<p dir="ltr">In the first chapter, I explore the impact of social connections on corporate attention to climate change exposure, focusing on how these connections influence discussions during earnings calls. Using social connection data to capture the transmission of distant shocks, I find that firms in counties more socially connected to disaster areas increase their focus on climate issues compared to less connected counterparts. This heightened attention is associated with real effect, as firms with greater social ties to affected areas significantly reduce their emissions, especially indirect emissions. The findings suggest that social connections play an important role in shaping corporate attitudes towards sustainability and can drive meaningful climate actions.</p><p dir="ltr">In the second chapter, I examine how social networks influence fund managers' evaluation of the climate risks of firms. I show that fund managers tend to decrease the portfolio weights of firms that are located in disaster-affected areas to a greater degree when they have stronger social connections to those regions. This difference remains robust even when controlling for the physical distance between a fund and the disaster area. I show that such a portfolio response is primarily driven by the salience bias channel, which diminishes over time, rather than informational advantage. I do not find any similar change in the portfolio weights of firms located in the neighboring area of the disaster. Moreover, I find no significant performance difference between firms in the disaster area and those in the neighboring area in the post-disaster period.</p><p dir="ltr">In the third chapter, co-authored with M. Deniz Yavuz and Adam Reed, we report evidence that the demand for high short interest stocks by short sellers declined after the meme stock event in January 2021 due to an increased risk of short squeeze induced by the meme stock rally. We show that the positive association between high short interest and next-day borrowing cost decreased after the meme stock event. As the decline in short-selling demand varied across short interests of stocks, the demand curve in the equity lending market became steeper and inelastic after the event. Moreover, we show that this change in short-selling demand leads to higher post-event return predictability of short interest.</p>

Local Government in South Africa has undergone much transformation since the year 2000. Although much of the change has been to correct imbalances, inequities and disparities within our local communities as a result of apartheid, change has also been motivated by the National Government's realisation that, as with governments throughout the world, there is a need to modernise all spheres of Government. Part of this transformation process at the local government level in South Africa has been to ensure that municipalities become more responsive to the communities' needs. The guiding principles for this transformation are contained in the White Paper on the Transformation of the Public Service (1995) and the Batho Pele White Paper (1997). This has informed the Municipal Systems Act: Act 32 of 2000 of which Chapter 6 determines that municipalities will have a Performance Management System to promote a culture of Performance Management amongst the political structures, political office bearers, councillors and administration. The Performance Management System must ensure that the municipality administers its affairs in an economical, effective, efficient and accountable manner. A literature review contained in this research, indicates that nationally, ensuring effective and efficient Financial Management Systems at the local government level is impacted upon by a number of factors such as the organizational culture of an institution and its revenue base. This research ends with recommendations for further research and it is argued that each organization has its own unique organizational problems impacting on its financial status. The conclusion is that no single typology, as contained in the literature, can account for the specific impact financial viability has on service delivery and organizational existence at the local government level in South Africa. Consequently, implementers of the financial strategy and other financial management policies must assess the unique characteristics of each organization prior to implementation thereof, in order to evaluate its impact on the organizational culture and other variables. / Thesis (MBA) North-West University, Mafikeng Campus, 2010

Thesis advisor: Philip Strahan / In the first two essays of this dissertation, I examine the role of third-party debt collectors in consumer credit markets. First, using law enforcement as an instrument, I find that higher density of debt collectors increases the supply of unsecured credit. The estimated elasticity of the average credit card balance with respect to the number of debt collectors per capita is 0.49, the elasticity of the average balance on non-credit card unsecured loans with respect to the number of debt collectors per capita is 1.32. There is also some evidence that creditors substitute unsecured credit for secured credit when the number of debt collectors increases. Higher density of debt collectors improves recoveries, which enables lenders to extend more credit. Finally, creditors charge higher interest rates and lend to a larger pool of borrowers when the density of debt collectors increases, presumably because better collections enable them to extend credit to riskier applicants. In the second essay I investigate the economics of the debt collection industry. The existence of third-party debt collection agencies cannot be explained by the benefits of specialization and economies of scale alone. Rather, the debt collection industry can serve as a coordination mechanism between creditors. If a debt collection agency collects on behalf of several creditors, the practices it uses will be associated will all creditors that hired it. Hence, consumers will be unable to punish individual creditors for using harsh practices. As a result, the third-party agency may use harsher debt collection practices than individual creditors collecting on their own. As long as the costs of hiring third-party debt collectors are below the benefits from using harsh debt collection practices, the debt collection industry will create economic value for creditors. The last essay, written jointly with Thomas Chemmanur, develops a theory of corporate boards and their role in forcing CEO turnover. We show that in general the board faces a coordination problem, leading it to retain an incompetent CEO even when a majority of board members receive private signals indicating that she is of poor quality. We solve for the optimal board size, and show that it depends on various board and firm characteristics: one size does not fit all firms. We develop extensions to our basic model to analyze the optimal composition of the board between firm insiders and outsiders and the effect of board members observing imprecise public signals in addition to their private signals on board decision-making. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2011. / Submitted to: Boston College. Carroll School of Management. / Discipline: Finance.

This thesis models rational criminals and regulators with flawed incentives. In it we develop a rational model of crime and regulation that we use to show the SEC's current incentive structure is ineffective at preventing fraud. Under our model, criminals balance the monetary rewards of larger frauds against an increased chance of being apprehended; and regulators design regulations to minimize either the damage caused by fraud or some other metric. We show that under this model, the SEC's focus on 'stats' and 'quick hits' leads to large frauds and a large social loss. We argue that regulators need to focus not just on successful prosecutions, but also on harm reduction and deterrence.

Not available / text

published_or_final_version / Economics / Master / Master of Social Sciences

This thesis models rational criminals and regulators with flawed incentives. In it we develop a rational model of crime and regulation that we use to show the SEC's current incentive structure is ineffective at preventing fraud. Under our model, criminals balance the monetary rewards of larger frauds against an increased chance of being apprehended; and regulators design regulations to minimize either the damage caused by fraud or some other metric. We show that under this model, the SEC's focus on 'stats' and 'quick hits' leads to large frauds and a large social loss. We argue that regulators need to focus not just on successful prosecutions, but also on harm reduction and deterrence.

No description available.

Inaug.-diss. - Leipzig. / Lebenslauf. "Literaturverzeichnis": p. 5-6.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Open University. BLDSC no. DX235604.