Examining the S&P 1500 stocks, the responses of the stocks to fiscal and monetary policy are found to differ due to E, S and G scores by the type of legislation. Non-Financial firms that manage environmental and governance risks better performed better over the pandemic. Part of this was due to their high environmental and governance scores allowing them to hedge the negative effects of the announcements of fiscal policies during the pandemic.

As global warming is becoming a bigger problem, sustainable investments and the issuance of green bonds have increased. In this article, we study the announcement returns of green bond issuers based on the environmental firm effort and the environmental appearance of the sector to see how the European market reacts to different types of issuers. By doing an event study based on both a one-factor analysis (CAPM) and a three-factor analysis (FF3) we show that investors are rewarding firms based on the sustainability of the issuer’s sector rather than the individual firm effort, with an average CAR from CAPM of 1,87% (p-value 0,06) for all issuers, and 2,91% (p-value 0,05) for issuers in green sectors, during the 21-day event window. The three-factor analysis shows an average CAR of 3,08% (p-value 0,02) for all issuers, 3,26% (p-value 0,03) for issuers in the green sector and 2,91% (p-value 0,04) for issuers in the brown sector, on the same 21-day event window. One possible explanation for the result is the fear of greenwashing, where firms in a brown sector should be more likely to greenwash. This implies that firms who are acting green in a brown sector are rewarded less, which could limit green investments in brown sectors.

Accessing and exploiting organizational resources plays an integral role in not only a firm’s propensity to achieve a competitive advantage, but also its mere survival in a competitive environment (Ulrich & Barney, 1984). One of the most common means of resource acquisition for both large administrative firms and smaller entrepreneurial enterprises is interorganizational alliances (Ireland, Hitt, & Vaidyanath, 2002). Utilizing the resource-based view of the firm within a strategic alliance framework, this dissertation examines a particular type of interorganizational exchange relationship permeating the marketing discipline. The promotional alliance is defined within this research as a strategic alliance based on resource exchange between a promoting enterprise and a firm seeking to fulfill promotion-based objectives through an ongoing collaboration with the enterprise. Each of the two sides of the promotional alliance relationship served as a focus for one of the two studies presented within this work. In the first study, a longitudinal survival model was employed to investigate the dependency of a promotional enterprise on external resource acquisition via alliances with promotion-seeking firms. Also at issue were the heterogeneity of resources accessed and the dynamics of the institutional forces regulating such alliances. Alliances with sponsoring firms offering financial and performance-based resources, as opposed to operational resources, were found to have a significant influence on the survival of sponsored enterprises. However, these dependencies were subject to changes in institutional support and the potential for diminishing returns. The second study approached promotional alliances from the perspective of the firms seeking promotion. Relying on the theory of efficient capital markets (Fama, 1970), an event study analysis was undertaken to determine the impact of internationally prominent promotional alliance announcements on the equity value of the sponsoring firms, which theoretically reflects investors’ expectations of future cash flows. Contrary to prior research, the initiation of these alliances demonstrated a negative impact on shareholder value. Several alliance, firm, and promoting partner characteristics were hypothesized to influence alliance outcomes to varying degrees within the cross-sectional sample of promotion-seeking firms. Surprisingly, only the magnitude of the sponsoring firm’s alliance investment and the nationality congruence within the alliance were influential in predicting investors’ reaction to such alliances. Each study was embedded within the institutional context of Formula One (F1) motor racing and focused on the promotional alliances involving corporate partners (sponsoring firms) and their affiliated racing teams. In this context, the racing teams acted as the promoting enterprises charged with providing the marketing platform to meet their sponsoring firms’ objectives. With annual races on four or more continents; a global television audience rivaled only by the Olympics’ opening ceremony, FIFA World Cup finals, and the NFL’s Super Bowl; direct competition between promoting teams; and sponsoring firms hailing from fifteen different nations and over twenty diverse industry sectors; F1 provided an ideal setting for the evaluation of interorganizational alliances’ impact on the survival of promoting enterprises and a promotion-seeking firm’s value implications. To compliment and strengthen the applied contribution of both studies, the analyzed results were subjected to a discussion with industry experts representing both sides of the promotional alliance relationship (Lane & Jacobson, 1995). Not only did this closing analysis reinforce the relevance of the research offered here, but it also presented a practitioner-focused examination of the industry challenges inherent in the theoretical tenets underlying such research.

There has been an increased attention to sustainability in the society which has affected bothconsumers’ and investors’ behaviour. Consequently, companies are pressured to include CSR intheir businesses. Further, the media is quick to report when companies are acting sociallyirresponsible. For this reason it is of interest to investigate whether these news reports affectinvestors. One way to examine this is to study the stock price during such events. In addition, ithas been shown that women tend to value sustainability higher than men when consuming goodsand services. Hence, it is relevant to study if this trend is shown in their investment attitudes aswell. The method in this study consists of an event study which has been used to investigate theimpact of CSR events on stock prices of Swedish listed companies. In addition, a survey wasconducted to examine the attitudes towards CSR among Swedish private investors.The average two-day CAR for negative events was -0.18 percent, which suggests an existingeffect of negative CSR events on stock prices of listed Swedish companies belonging to OMX30.The findings in the survey showed that there is a great interest in CSR among Swedish investors.Further, a larger proportion include CSR in their investment decision compared to those who donot. Our findings showed that there exist differences in attitudes towards CSR within differentcategories of investors such as gender, age and trading habits. A larger proportion of femalerespondents have a greater interest in CSR and include CSR aspects in their investmentdecisions compared to males. A greater amount of female participants believe that a company'sCSR performance is at least as important as its financial one compared to males. Further, asignificant smaller proportion of investors between 18-24 years include CSR aspects when theymake investment decisions compared to those between 55-64 years. Our results suggest that themain underlying reason for respondents to include CSR was risk mitigation for the ones who trademore often and moral concerns for those who trade less often. Lastly, a larger proportion of thosewho trade less frequently believe that a company's CSR performance is at least as important asits financial one, compared to those who trade more frequently.

The U.S. forest products industry has witnessed an unprecedented period of mergers and acquisitions in the last decades. The overall goal of this thesis is to examine the impact of these activities on the financial performance and market power of the U.S. forest products industry in the last several decades. The first part of this thesis evaluated the mergers by event study. The results revealed that the equity market reacted positively to these mergers; the position of a firm and the relative transaction size explained most of the variations of the cumulative abnormal returns; and the risk for most of the selected 14 acquiring firms had changed after the mergers. The second part examined the market power of the U.S. paper industry by the new empirical industrial organization approach. The results indicated that the oligopoly power remained significant at the 1% level over the whole sample period; whereas the oligopsony power had dropped dramatically and become insignificant at the 5% level in recent 30 years.

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The hospitality industry is characterized by a close interdependence between retailers and suppliers. Retailers depend on suppliers to provide the necessary goods and services to operate effectively, while suppliers rely on retailers to buy and market their products. With intense competition in the industry, effective supplier selection has become a critical asset for companies. Traditional supply chain management approaches that focus solely on increasing economic value are insufficient in the face of growing pressure for socially and environmentally responsible business practices. As a result, new criteria, including environmental, social, political, and customer satisfaction considerations, have been added to the pre-existing factors in supplier selection. While restaurants strive to select suppliers who meet their quality, social, and environmental standards, these suppliers may still face internal issues such as food safety, ethical malpractice, environmental concerns, and human rights issues. When such issues arise, it is unclear whether customers hold restaurants accountable for the mistakes of their suppliers, even when the restaurant has not been directly involved in these issues. The first part of this dissertation aims to explore how consumers associate negative news about supplier food quality and practices with the restaurants they patronize. By doing so, this study contributes to a better understanding of the indirect link between supplier issues and restaurant market value. On another note, Online Travel Agents (OTAs) play an important intermediary role in the two-sided travel distribution market. A critical factor that enhances a firm's competitive advantage is innovation. Yet, the analysis of innovation in the OTA context is scarce. The main objective of the second part of this dissertation is to fill this gap and examine the effect of OTA innovations on firm performance. We analyze the effect of two-sided market specific innovations (same-side and cross-side) on performance and contribute to the literature by expanding the theoretical understanding of innovations. We find that producer-to-consumer innovations have a greater effect on OTA performance than producer-to-producer and consumer-to-consumer innovations. A fundamental managerial implication is that exchange management is an area to be enhanced when innovating in travel market distribution. Lastly, with the unprecedented increase in food delivery demand due to the new consumption habits of individuals, delivery pricing is an issue to consider keeping consumers happy and continuously demanding this service. Research in economics and in service marketing have described how consumers do recognize the "free" under a product's price differently. This pricing approach is based upon that widespread notion that providing free goods or services to customers adds value to them and so increases their desire to buy. In the last part of the dissertation, we study the Zero price model on a multicomponent product with Food being the first component (where its price is always positive) and the delivery service as the second (where its price will eventually hit the zero-price tag). Elaborating more on previous studies and filling their gaps, we will be dividing the zero-price model into three scenarios: The true free scenario, the true free scenario with different discounts, and the fake-free scenario as each one is expected to yield different consumer behaviors in the process, but all should act similarly when the price hits the "free" tag. / Doctor of Philosophy / The hospitality industry is deeply intertwined, as retailers and suppliers rely on one another for success. Retailers depend on suppliers for essential goods and services, while suppliers count on retailers for purchasing and promoting their products. With increasing competition, it is vital for companies to select the right suppliers. Merely focusing on profit maximization is no longer sufficient, as there is growing pressure to adopt socially and environmentally responsible practices. Factors such as environmental, social, political aspects, and customer satisfaction now play a role in supplier selection. Restaurants strive to collaborate with suppliers that meet their criteria, but these suppliers may still encounter issues like food safety, ethical dilemmas, environmental issues, and human rights problems. The question remains whether customers hold restaurants accountable for their suppliers' mistakes. The first part of this dissertation investigates consumer responses to negative supplier news and its impact on their choice of restaurants. In another aspect, Online Travel Agents (OTAs) significantly influence the travel market. Innovation is a critical factor in achieving success, yet there has been limited research on innovation within the OTA context. The second part of this dissertation seeks to bridge this gap by examining how OTA innovations affect their performance. The study reveals that certain innovations have a more significant impact on OTA performance than others, indicating that enhancing exchange management is essential for innovation within the travel market. Lastly, the surge in food delivery demand has made delivery pricing a crucial aspect in maintaining customer satisfaction and promoting continued use of the service. Research indicates that consumers perceive "free" items or services distinctively, with "free" offers increasing their inclination to purchase. The last part of this dissertation explores the Zero price model for food delivery, wherein the food is the first component with a positive price, and the delivery service is the second component with a potentially free price. We categorize the zero-price model into three scenarios: true free, true free with different discounts, and fake-free, anticipating that they will result in different consumer behaviors, but all should exhibit similar effects when the price is "free."