Thesis (Ph.D.)--Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 99-104).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1996. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.Comm.) - University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2009. / Full text also available online. Scroll down for electronic link.

Thesis--University of Wisconsin. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Bibliography: p. 341-350.

<p>This study examines the relationship between stock prices and accounting figures, primarily the book value of equity and earnings, as well as the market perception of accounting choices implemented by</p><p>companies. Market event studies from late sixties have initiated numerous of researches, and the majority of contemporary results were consistent with strong belief in the market efficiency theory. The</p><p>book value of equity and earnings have been proved to have the highest explanatory power of future stock prices. Other accounting-related issues, like inventory methods or accounting for business combination, were proven to have reliable impact on the stock prices. Moreover, the cash flow implications triggered by the accounting change are not an indispensable condition to influence the stock price level. Although a great body of research has treated the relationship between accounting</p><p>choices and stock prices, a clear-cut mechanism is not well specified. The evidence is inconsistent, and the consequences of accounting change are difficult to measure. However, the accounting figures</p><p>included in financial statements remain the most important measure of the companies’ performance. Due to the economic and technical progress, which considerably modified the structure of companies</p><p>and the environment in which they operate, further studies are advisable in order to maintain the reliability of accounting figures on significant level.</p>

by Terry A. Marsh, Robert C. Merton. / "First draft: September 1983"--p. [1]. "Last revised: March 1984"--p. [1]. / Bibliography: leaves 14-16.

21, [58] leaves : ill. ; 28 cm.

No description available.

Food prices have increased rapidly in recent years, and so has ethanol consumption. Some studies have claimed that there is a connection between those two. Net exporters of food tend to benefit from higher prices, while regions that are net importers of food, tend to be adversely affected. The large amount of poor countries in the second group justifies an investigation of the causes of increasing food prices. This thesis aims to contribute to the discussion, analyzing, theoretically and empirically, the impact that the diversion of feedstock from food to ethanol production has on food prices. The interaction between food prices and ethanol is first examined in a two-good (food and ethanol), one input (land) theoretical model. The outcome of this model is that an increase in ethanol productivity will have a positive impact on food prices, which is confirmed in the empirical test. We also found that increases in area allocated to produce sugarcane based ethanol in Brazil had depressing effects on relative food prices. No significant conclusion could be found on the effect of the area allocated to produce corn based ethanol in the United States.

This study consists of two essays. In the first essay, I examine whether the overlap in institutional investors between the supplier and its customer can be an efficient monitoring mechanism in the product market. Using a large sample of supplier–customer relationships for the period 1980–2011, I provide the following evidence. First, a high level of overlapping institutional ownership mitigates the adverse effect of asymmetric interdependence between supplier and customer on their firm performance. Second, relationship-specific investments and partnership duration are identified as underlying channels through which overlapping institutional ownership mitigates the adverse effect of asymmetric interdependence on partners’ performance. Third, overlapping institutional ownership is negatively associated with accounts receivable when the supplier is more financially constrained than the customer, suggesting that overlapping institutional ownership improves the efficiency of trade credit allocation. These findings survive out of a series of robustness checks. The findings of this study highlight that the overlap in institutional investors between supplier and customer plays as an efficient monitoring mechanism in the product market. In the second essay, I examine the informational role of overlapping transient institutional investors who hold stocks of both the firm and its customers in disseminating customer information to the firm’s bond market and document four findings. First, I find that overlapping transient institutional ownership significantly alleviates the prediction of lagged customer-portfolio bond returns to supplier bond returns even after controlling for the interaction effect between stock market and bond market. This finding survives out of a series of robustness checks. The alleviation effect is more pronounced for firms with high customer concentration and low customer industry competition, or with non-investment grade. Second, I find that overlapping transient institutional ownership represents more than a mere proxy for investor attention and leads to information advantage over overlapping institutional bondholders. Third, I find that current customer-portfolio return is significantly associated with the trading volume of overlapping transient institutional investors in the bond market, suggesting that overlapping transient institutional investors indeed take customer information into account when they trade bonds of suppliers. Fourth, I examine the real effect of customer information on bondholders and find that customer bond return is significantly related to the supplier’s future operating performance, which is an important predictor of credit risk. Overall, my results show that overlapping transient institutional shareholders take economically linked information into account when they trade in the bond market and improve the informativeness of bond price. Keywords: supplier–customer relationships, overlapping institutional investors, monitoring mechanism, bond price informativeness