Background and problem: Recent banking and financial crises has undoubtedly stressed the importance of a sound and well-functioning banking system. The banking industry is in critical need of strong governance stemming from their opaque and complex business along with the high social costs incurred in the event of bank failure. Previous research has shown that credit rating changes serve as a governance mechanism on the U.S. banking market, affecting real economic decision-making. However, no existing research has been conducted in an European context, rendering the objective of this thesis. Objective: The objective of this study is to examine the governance effects of credit rating changes on banks within the European banking market. Methodology: The objective of this thesis is achieved by using a novel and comprehensive data set comprising credit rating changes and financial accounting variables of 202 banks on the European banking market between the time period 1997-2011. A quantitative method is implemented to examine banks’ financial accounting variables in the event of credit rating changes. In order to measure the isolated effect from a credit rating change, the difference-in- differences econometric approach in combination with a Propensity Score Matching procedure will be conducted. Conclusions: The results from this research provide numerous evidence that credit rating changes have consistent governance effects on the European banking market. In the event of a credit rating downgrade, banks on the European banking market decrease in size and set aside more capital as reserves for non performing loans. In the event of a credit rating upgrade, banks increase in size and re-allocate assets, providing evidence that these banks have a more optimistic view of their financial conditions. The findings in this thesis are in line with previous research on the U.S. banking market, however, banks on the European banking market seems to have, on average, a more conservative attitude towards risk-taking in the event of a credit rating change.

In the master’s work there are analyzed and systemized various Lithuanian and foreign theoretical and practical researches of risk measures and control researches; there are researched banking risk, importance of liquidity control in commercial banks; formed liquidity risk control of the problems in commercial banks and summarized used methods controlling and setting the liquidity risk. There is properly done liquidity risk analysis and the estimation of AB “Šiaulių bankas”, according to the system of indices of liquidity and testing method during inauspicious circumstances. In the constructive part of the master’s work, there are presented improving possibilities of estimation and control of liquidity risks of AB “Šiaulių bankas”. There was suggested the practicing of the liquidity risk control model, estimation of particular currency liquidity positions (gaps) using liquidity value method (VAR) and practicing variation / co-variation method; the supplement of new participants of the system of liquidity indices.

Societies have, since time immemorial, traded real goods and services for expectations of goods and services in some future. These expectations have been associated with tangible and, lately, intangible property - which is generally called money. From the crude quantity theory of money, the purchasing power of a monetary unit is given as 1/ P = T/(Mv). P is the price of the traded goods and services T, M is the total money supply and its turnover rate is v. The total money supply M is dominated by bank credit. In the South African law (and elsewhere) the judicial recognition given to bank credit (1) as money seems to have happened as an unintended side-effect to accepting cheques as delivery vehicles in a cash transfer without any tangible money moving from the transferor to the transferee. In payment of money, the law of property and the law of contract overlap and become inseparable. Both the English and South African laws define payment as performance of a preceding duty. The Supreme Court of Appeal, in the Vereins- und Westbank case seems to have declared an abstract transfer of ownership of money to be payment even though no preceding duty to pay was found. The profit of a financial investment is called interest and is calculated from a simple or compound interest formula. Despite medieval legal, theological and ethical objections, neither is illegal in the South African positive law. The last remnant of the medieval protection of a guilty debtor (often the ruler) at the expense of an innocent creditor is the in duplum rule. This is particularly obnoxious during modern rampant inflation that was unknown and could not be predicted when only metallistic money was in use. The influence of the in duplum rule is being limited by recent restrictive judgments in South Africa and in Zimbabwe. In South Africa, the Government has a constitutional duty to ensure that its subjects are not deprived of property. Specifically, the Constitution prescribes in Section 224(1) that the South African Reserve Bank must 'protect the value of the currency'. It is shown that the recent Reserve Bank policies, unless urgently modified, are in conflict with the publicly promised inflation rate of no greater than 6%. The exchange rates depend fundamentally on the price levels of the traded or tradable goods and services in the respective economies. This leads to the concept of purchasing power parity, which is most accurately reflected in the relationship between interest rates in different states and their relative foreign exchange depreciation rates. It is submitted that the South African Exchange Control Regulations have outlived their usefulness (if ever they had any) and are unconstitutional - at least in so far as they interfere with the South African Reserve Bank's obligation to pursue its primary object 'independently and without fear'. In the main, the South African Courts have applied restrictive interpretation to the Exchange Control Regulations and they have justifiably ignored the public international law obligation of the Republic to recognise the Exchange Control Regulations of fellow IMF members extraterritorially. (1) To money related claims on banks - see the body of the thesis for the two-creditor-two-debtor legal aspects in the 'bank credit'. / Thesis (LL.D)-University of Durban-Westville, 2002.

US – Definitive Anti-dumping and Countervailing Duties on Certain Products from China is the initial WTO dispute in which China claims that US-countervailing duties on certain products from China are inconsistent with the obligations of the United States under the SCM Agreement. The meaning of “public bodies” within Article 1.1 (a) (1) of the SCM Agreement and the question of whether China’s “SOCB” constitute “public bodies” are the heart of the matter. The thesis argues that the theory of the governmental function is more persuasive than that of governmental control in terms of defining “public bodies”. Although the majority ownership of China’s SOCBs has remained in the Chinese government, their policy-oriented nature has been largely marginalized. The conclusion is that the WTO system needs to give developing countries more policy flexibility, and developing countries should also make the best use of their latent comparative advantage and the effects of globalization.

US – Definitive Anti-dumping and Countervailing Duties on Certain Products from China is the initial WTO dispute in which China claims that US-countervailing duties on certain products from China are inconsistent with the obligations of the United States under the SCM Agreement. The meaning of “public bodies” within Article 1.1 (a) (1) of the SCM Agreement and the question of whether China’s “SOCB” constitute “public bodies” are the heart of the matter. The thesis argues that the theory of the governmental function is more persuasive than that of governmental control in terms of defining “public bodies”. Although the majority ownership of China’s SOCBs has remained in the Chinese government, their policy-oriented nature has been largely marginalized. The conclusion is that the WTO system needs to give developing countries more policy flexibility, and developing countries should also make the best use of their latent comparative advantage and the effects of globalization.

This thesis examines the role of banks in influencing innovation and analyses their links to payment systems modernisation. The main argument is that banks are a type of technological institution having the potential to promote innovation, although such roles may be implicit or secondary. This role is investigated in eight chapters. The first three chapters review the major innovation models and progress in payment system. An analytical framework, based on evolutionary and resource-based views, is developed to examine how resources and routines which reflect an organisation's stock of skills, influence innovation, and assist them in sustaining competitive advantage. The following three chapters present the empirical results. In a survey of innovation in the banking industry, research results suggested that although there were relatively high levels of information technology awareness and application, particularly in payment system automation, there remained a moderate level of innovative capabilities among the banks studied. Further analysis through four mini case studies of the largest commercial banks also suggested similar increases in technological investments, but replication rates were also relatively high. Thus, it is argued that such investments may gain, but not sustain, competitive advantage, whereby the latter requires banks to innovate by acquiring, accumulating, and advancing their stock of skills. In this respect, the role of the central bank in creating a conducive environment for innovation is also important which may be seen through its involvement in payment systems modernisation. The final two chapters discuss the policy and research implications. It is argued that central bank policies oriented towards payment system reform, along with new payment product and services development by commercial banks, have come to play an important part in promoting technological innovation in banking. Such roles in reforming rudimentary payment systems have helped strengthen national information infrastructures, especially in emerging market economies, and moreover, have influenced the set-up of a national innovation system in banking which underpins economic development.

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In this study, I employ a combination of social semiotics and critical discourse analysis to examine the marketing media from corporate social responsibility campaigns focused on food bank philanthropy and awareness-raising for the issue of hunger. I use media from a sample of six of the largest and most visible corporate food bank philanthropy campaigns to represent a broad range of their differences. Each campaign is analyzed for how the problem of hunger and the solution as food banks are represented. Hunger is represented by these corporations as a problem of a lack of food that can happen to anyone, anytime, anywhere, for which families and/or local communities bear responsibility. This typification of the problem of hunger comes packaged conceptually with a characterization of the solution to that problem in food banks represented as a food-focused, charity-based, volunteer-run response that relies on corporate sponsorships and corporate social responsibility programs to harnesses the marketability of hunger to increase donations. These representations are evidence form the basis on an analysis of how the problem of hunger is currently thought about and acted upon in Canada. Claims about hunger exist at a juncture between the resources available and the kinds of responses to hunger that are likely to arise. This study demonstrates what corporate claims about hunger mean in relation to the ongoing development of food banking. This study is also an analysis of a particular case of corporate food bank philanthropy as an example campaign to highlight how the corporate construction of hunger is deployed to obscure, marginalize, and foreclose on the possibility of the emergence of alternative understandings of hunger and approaches beyond food banking based on a charity model. The dominant typification of the problem of hunger by corporations further institutionalizes an inadequate food banking paradigm that cannot address the social underpinnings that lead to the expression of hunger. / Thesis (Master, Kinesiology & Health Studies) -- Queen's University, 2014-06-01 00:17:52.246

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