czech Republic, Lithuania and Romania. The results are similar between nominal and real returns. Both cycles are also considered significant for the panel of countries. Moreover, cycles are hardly explainable by macroeconomic conditions, which indicates market inefficiency. This is confirmed by analysis of volatility, which reveals that risk does not correspond to changes in returns induced by the cycles.

In this thesis, we analyze new possibilities in predicting daily ranges, i.e. the differences between daily high and low prices. The main focus of our work lies in investigating how models commonly used for daily ranges modeling can be enhanced to provide better forecasts. In this respect, we explore the added benefit of using more efficient volatility measures as predictors of daily ranges. Volatility measures considered in this work include realized measures of variance (realized range, realized variance) and range-based volatility measures (Parkinson, Garman & Klass, Rogers & Satchell, etc). As a subtask, we empirically assess efficiency gains in volatility estimation when using range-based estimators as opposed to simple daily ranges. As another venue of research in this work, we analyze the added benefit of slicing the trading day into different sessions based on trading activity (e.g. Asian, European and American session). In this setting we analyze whether whole-day volatility measures reliably aggregate information coming from all trading sessions. We are led by intuition that different sessions exhibit significantly different characteristics due to different order book thicknesses and trading activity in general. Thus these sessions are expected to provide valuable information concealed in...

This thesis deals with the behaviour of stock markets during the period of election process. We focus on the influence of elections to the German Bundestag on stock market performance of the countries allied in Visegrad Group during the reference period 1994-2013 covering six Bundestag elections. Germany is a major export partner for all members of Visegrad Group - the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia. We examine whether there are abnormal returns on stock markets in Visegrad Group countries around the date of German Bundestag elections. We thus examine if the fact that performance of German economy is important for performance of economies of countries allied in Visegrad Group means that Bundestag elections influences their stock markets. We also analyze the influence of elections to German Bundestag on domestic stock market during the reference period 1961-2013. To measure the effect of elections we employ event study methodology using the mean-adjusted return model to measure normal returns. Our event window consists of 65 trading days around the election day (-15,50). We use the estimation window of 100 days (-150,-51). We assess our main hypothesis for each country around every Bundestag elections in our reference period separately over three event windows and also over eight event...

This research consists of two essays. The first essay entitled” Stock Return Forecasting with Sum-of-the-Parts Methodology: Evidence from Around the World”, examines forecasting ability of stock returns by employing the sum-of-the-parts (SOP) modeling technique introduced by Ferreira and Santa-Clara (2011).This approach decomposes return into three components of growth in price-earnings ratio, earnings growth, and dividend-price ratio. Each component is forecasted separately and fitted values are used in forecast model to predict stock return. We conduct a series of one-step ahead recursive forecasts for a wide range of developed and emerging markets over the period February 1995 through November 2014. Decomposed return components are forecasted separately using a list of financial variables and the fitted values from the best estimators are used according to out-of-sample performance. Our findings show that the SOP method with financial variables outperforms the historical sample mean for the majority of countries. Second essay entitled,” Equity Premium Predictability under Regime Shifts: International Evidence”, utilizes the modified version of the dividend-price ratio that alleviates some econometric concerns in the literature regarding the non-stationary and persistent predictor when forecasting international equity premium across different regimes. We employ Markov switching technique to address the issue of non-linearity between the equity premium and the predictor. The results show different patterns of equity premium predictability over the regimes across countries by the modified ratio as predictor. In addition, transition probability analysis show the adverse effect of financial crisis on regime transition probabilities by increasing the probability of switching between regimes post-crisis 2007 implying higher risk perceived by investors as a result of uncertainty inherent in regime transitions.

O objetivo desta tese é questionar a interpretação da relação entre educação e renda do trabalho como sendo fundamentalmente aquela entre investimento e retorno. Argumenta-se que a renda pode ser enquadrada numa abordagem sociológica relacional e mostra-se de que modo as desigualdades de renda se configuram como um tipo específico e irredutível de desigualdade social. Restringindo o foco às desigualdades da renda auferida na esfera do trabalho, procura-se compreender como a educação veio a se tornar o principal componente explicativo em grande parte das perspectivas contemporâneas. A narrativa atualmente mais importante associa os seus efeitos a retornos de investimentos produtivos e lê o movimento dos indicadores empíricos como expressão de sua variação. Argumenta-se que essa leitura não é necessária, do ponto de vista lógico, nem tem consistência teórica ou empírica. Ainda assim, há grande insistência em compreender a educação como investimento será preciso compreender as bases desse fenômeno. Veremos que esse modo de associar educação e renda resolveria, do ponto de vista da teoria econômica, certos enigmas sobre o crescimento da produtividade agregada; além disso, configurou-se como importante explicação não apenas analítica, mas também moral sobre a origem da desigualdade entre indivíduos, descartando perspectivas inatistas e racistas. Argumenta-se que não é necessário compreender a educação como investimento que traz benefícios pessoais para se valer dos ganhos analíticos trazidos por essas soluções. Além disso, mostra-se que os métodos de cálculo dos retornos mantêm ligação frouxa com a perspectiva dos investimentos e poderiam facilmente ser compatíveis com quaisquer processos de vantagens cumulativas ao longo do tempo. Por fim, arriscam-se, por meio de um ensaio, os primeiros passos para uma compreensão sociológica e histórica da relação entre renda do trabalho e educação a partir da perspectiva dos fechamentos e das prerrogativas sociais exclusivas. / The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the interpretation of the relationship between education and labor income as that between investment and return. It is argued that income can be framed in a relational sociological approach and that it shows that income inequalities can be defined as a specific and irreducible type of social inequality. Focusing on income inequalities in the sphere of work, it is sought to understand how education has become the main explanatory component in most contemporary perspectives. Today\'s most important narrative associates the educational effects with \"returns\" of productive investments and reads the movement of empirical indicators as an expression of its variation. It is argued that this interpretation is not necessary, from the logical point of view, and that it lacks theoretical or empirical consistency. Nevertheless, since there is a great insistence on understanding education as an investment - it is necessary to understand the basis of this phenomenon. We will see that this way of associating education and income would solve, from the point of view of the economic theory, certain puzzles about aggregate productivity growth; Moreover, it was an important - not only analytical, but also moral[ - explanation of the origin of inequality between individuals, in opposition to inattentive and racist perspectives. It is argued that it is not necessary to understand education as an investment that brings personal benefits in order to profit from the analytical gains brought by these solutions. In addition, it is shown that the methods used for calculating the \"returns\" are loosely connected with the investment perspective and could easily be compatible with any processes of cumulative advantages over time. Finally, the first steps towards a sociological and historical understanding of the relationship between labor income and education from the perspective of closures and exclusive social prerogatives are put to the test.

E-handel är i nuläget ett etablerat fenomen som växer för varje år. I samband med att e-handen breder ut sig och försäljningen mellan olika länder ökar bidrar det även till en ökad returgrad. Returgraden inom e-handel är den högsta i jämförelse med övriga försäljningskanaler och är ett hot för många företags överlevnad. För att vända returen till någonting positivt kan returprocessen användas för att stärka kundlojalitet och kundvärde genom segmenterade lösningar.  Syftet med rapporten är att identifiera de steg en konsument går igenom i en returprocess och om dessa aktiviteter kan skapa lojalitet och kundtillfredsställelse som stärker relation mellan konsument och företag. För studien utformades det en enkätundersökning för konsumenter som returnerat en produkt på Etonshirts.com. Från enkätundersökningen framgick det att stor andel av respondenterna var mycket nöjda med företagets returprocess men även att det fanns områden som kan utvecklas. För att bekräfta vilka steg en konsument går igenom under en returprocess gjordes en flerfallstudie av fem svenska e-handelsföretag. Studien bekräftar vilka steg som finns och att de kan skilja sig mellan företag. En observationsstudie utfördes i syfte med att identifiera företagets steg i en returprocess, detta för att bekräfta vilka steg ett företag har och hur det i sin tur påverkar kundens process.  För att en återförsäljare ska kunna generera kundnöjdhet måste återförsäljaren förstå sina konsumenters beteende och en returprocess bör anpassas beroende på segment och marknad. Kundnöjdheten kan nås genom effektivitet, bekvämlighet och noggrannhet som bidrar till lojala kunder. Beroende på hur företaget presenterar information på webbplatsen, om köpet, retursedel och returpolicy bidrar det till hur kunden upplever returprocessen och i vilken utsträckning en konsument returnerar. Den totala upplevelsen av köp och retur är viktig för att stärka relation mellan kund och företag. / E-commerce is an established phenomenon that grows for each year. As the e-commerce expands and sales between different countries increase, it also contributes to an increased return rate. The return of e-commerce is the highest in comparison with other sales channels and is a threat to many online companies. In order to turn the return into something positive, the return process can be used to strengthen customer loyalty and customer value through segmented solutions. The purpose of this report is to chart the activities a consumer goes through in a return process and investigate if these activities can create loyalty and customer satisfaction that strengthen consumer / business relationship. For the study, a survey was conducted for consumers who returned a product on Etonshirts.com. From the survey, it was found that a large proportion of respondents were very pleased with the company's return process, but also that there were areas that could be developed. To confirm what activities a consumer is going through during a return process, a multivariate study was conducted at five Swedish ecommerce companies. The study confirms which steps exist and that they can differ between companies. An observation study was conducted to map the company's steps in a return process, to confirm what activities a company has and how it affects the customers return process. In order for a company to generate customer satisfaction, they must understand the behaviour of their consumers and a return process should be customized depending on segment and market. Customer satisfaction can be achieved through efficiency, convenience and accuracy that contribute to loyal customers. Depending on how the company presents information on the website, the purchase, return and return policy, it helps to understand how the customer experiences the return process and to which extent a consumer returns. The overall experience of purchase and returns is important in strengthening relationships between customers and companies.

[pt] A presente pesquisa se insere em um contexto caracterizado pela crescente discussão de geração de valor ao acionista intensificada pela crise econômica ocorrida entre os anos de 2008 e 2009, que fez crescer diversas dúvidas relacionadas à doutrina de maximização do valor para o acionista principalmente no que tange as estratégias para alcançar este objetivo. Neste contexto, a definição e a escolha da estratégia mais adequada se mostram como diferenciais para enfrentar os desafios impostos pelo cenário econômico no que tange a questão do desempenho da empresa e seu retorno para os acionistas. Desta forma, o objetivo central do estudo foi relacionar as estratégias de crescimento (fusões e aquisições ou crescimento orgânico) com o desempenho de empresas que passaram por um processo de fusões e aquisições no período de 2003 até 2013 baseado no indicador de desempenho definido como Q de Tobin. A pesquisa foi realizada por meio de testes estatísticos com dados empíricos das empresas de capital aberto, com ações negociadas na bolsa de valores de São Paulo e avaliou indicadores de retornos das ações das empresas que foram adquiridas e das firmas que as compraram, bem como características da transação tais como a forma de pagamento, a quantidade de compradores, o tamanho relativo entre as empresas e o desempenho destas empresas medido pelo índice Q de Tobin. Os resultados demonstraram que a base de dados disponível para o período analisado não é suficiente para chegarmos a uma conclusão definitiva sobre o impacto das variáveis citadas acima sobre o retorno das ações. / [en] This research is part of a context characterized by increasing use of discussion to generate shareholder value enhanced by the economic crisis that occurred in 2008 and 2009 that has increased several questions related to the doctrine of maximizing shareholder value, especially regarding the strategies to achieve this goal. In this context, the definition and selection of the most appropriate strategy is shown as differential to face the challenges posed by the economic scenario regarding the issue of the performance of the company and its shareholder return. Thus, the main objective of this research was to compare the growth strategies ( mergers and acquisitions or organic growth ) with the performance of companies that have gone through a process of mergers and acquisitions from 2003 to 2013 based on the performance indicator defined as Tobin s Q. The survey was conducted by means of statistical tests with empirical data of publicly traded companies with shares traded on the São Paulo Stock Exchange and assessed indicators of stock returns of companies that went through the acquisition event as well as features transaction such as payment method, the number of buyers, the relative size between firms and the performance of these companies measured by Tobin s Q. The results showed that the available database for the reporting period is not sufficient to come to a definite conclusion about the impact of the aforementioned variables on stock returns.

The listing of firms on stock exchanges does not only provide these firms with the opportunity to raise long-term equity capital, it also allows for investors to participate in the primary and secondary equity markets. Traditionally executed through Initial Public Offerings (IPOs), listings were previously reserved for large firms due to the requirements and costs involved. In response, the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) introduced the JSE Alternative Exchange (AltX) in 2003 as a parallel exchange market in order to also provide South African small and medium sized entities with an opportunity to access equity capital. This also allowed for investors to invest in small high-growth companies with the expectation of higher returns. The aim of this research was to analyse the IPO performances of JSE AltX listings in order to establish the returns achieved by the initial IPO and the subsequent aftermarket participants. This research analysed the initial IPO returns attributable to the initial investors and the 1, 2 and 3 year aftermarket returns attributable to the aftermarket participants. Although various studies have been concluded on the investor returns for IPOs listing on the JSE, this report focused specifically on the AltX which has not been as extensively studied. IPOs listing on the JSE AltX from April 2006 to December 2011 were analysed. It was found that during this period, the average initial market-adjusted return offered to the initial invertors was 21 per cent after the first day of trade. The average 1, 2 and 3 year aftermarket market-adjusted returns were -0.08, -0.33 and 3.36 per cent respectively. An analysis of the combined aftermarket market-adjusted returns for the same 1, 2 and 3 year post IPO periods yielded returns of 25.17, 20.03 and 25.67 per cent respectively. From the conducted study, the results indicate that there is existence of average positive abnormal initial returns on the JSE AtlX, and returns underperformance for the two years following that. The aftermarket returns are then positive 3 years post IPO date. Combined returns were found to be abnormal and positive throughout the 1,2 and 3 year periods post IPO.

Comparing the performance of a pure momentum strategy with a strategy based on intermediate past returns on OMXS 1999-2018, this study shows that a pure momentum strategy significantly outperforms a strategy based on intermediate past returns. The pure momentum strategy delivers significant returns, primarily for portfolios based on shorter formation and holding periods. Furthermore, this study show that these significant returns are not due to loading on common systematic risk factors. Moreover, this study shows that by implementing a scaling component to the pure momentum strategy, investors can mitigate the crash risk in momentum strategies to some extent.