For the last two to three decades there has been an on-going legitimacy debate surrounding Investment Treaty Arbitration. States, scholars and public opinion argue that reform is needed. The European Union proposes the reform of Investor-State Arbitration through the creation of an Investment Court System. This is exemplified by recent European Union negotiated trade agreements such as the EU-Canada Comprehensive Economic Trade Agreement and the EU-Vietnam Investment Protection Agreement. This thesis discusses whether an Investment Court System is a step towards solving the legitimacy concerns or whether an Investment Court System will thrust Investor-State Arbitration into the relative unknown, exacerbating the validity questions enveloping Investor-State Arbitration. The thesis observes the criticisms raised by eminent scholars, States and campaigners against Investor-State Arbitration and the reforms proposed by the European Union Commission and European Union Parliament, in the form of an Investment Court System. Finally, the study looks briefly at how certain countries who have become disenfranchised with Investor-State Arbitration are approaching reform internationally, and comparatively discusses whether these options would be more beneficial to the Investor-State Arbitration community, rather than the European Union proposed Investment Court System.

Debt holding by managers, i.e., inside debt, aligns the incentives of managers more closely with those of debtholders, reducing agency costs of debt (Jensen and Meckling (1976) and Edmans and Liu (2011)). My thesis investigates the effect of managerial ownership of debt on corporate risk-taking, bank loan contracting, and accounting conservatism. / In the first chapter I examine the effect of managerial ownership of debt on agency costs of debt problems related to risk-taking. I find that higher managerial ownership of debt implements lower corporate risk-taking, in terms of less investment in R&D, more investment in capital expenditures, and more corporate diversification. The role of inside debt in moderating risk-taking is more pronounced in firms with high level of default risk. These findings suggest that managers with large inside debt holdings are less likely to pursue risky projects that potentially transfer wealth from debtholders to shareholders. / In the second chapter I examine how terms of bank loans are related to managerial ownership of debt. Specifically, the analysis uncovers significant evidence of lower loan spreads for firms with larger debt ownership by CEOs. The negative relation is more pronounced when creditors face higher expropriation risk and when the CEO's expected retirement horizon is beyond loan maturity. I also find that loans to firms with larger managerial debt holdings are associated with smaller lending syndicates, fewer covenant restrictions, and less collateral requirement, consistent with lenders anticipating lower expropriation risk at these firms. / In the third chapter I examine the relation between accounting conservatism and managerial ownership of debt. Consistent with debt holdings by managers mitigating the debtholder-shareholder conflicts and reducing debtholders' demand for accounting conservatism, I find significant evidence of less conservative financial reporting at firms whose CEOs have accumulated more deferred compensation and pension benefits. This negative relation is more pronounced in firms with higher expected agency costs of debt and in firms that can credibly commit to a higher level of conservatism if required by debtholders. These findings are robust to using a number of alternative accounting conservatism measures and to correcting for potential endogeneity of managerial ownership of debt. / Xin, Xiangang. / Advisers: Danqing Young; Oliver M. Rui; Cong Wang. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 73-07(E), Section: A. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2011. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 134-140). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI : ProQuest Information and Learning Company, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstract also in Chinese.

<div>Social capital through connections in networks has been argued to be important for startup enterprises. Founder human capital qualities like education, experience, skills have also been shown to be important predictors of startup success. However, does founder social capital matter for startup success beyond founder human capital? To answer this question, this project draws from the decision-making literature and uses five decision strategies to explore how founder human capital and social capital are associated with investment funds raised by startup companies. </div><div><br></div><div>Two studies were conducted. The first study investigated if a decision strategy that looks at founder social capital better predicts which company raises more investment funds than a decision strategy that only uses founder human capital. The second study investigated if actual investors and entrepreneurs, of varying expertise levels, integrate founder social capital variables while making investment decisions. </div><div><br></div><div>Both studies found that number of LinkedIn connections of founders of a company was the best predictor of investment funds raised by the company. The first study showed that decision strategies that use social capital cues are similar in predicting successful companies compared to strategies that use human capital cues. The next study showed that, contrary to our expectations, decision strategies that use social capital cues better predict investor choices than strategies that use only human capital cues. It was expected that models that used human capital cues would be better predictors of investor choice behavior than social capital cues. Therefore, the two studies show that founder social capital is associated with investment funds raised by a startup company and investors do take founder social capital into consideration while deciding which startup company to invest in. In doing so, the studies establish the importance of founder social capital in the entrepreneurial context. </div><div><br></div>

This study critically examines rulings of Investor State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) tribunals. Under the North American Free Trade Agreement’s (NAFTA) Chapter 11, ISDS provides foreign investors with the tools to launch a claim against signatory countries should they feel their investment was inhibited by local regulations. Empirically this study draws upon Windstream Energy LLC. v. the Government of Canada as a case study to analyze the competing responses exchanged during the tribunal’s hearings. The claim by Windstream Energy LLC against the Government of Ontario (GoO) serves as both a central and relevant example for examining the ramifications of ISDS, as it is one of Canada’s most recent defeats featuring the largest award outside a pre-tribunal ISDS settlement. Information was drawn from tribunal documents, referred to as a Memorial and Counter Memorial, which outline each party’s argument and supporting claims. Additionally, the tribunal publishes their final decision and justifications. A critical discourse analysis method, theoretically informed by the corporate crime literature and Gramsci’s theory of hegemony, helps in critically examining the economic, political, and cultural assumptions that influenced the tribunal’s decision and the state’s approach to foreign investment. Overall, dominant voices reinforced neoliberal beliefs about transnational market expectations and the role of the state under a globalized capitalist system. Justifications rooted in market logics prioritized the accumulation of foreign capital over the potential dangers of Windstream’s project. Ultimately, it is the inclusion of corporate safeguards, like ISDS, in free trade pacts that help to (re)produce neoliberal capitalist ideals and further reinforce status-quo economic relations.

In this thesis, we study if credit rating agencies (CRAs) are capable, through their rating process, of discover information that it is valued by the market. Additionally, we investigate if CRAs are able to propagate their findings to the market. if Specifically, we study the differences between issuer-paid and investor-paid credit rating agencies, and how those differences shape the characteristics of their credit ratings and ultimately, if investors can profit from credit rating announcements. For our research we use a large dataset of rating announcements from 1997 to 2012, which includes information of four credit rating agencies (CRAs), Egan-Jones Ratings Company (EJR), Fitch, Moody's and Standard and Poor's, which representing investor-paid and issuer-paid CRAs. This allows us to compare these two kind of agencies and its ratings. In the first essay we study what variables explain the rating coverage of an investor-paid credit rating agency. We show that probability of being covered by EJR is positively related with the size of the firm, the level of institutional ownership of the firm, stock analysts and issuer-paid CRAs level of coverage, while it is negatively related to the firm's corporate governance. We found that the likelihood of being covered by EJR augments after regulatory changes and most interestingly, since EJR received the NRSRO certification. In the second essay we compare the timeliness of rating changes produced by EJR and the issuer-paid CRAs representatives. We found that the lead effect of investor-paid over issuer-paid CRAs has weakened in recent years, while Granger causality is bidirectional and therefore a lead-lag relationship cannot be established. Finally, stock prices manifest statistically significant abnormal reactions to downgrades of all agencies; however, abnormal negative returns are significantly higher for EJR. Our results support the hypothesis that issuer-paid agencies improve the quality and timeliness of their ratings when they see their market power threatened by tighter regulations. Nevertheless, event studies illustrate that markets still price stocks under the assumption that investor-paid rating actions carry superior information. Finally, our third essay found that purchasing (selling short) stocks with positive (negative) rating announcements generates portfolios with positive annual abnormal returns when investors react immediately to rating announcements. Returns are higher for stronger announcements (i.e. rating changes over rating outlooks) and for an investor-paid agency rather than an issuer-paid agency. When we introduced transaction costs, only the investor-paid agencies' announcements lead to positive abnormal returns. Additionally, when we included a delay in the reaction of investors to rating announcements, all positive abnormal returns net of transaction costs disappeared. Finally, our results suggests that the differences between investor-paid and issuer-paid agencies are based on their dissimilar business models rather than their regulatory status.

Tidal current and wave power, as emerging forms of renewable generation, represent innovations that are confronted by significant technological and financial challenges. Currently, the marine energy sector finds itself in a decisive transition phase having developed full-scale technology demonstrators but still lacking proof of the concept in a commercial project environment. After the decades-long development process with larger than expected setbacks and delays, investors are discouraged because of high capital requirements and the uncertainty of future revenues. Although ideas for improving the investment climate can be found, there is a lack of well-founded arguments and coordinated strategies to work towards a breakthrough in the marine energy market. The objective of this research is to provide stakeholder-specific prioritised strategy options for de-risking the commercialisation of tidal current and wave power technologies. A key principle applied is to integrate a wide knowledge spectrum comprising the technology, policy and financing sectors and to compile the information in a holistic and transparent manner. To gain a broad understanding of the characteristics of presently ongoing marine energy activities and the correlated strategic planning, a comprehensive survey was conducted. Based on this multidisciplinary attempt, an all-encompassing appraisal was possible by avoiding over-concentration on stakeholder-specific views or interests. System dynamics modelling was employed to develop a series of cause-effect relationship diagrams of the key interactions and correlations in the field. It was revealed that the circular relationship between two major risks for array-scale projects - reliability and funding - requires coordinated action to overcome. As funding is necessary for improving system reliability (and vice-versa), showcasing 'array-scale success' was identified as the game-changing milestone towards commercial generation. Furthermore, it was found that a number of comparably competent manufacturing firms is required to implement major marine energy projects. This would result from fostering a multi-company market breakthrough concept, based on intensified knowledge sharing and trustful collaborative interaction between competitors. Additionally, effective separation of complexity into 'detail' and 'dynamically complex' constituents was found to be fundamental for identifying long-term, effective solutions. It is decisive to accept this primary classification, as measures appropriately applied on one type of complexity can be counterproductive if applied on the other. Most of the available planning tools and analytical methods do not address the management of dynamic complexity, necessary in innovative environments where flexibility and tolerance of vagueness are indispensable. Successful application of several strategies to deal with both types of complexity in comparable innovation-driven environments was considered suitable for de-risking the commercialisation of marine energy. The challenges for strategy-finding in a demandingly complex and increasingly dynamic environment are addressed in this research by exploiting a case-specific expert knowledge database. The structured information compression and subsequent strategy-finding process is realised based on calculated rankings of impact factors by systems dynamics software and substantiated by representative interview statements. The analysis makes use of multi-level expert knowledge and the application of a control-loop-based methods. The systems approach as applied in this research comprises the combination of interview-based (bottom-up learning) processes and the application of prioritised strategy options in the form of concerted management action (top-down planning). The approach of processing multi-level interview data by system dynamics modelling represents a powerful method to detect and assess ongoing developments and thus to advance strategy-finding. The systematic and unbiased approach to identify the top-level drivers for commercialising marine energy supports the long-term creation of investor confidence, based on a concept of transparency and credibility.

Denna uppsats ämnar att undersöka de kommunikativa processer för blockedjeteknologi startups som ska lansera en så kallad “initial coin offering” och således mynta sin egna kryptovaluta, såsom till exempel bitcoin. Vi avser att undersöka det strategiska kommunikation processerna detta involverar. Från ena perspektivet är ett decentraliserat blockkedjesystem högt värderat på grund av det faktum att det jämställer samtliga medverkande och på så vis skapar en “perfekt demokrati”, å andra sidan argumenterar många att centralisering behövs för att bibehålla tillit. Tillit till organisationer skapas genom vetandet att det finns konsekvenser till dess handlingar som kan införas av högre auktoriteter ifall dessa handlingar faller utanför ramarna av vad som anses accepterat (De Fillipe &amp; Wright, 2015). Utan en högre auktoritet som kan implementera detta blir tillit svårare att upprätthålla. Dock verkar blockkedjeteknologi motbevisa detta koncept. Hur är det möjligt för organisationer utan någon reglering från centrala myndigheter att skapa legitimitet och tillit för att på så sätt kunna få investeringar? Resultaten vi fann ställdes i jämförelse sig till våra tre legitimitets teorier som var kognitiv legitimitet, moral legitimitet och pragmatisk legitimitet, samt centrala teman och nyckelord. Att etablera en levande närvaro på sociala medier som till exempel Twitter, LinkedIn och framför allt Telegram grupper var mycket relevant. I telegram grupper sågs en grupp med många aktiva medlemmar och snabb svarsfrekvens från organisationen som mycket betydelsefullt, samt att ha botar som städar upp irrelevant material utan att deltagarna upplever detta som automatiserat och genuint. Att delta på event och etablera relationer med andra individer inom området och även närliggande områden som till exempel banksektorn var centralt, målet med detta var i många fall att kunna få betydelsefulla individer i sin styrelse av rådgivare vilket ökar legitimiteten. Att kunna ställa organisationens implementering av decentraliserad blockkedjeteknologi i jämförelse med den nuvarande centraliserade lösningen var essentiellt för att locka investerare som var villiga att riskera kapital för en ny modernare lösning.

This research studies the moderating effect of ownership concentration and the strength of investor protection on the relationship between the level of board independence, as measured by the number of non-executive directors in relation to total number of directors and the firm performance. Using a sample of 9018 observations on all non-financial publicly listed firmsin 27 OECD countries between the year 2012 and 2015. The findings show a positive correlation between board independence and firm performancein all regression models. Furthermore, I find the negative moderating effect on both shareholder concentration and investor protection on the main relationship.

Si la consommation, dans son acception économique, constitue le dernier stade du processus de production et de distribution des produits, elle est perçue, dans une acception juridique, comme étant le point de départ d‟un autre processus qui lie le consommateur au professionnel. Cette phase constitue le point de départ d‟un rapport qui fait naître des obligations au professionnel qui sont autant de droits pour le consommateur.Depuis le début des années 90, une attention particulière est consacrée à l‟épargnant et à sa protection, à travers d‟une part, des dispositions propres au droit financier, notamment par la régulation des marchés financiers, le contrôle des prestataires de services d‟investissement, et d‟autre part, des dispositions consacrées par le droit de la consommation notamment l‟encadrement du démarchage, de la commercialisation des produits et des services financiers, le renforcement de l‟obligation d‟information due par l‟intermédiaire financier et l‟extension de son obligation de conseil.L‟analyse juridique du processus de consommation des produits financiers passe par la combinaison de tous ces éléments. D‟une part, avant et lors de la formation des liens, les pouvoirs publics tentent de rétablir un équilibre dans les rapports entre professionnels et consommateurs. Ces derniers, étant réputés faibles économiquement, ne disposent pas des mêmes informations sur les produits et services financiers, sont sollicités par différents moyens et techniques dont ils n‟ont pas la maîtrise, et doivent faire des choix entre des produits variés, complexes et plus ou moins risqués. D‟autre part, lors de l‟exécution des prestations, à côté des risques liés aux produits, ou de l‟inexécution des obligations contractuelles, d‟autres risques peuvent naître des défaillances dans le fonctionnement du marché et des comportements de ses acteurs. Par conséquent, un renforcement des moyens de protection des consommateurs s‟avère nécessaire pour pallier aux insuffisances des moyens actuels dont ces derniers disposent pour obtenir réparation du préjudice et demander indemnisation. / If consumption, in the economic sense, is the final stage of the production and distribution of goods, it is perceived in a legal sense, as the starting point of another process linking the consumer to professional. This phase is the starting point of a report which gives rise to obligations which are all professional fees for the consumer.Since the beginning of the particular 90s, an attention is devoted to protection, through some measures specific to the financial law, including the regulation of financial markets, supervision of providers investment services, and other provisions that tend toward a reconciliation of the provisions enshrined in the consumer law including the regulation of canvassing, measures to provide protection in the marketing of products and services Financial distance, enhanced disclosure requirements owed by the broker and the extension of its obligation to counsel.The legal analysis of the consumption process of financial products supposes the combination of all these elements. On the one hand, before and during the formation of links, governments attempt to restore balance in relations between professionals and consumers. The latter being deemed economically weak, do not have the same information on financial products and services are sought by various means and technologies they have no control, and must make choices between various products, and more complex. On the other hand, during the execution of services, in addition to commodity risk, or non-performance of contractual obligations, other risks may arise from failures in market functioning and behavior of its actors. Therefore a means of strengthening consumer protection is needed to overcome the shortcomings of current means that they have to obtain compensation and seek compensation.

iiABSTRACTBehavioral finance has been a popular research subject for a while and therefore the understanding of human behavior when it comes to private financial investments has increased. When comparing human behavior to the financial theories one can conclude thatthe assumption of perfect and efficient markets with fully informed and rational investors is not realistic. This study has therefore looked at the investor rationality when choosing which index fund to invest in. Index funds are to a large degree used asa savings tool for either pensions or other specific purposes. It was therefore interesting to look at the behavior of Swedish investors buyingthe Swedishindex funds available in Sweden with a quantitative analysis of the relationship between flow and other features of index funds. The dependent variable reflecting rationality was the fund flow and the independent variables were return, tracking error, size, fee and risk. No previous studies have been made on the investor rationality regarding index funds in the Swedish market, although similar studies havebeen done on the American S&amp;P 500 investors. 17 index funds were included in this study, which is the whole population of index funds following Swedish indices available in Sweden at the point of time when this study was conducted. From this population funds that had been available for more than 3 years was chosen since we wanted to look at the behavior based on a longer time span than one year. In the end, 17index funds with 51observations was included in the study.Five hypotheses were created and tested of whichtwowereaccepted. From the regression model we found that return and standard deviation (SD) weresignificant andhadpositiverelationshipswith the fund flow. This implies that Swedish investors are rational to some degree but not fully rational since they are not taking any of the other variables into account which a rational investor ought to consider. It is therefore useful information for both investors and fund companies to see which factors weight in the most and how rational the behavior is. Conclusions from this study is that Swedish investors are subject to the index fund rationality paradox to some degree and the rational choice theory applies to some extent. One has to fully consider the outcomes of an action and base the decisionon utility maximization that the outcome will give one. To act fully rational is hard even for the most aware investor and even harder for an ordinary investor with gaps in knowledge and limited resources to information.