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Previous academic literature examining the performance of private equity funds has documented that the average private equity fund has failed to outperform public equity markets. This underperformance coupled with a greater risk-return trade-off has failed to discourage investment in private equity markets. In fact, private equity firms have enjoyed record amounts of fund raising over the past several years. This phenomenon has been characterized as a puzzle and its investigation within the academic literature has only just begun. Using a unique and current data set covering private equity returns and their underlying cash flows, we examine performance measurements of private equity funds in the context of their relationships with one another and with public markets; as well as, examine the characteristics of the funds and their managers that drive these relationships. Our findings suggest that private equity investors are partially motivated by misinterpreted performance measurements and that this misinterpretation is compounded by fund reported residual values. These findings have important policy implications for both private equity fund managers and investors.

Cyber-Incident Response (or, as it was initially called, Computer Incident response) has traditionally followed cyclic models such as the SEI Incident Response Cycle and SANS models, which aim to detect and identify incidents, stop, contain and eradicate them. Using the knowledge gained from the incidents, these models then advocate improving the capabilities to defend against subsequent attacks of the same nature. Although some later versions of these models, including the NIST model proposed in 2012, have nested the cycles to provide a more reactive response, they are neither demonstrably empirically founded nor do they represent the interests of all stakeholders within an organisation. This research addresses cyber-incident response from a broader perspective, looking from the viewpoint of a cross-functional set of stakeholders and ensures that incident response decisions are sensitive to temporal priorities, taken from an organisation-wide perspective and provide a range of responses rather than only containing and eradicating an incident. During this research, principal component analysis and structural equation modelling were used to develop the Dynamic Cyber Incident Response Model (DCIRM) which resulted in the development of a fielded prototype tool, the Cyber Operations Support Tool (COST). COST was then subjected to both controlled experimentation and operational validation. Empirical analysis of both of these activities confirmed the utility and effectiveness of the COST and the underlying DCIRM. The COST has since been used to train military cyber operational planners. The novel areas of this research are the dynamic nature of DCIRM which takes account of the changing asset values based on the point in the business/mission cycle, the trade-off between risk to the organisation and gathering intelligence during an incident, the flexibility in response options within organisational constraints and the abstraction of the information to allow a non-cyber specialist to make an appropriate incident response decision.

Recent studies have reported that open-end fund has its performance persistence. However, those studies didn¡¦t mention the factors of performance persistence. Therefore, investors knows the character of the types of fund, but unable to determine which individual fund have the character given the type of fund. The main purpose of this study is to provide investors a new way to select funds. First, investors can select high performance funds in the past period and aim to pick the individual funds which fit the character of high performance persistence. This study is divided into two parts. In first part, the researcher use Spearman's Rank Correlation Coefficient Test to examine the existence of performance persistence. In second part, the study aims to use Panel Data Analysis to examine the impact of 10 factors on the performance persistence in different type of funds, and periods. Samples in the study are chosen from 160 Taiwan open-end equity funds during 2004-2011. The return rate data is rolling data. In order to remove the difference of the risks of the funds, simple return rates were transferred into Jensen¡¦s Alpha. The conclusions are shown as below¡G 1. In short term, Time of Establishment often has a positive effect on fund performance persistence. 2. In short term, Net Asset Value often has a negative effect on fund performance persistence. In long term, net asset value often has a positive effect on fund performance persistence. 3. In short and middle term, Average Investment Amount always has a positive effect on fund performance persistence. 4. Almost in all type of funds and all periods, Stock Holding Rate has a negative effect on fund performance persistence. 5. Almost in all type of funds and all periods, The Score of Monitoring indicator has a negative effect on fund performance persistence.

Consistently high returns in private equity has lead to a steady increase in the global totalassets under management during the past few decades. Therefore, the relevancy of investing in private equity is obvious. As an investment class, private equity is much younger thanits public counterpart, which is a big part of the reason why the amount of financial researchand modeling on it is quite confined. Nevertheless, the need for forecasting capabilities for anyinvested party in private equity is still great, and the authors of this thesis set out to delivera model which accurately forecasts expected net asset value development of a private equityportfolio and present a confidence interval for it. Furthermore, the thesis serves to present suchresults conditional on macroeconomic scenarios. The scope of the study includes private equityfunds of various investment classes, namely, small-cap and mid-cap buyout, large-cap buyoutand venture capital and growth equity.To achieve an accurate model, the study is based on data from a credible source and threeseparate models are derived and tested against each other. The three models consist of one using a simple historical mean approach, another is based on theory presented by Takahashi andAlexander (2002) (the TA-model), and the third model (the modified TA-model) comes fromresearch by Buchner, Kaserer and Wagner (2009). The TA-model and the modified TA-modelhave at least one parameter which needs to be optimized. This was done using a conditional leastsquare method, utilizing MATLAB’s tool for solving nonlinear optimization problems, fmincon.Subsequent to the derivation of each model, a statistical test (a p-value test) was completed.This resulted in the TA-model being proved to be the best in forecasting net asset value development of private equity funds (which by extension means it is also the best at projectingthe same for an entire private equity portfolio) and was therefore implemented in further areas. By sorting the data on vintage year of the fund, data sets corresponding to pre-definedmacroeconomic periods could be attained. The TA-model was then fitted on these data setswhich produced meaningful results in regards to net asset value development, conditional onthree different macroeconomic scenarios, early-, mid-, and late market cycle. Next, Monte Carlosimulations were performed by stochastically simulating the distributions of funds in the various investment classes, resulting in confidence intervals of potential outcomes. Ultimately, theresults were applied to a mock portfolio designed by the authors to represent reality in fair way.The results of the study allow for two important conclusions to be drawn. Firstly, the authors areconfident that the thesis delivers a model which forecasts net asset value development of privateequity investments within certain confidence intervals in a good way, thereby fulfilling the aimof the study as accurately as possible, given the scope and limitations of the study. Secondly,the investigation provides solid evidence that the net asset value development of a private equityfund is dependent on what market cycle is prevailing at the time of fund commencement, andhow the development varies between such scenarios. Finally, using insights gained during theinvestigation process, the authors identify some potential areas for future studies.

共同基金在台灣是一個新興的投資理財管道，根據財政部證管會的統計資料得知，臺灣的共同基金數目已由民國八十年的27個增加到八十六年的129個，其總淨值亦由77l億台幣攀升到4691.61億台幣，顯示投資的人口正以大幅度之姿向上竄升，其投資群也由早期的機構投資者、股票族逐漸漫延到社會大眾，而投資人的動機亦曲純粹增加個人的財富，進一步擴展到籌措子女的教育準備金或個人退休養老金的規劃目標。 傳統的基金績效評估方法，大部分的研究重點均著眼於以資本資產定價模型（Caftal Asset Pricing Model ，簡稱CAPM）為理論來建立績效評估指標；或者以基金經理人的選股能力(Stock Selection)與擇時能力(Market Timing)做為評估標準；近年來亦有以投資組合為基礎的持股比率分析法。以上種種的研究，大部分都是以基金淨資產價值（Net Asset Value，簡稱NAV）與市場報酬率的變化來作為整體績效的評估基準。因此，在這樣的一個基礎上，基金淨資產價值的預測對於投資人而言就變得非常重要。如果，投資人可事先預測到各個基金的淨資產價值的未來走向，再運用上述的績效評估方法來衡量其績效，那麼投資人即可更早一步得到投資的訊息，並選取在未來績效良好的基金作為投資的重點。 因此，本研究的目的乃是企圖運用類神經網路的預測能力來建構國內共同基金淨資產價值的預測模型，並和傳統統計方法做一比較。而本研究的結果證實了倒傳遞類神經網路模式，確實在臺灣共同基金之年終淨資產值的預測上，優於傳統統計方法中的線性及非線性之迴歸分析模式。

A discount to the net asset value of Swedish investment companies is something that have existed for decades and a general explanation for the cause have not been found. The aim of this thesis is to find the the factors that impact the discount to net asset value of Swedish investment companies. The result will later be used to for comparison to gain a better understanding of the different causes behind the discount and in what way they differ among the companies. This will be done by using regression analysis. The results indicate that unlisted holdings contribute greatly to the discount but can't be used as a general explanation for the discount as investment companies which only hold listed holdings trade at a discount as well. Furthermore when foreign ownership or institutional ownership of the investment companies increase, the discount decreases as it signals to the market that their value is fair. / En substansrabatt hos svenska investmentbolag är något som har existerat i årtionden, men ändå har ingen generell förklaring till dessa kunnat hittats. Detta kandidatexamensarbete syftar att försöka hitta de variabler som ger upphov till substansrabatt hos svenska investmentbolag. Resultatet används sedan för att med jämförelse förstå de olika orsakerna som ger upphov till rabatten och varför det inte är samma förklaring mellan de olika bolagen. Resultaten indikerade att olistade bolag bidrar stort till rabatten men att det inte kan användas som en generell förklaring då det finns investmentbolag med en portfölj som bara innehåller listade bolag men som ändå har en substansrabatt. Vidare visar det sig att substansrabatten minskar när andelen utländsk eller institutionellt ägande av investmentbolaget ökar eftersom det signalerar till marknaden att det nuvarande priset är attraktivt.

Thesis (PhD)--Stellenbosch University, 2014. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Business-to-business services relating to physical asset management are playing an increasingly important role in industry. This is in the midst of the current pressures which asset owning organisations are experiencing in realising optimal value from their assets. The pursuit of understanding and complying with asset management standards such as ISO 55000 as well as the potential value to be gained from successful and sustainable business relationships contributes towards the importance of these services. The problem is that there is little or no evidence regarding the critical success factors for collaborating successfully in asset management services. The study identi es these critical success factors and demonstrates how the factors can di er between role players, industries, global regions and service types. A decision support model is developed providing the asset management community with access to the critical success factors for decision-making purposes. Based on the synthesis from internationally conducted Delphi- and survey studies it is found that the continued and sustained commitment from the asset owning organisation's senior management in support of the asset management service is the most critical factor for a successful asset management service partnership. Open and e ective communication is also highlighted as being critical, while it is important to have a process in place to improve the service continuously. Laboratory and eld testing con rm the validity of the decision support model for facilitating the decision-making process to improve asset management services, and in addition it also formalises the commercial and contracting processes relating to these services. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Besigheid-tot-besigheidsdienste met betrekking tot siese batebestuur speel 'n toenemende belangrike rol in die industrie. Dit is te midde van die druk wat batebesittende organisasies tans ondervind om optimale waarde uit hul siese bates te verkry. Die strewe na beter begrip en om te voldoen aan batebestuurstandaarde soos ISO 55000, asook die potensiële waarde wat verkry kan word uit suksesvolle en volhoubare besigheidheidsvennootskappe, dra by tot die belangrikheid van hierdie dienste. Die probleem is daar bestaan min of geen bewyse rakende die kritiese suksesfaktore vir suksesvolle samewerking in batebestuurdienste. Die studie identi seer die kritiese suksesfaktore en toon aan hoe hierdie faktore kan verskil tussen rolspelers, industrieë, wêreldstreke en dienstipes. 'n Besluitnemingsmodel is ontwikkel wat die batebestuurgemeenskap toegang gee tot die kritiese suksesfaktore vir besluitnemingsdoeleindes. Gebaseeer op die sintese van internasionale Delphi- en opnamestudies is daar bevind dat die mees kritieke faktor vir 'n suksesvolle vennootskap in batebestuurdienste die voortgesette en volgehoue toewyding deur die bate-besittende organisasie se senior bestuur, ter ondersteuning van die batebestuurdiens, is. Doeltre ende en openhartige kommunikasie is ook uitgewys as krities, terwyl dit belangrik is om 'n proses te volg om die diens voortdurend te verbeter. Laboratorium- en praktyk toetsing het bevestig dat die besluitnemingsmodel geldig is vir die fasilitering van die besluitnemingsproses om batebestuursdienste te verbeter asook vir die formalisering van die kommersiële en kontraktuele prosesse wat verband hou met hierdie dienste.

The predictability of the US-based international mutual fund returns has received renewed consideration in recent academic studies. This dissertation extends recent research by exploring the 2,479 daily return observations covering the period from January 4, 1993 to October 31, 2002 for all categories of international mutual funds. This exploration splits the sample, uses the initial sub-sample to investigate return patterns of international mutual funds and develops trading rules based on the predictable return patterns, and tests those rules on the holdout sample. The empirical findings suggest that smart investors may earn higher riskadjusted returns by following daily dynamic trading strategies. The excess returns earned by investors are statistically and economically significant, irrespective of load or no-load mutual funds and even in the presence of various exchange restrictions and regulations.

<p>Title: The appraiser’s choice of valuation method – factors that influences the choice of company valuation methods</p><p>Seminar date: 04/06/07</p><p>Course: Master thesis in Business Administration, 10 Swedish credits.</p><p>Authors: Anne Benedicks and Veronica Öberg</p><p>Advisor: Eron Oxing</p><p>Profession of category: Financial analysts, auditors and company lawyers.</p><p>Key words: Company valuation, valuation methods, cash flow analysis, comparative valuation, the net asset value method.</p><p>The Main Issue: What is of decisive importance when choosing a special company valuation method?</p><p>Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to identify, analyse and evaluate the most common methods of valuation for financial analysts, auditors and company lawyers and those factors that influences the choice of method.</p><p>Method: A multiple survey has been implemented for the actual profession categories. Primary data was collected through semi-structured interviews and a questionnaire survey.</p><p>Theoretical: The theoretical frame of reference is based upon the paper’s dependent variable, i.e. the role of the appraiser. The appraiser is dependent of following undependent variables: comparative valuation of company, situations of valuation, relevant information, the processes of valuation, the methods of valuation and common custom valuation.</p><p>Empiricism: Material from the interviews and the questionnaire survey shows how the professional category respectively acts when they valuate a company and why and which valuation method is used. According to the interviews the financial analysts often uses comparative evaluation, the auditor uses the cash flow analysis while the lawyer chooses the net asset value method.</p><p>Conclusion: The result of this paper considerable agrees to earlier research within the field. The main underlying factor for the appraiser to choose a certain evaluation method is simply depending on the actual situation. Example of other determining factors is customer relations, access to relevant information and which type of business under evaluation.</p> / <p>Yrkesgrupper: Finansanalytiker, revisorer och jurister.</p><p>Problemformulering: Vad är avgörande för att en specifik företagsvärderingsmetod väljs?</p><p>Syfte: Syftet med uppsatsen är att identifiera, analysera och utvärdera vilka de vanligast förekommande värderingsmetoderna är för finansanalytiker, revisorer och jurister samt vilka faktorer som påverkar valet av metod.</p><p>Metod: En flerfallstudie har gjorts hos de berörda yrkeskategorierna. Primärdata samlades in genom semistrukturerade intervjuer samt enkätundersökning.</p><p>Teoretisk referensram: Den teoretiska referensramen utgår från uppsatsens beroende variabel, värderarens roll. De oberoende variabler som värderaren är beroende av är: relativ företagsvärdering, värderingssituationer, informationskällor, värderingsprocessen, värderingsmetoder och god värderingssed.</p><p>Empiri: Material från intervjuer och enkätundersökning visar på hur respektive yrkeskategori handlar i en företagsvärderingssituation samt varför och med vilken värderingsmetod. Enligt intervjuerna använder finansanalytikern oftast jämförande värdering, revisorn väljer kassaflödesanalys medan juristen väljer substansvärdemetoden.</p><p>Slutsats: Uppsatsens resultat överensstämmer på ett bra sätt med tidigare forskning inom området. Den största bakomliggande faktorn till att värderaren väljer en viss värderingsmetod beror oftast på situationen. Exempel på andra avgörande element är relationen till kunden, tillgång till information samt vilken typ av företag som ska värderas.</p>