This thesis examines firm performance through the dot-com bubble through the lens of executive compensation. Hypotheses based on the theoretical literature of Bolton, Scheinkman and Xiong (2006) as well as Bertrand and Mullainathan (2001) in regards to management compensation in a speculative bubble motivate three regression models with differing market-cap-growth based dependent variables and specific compensation variables. Regression analyses test the models using public compensation and security data from S&P's Execucomp and Compustat databases. Synthesizing regression results show that stock option vesting schedules and executives' status on the board of directors may significantly affect firm performance through the dot-com bubble, but more analysis, using more robust data, is necessary to verify either claim.

Economic growth is the increase in the inflation-adjusted market value of the goods and services produced by an economy over time. The total output is the quantity of goods or servicesproduced in a given time period within a country. Sweden was affected by two crises during the period 2000-2010: a dot-com bubble and a financial crisis. How did these two crises affect the economic growth?     The changes of domestic output can be separated into four parts: changes in intermediate demand, final domestic demand, export demand and import substitution. The main purpose of this article is to analyze the economic growth during the period 2000-2010, with focus on the dot-com bubble in the beginning of the period 2000-2005, and the financial crisis at the end of the period 2005-2010. The methodology to be used is the structural decomposition method.     This investigation shows that the main contributions to the Swedish total domestic output increase in both the period 2000-2005 and the period 2005-2010 were the effect of domestic demand. In the period 2005-2010, financial crisis weakened the effect of export. The output of the primary sector went from a negative change into a positive, explained mainly by strong export expansion. In the secondary sector, export had most effect in the period 2000-2005. Nevertheless, domestic demand and import ratio had more effect during the financial crisis period. Lastly, in the tertiary sector, domestic demand can mainly explain the output growth in the whole period 2000-2010.

Syfte: Syftet med denna studie var att se hur och varför volatiliteten påverkades i DJIA, S&P 500 och NASDAQ Composite under IT-bubblan. Metod: Års- och månadsvolatiliteten för DJIA, S&P 500 och NASDAQ Composite har beräknats under 1995-2004 med hjälp av data från Yahoo Finance. Empiri: Resultatet visar att volatiliteten var väsentligt högre i NASDAQ Composite än vad den var i S&P 500 och DJIA som i sin tur höll en liknande volatilitet i förhållande till varandra. Analys: I analysen framträdde det att volatiliteten blev väsentligt högre i samband med att bubblan sprack under maj 2000 fram till dess att paniken lade sig kort efter maj 2002. Det fanns en hög överensstämmelse mellan denna rapport och övriga tidigare studier. Teorierna var mestadels väl applicerbara. Slutsats: Volatiliteten för DJIA, S&P 500 och NASDAQ Composite var som högst mellan 2000 och 2002 under undersökningsperioden 1995-2004. IT-bubblan uppstod samt sprack till följd av irrationellt investeringsbeteende bland investerarna på aktiemarknaden och paniken som uppstod efteråt gjorde att volatiliteten på aktiemarknaden höll sig förhållandevis hög fram tills den lade sig kort efter maj 2002. NASDAQ Composite hade högst volatilitet till följd av IT-bubblan medan DJIA och S&P 500 hade likvärdig volatilitet. Samtliga index följde ett liknande mönster, detta var troligtvis på grund av att företag från NASDAQ Composite kunde återfinnas i S&P 500 samt DJIA. / Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to see how and why the volatility was affected in DJIA, S&P 500 and NASDAQ Composite during the Dot-com bubble. Method: The yearly and monthly volatility of DJIA, S&P 500 and NASDAQ Composite were computed with data from a period spanning 1995-2004, which were collected from Yahoo Finance. Empiricism: The results illustrate that the volatility was vastly higher in NASDAQ Composite than in DJIA and S&P 500 which in turn yielded a comparable volatility in relation to each other. Analysis: The analysis extracted the fact that the volatility rose considerably after the bubble burst during May 2000 and started waning after the panic died out circa May 2002. There were a relatively high harmony between the results of this report and the earlier studies which it was compared to. Conclusion: The volatility for DJIA, S&P 500 and NASDAQ 500 was higher between 200 and 2002 than during the rest of the observed period. The Dot-com bubble arose due to irrational investment behavior among investors and the panic which arose afterwards contributed to the increasing volatility which maintained a high level until it subsided after May 2002. NASDAQ Composite had the highest volatility during the Dot-com bubble while DJIA and S&P 500 had a similar volatility. All indexes followed a similar pattern, this was probably due to that companies from NASDAQ Composite reasonably should be found in S&P 500 and DJIA.

The economic prosperity of the late 1990s was characterized by a perceived expansive growth that increased the expectations of a company's performance. WorldCom, a telecommunications company, was a victim of these expectations that led to the evolution of a fraud designed to deceive the public until the economic outlook improved. Through understanding what led to the fraud, how the fraud grew, and what its effects were, lessons can be derived to gain a better understanding of the reasons behind a fraud and to prevent future frauds from occurring or growing as big as the WorldCom fraud did.

This thesis deals with the impacts of information and communication technology investment surge on USA economic growth in the 1990s. Besides others, rapid development of these technologies also led to the creation of a stock market bubble, which affected the expansion phase of the economic cycle. Its burst in 2000-2001 resulted in economic slow-down and end of the longest recorded economic expansion in the history of the United States. Main part of the thesis discusses the benefits of information technology for economy and further evaluates the role of the speculative bubble in the development of consumption and investment expenditures. The thesis results suggest that the increase in capital intensity and sharp stock market price inflation significantly accelerated the dynamics of the economic growth in the second half of the described cycle.