>Magister Scientiae - MSc / The introduction of biosimilars to health care markets across the globe has had some success in increasing competition and improving the cost of healthcare. While savings are important for driving the biosimilar uptake, this is not the only consideration for the growth of biosimilars onto emerging markets. A systematic review of the literature to assess the growth of biosimilars onto the emerging market was conducted using the following data sources: PubMed, Website of the Generics and Biosimilars Initiative (GaBI) journal, ProQuest, Google Scholar. Studies that provided evidence of biosimilars onto the emerging market through surveys and other sources of existing data were included. The systematic review process followed Wichor et al. (2018) and the PRISMA checklist (PRISMA, 2009). The search strategy for the review provided a total of 71studies, which underwent title, abstract and full text review to give 20 articles that fit the inclusion criteria for the aimed study. A quality assessment was conducted on the 20 articles and by using the Hawker et al. (2002) quality tool and directed research questions to set variables, the data analysis of 13 articles emerged. The included studies agreed on the growth of biosimilars onto the emerging market and on the switch to biosimilars to improve access to therapies. However, International Nonproprietary Name (INN) and physician confidence were still considered as hurdles. The two most successful drivers of the growth of biosimilars onto the emerging market based on this review was certainly the regulation of the process followed by the cost of biosimilars. To conclude, data analysis of 13 articles determined that the general perception of using biosimilars in emerging markets is positive. However, for successful integration into routine healthcare and uptake into these markets, there must be a direct focus on the regulation of Biosimilars

Time series models have been widely used in simulating financial data sets. Finding a nice way to estimate the parameters is really important. One of the traditional ways is to use maximum likelihood estimation to make an approach. However, when the error terms don’t have normality, MLE would be less efficient. Quasi maximum likelihood estimation, also regarded as Gaussian MLE, would be more efficient. Considering the heavy-tailed financial data sets, we can use non-Gaussian quasi maximum likelihood, which needs less assumptions and conditions. We use real financial data sets to compare these estimators.

In this thesis the author investigate the overreaction effect of Asian country exchange traded funds (ETFs) to US stock market returns, trading strategies of leveraged exchange traded funds (LETFs), and the regime switching behavior of emerging market sovereign credit default swaps. In the Asian country ETF paper the author studies the overreaction effect of US investors towards US market return when they formulate Asian country ETF prices. The Asian country ETFs are special because when the ETF shares are traded in the US the underlying Asian stock markets are closed resulting in stale Net Asset Values (NAVs) of ETFs. This feature of Asian country ETFs offers a unique setting to study the relation between security price and market sentiment. With a dynamic contrarian trading strategy the author records economically significant abnormal returns over the buy-and-hold benchmark suggesting that US investors’ sentiment does lead to abnormal returns in the Asian country ETF market. The author also studies the correspondence of the abnormal return with US market sentiment index and finds that they are positively correlated. Furthermore the author documents asymmetric responses of overreaction in bullish vs. bearish market sentiment. The results pose significant implications for both the academics and practitioners. iii The LETF trading strategy paper is a joint work with my supervisor Dr. Peter Miu and my supervisory committee member Dr. Narat Charupat. The authors investigate the market conditions that tip the balance between the market trending effect and the volatility drag in governing the performance of LETFs. The market conditions that promote a stronger former effect than the latter will result in a positive compounding effect, thus enhancing the profitability of a long LETF position at the expense of a short one. On the other hand, those market conditions that promote a dominating latter effect will result in a negative compounding effect, which benefits the short LETF position as opposed to the long position. To address our research questions, we conduct a series of simulation exercises by gauging the sensitivity of the LETF returns on key parameters of the return generating process of the underlying benchmark as represented by the GJR model. We first study the return distributions of a long strategy in a +3x LETF, a short strategy in a -3x LETF, and the pair strategy of a 50% short position in the +3x LETF together with a 50% short position in the -3x LETF, all on the same S&P 500 index. We examine different performance measures and study the risk-return trade-offs of LETF investment. We contribute to the literature by establishing the link between the performance of LETFs and characteristics of the return dynamics of the underlying benchmark through pinpointing the underlying drivers of the compounding effects to facilitate the decision-making process of LETF investors. In the sovereign Credit Default Swap (SCDS) paper the author investigates the dependency of sovereign CDS spread change on a sovereign’s country specific fundamental, local, regional and macro global factors. Using Markov regime switching model the author reveals that in a tranquil state a sovereign market’s fundamental factors mainly determine the direction of the SCDS spread movement, while in a turmoil state the global factors become dominant. Cross sectional analysis to examine the behavior of the same explanatory variable on countries of different macroeconomic characters and reveal that more “open” countries are more integrated with the regional economies with the contagion effect being more salient in the bad state, and smaller countries with less diversified economies would be more affected a global crisis because economic links are more important for such countries than larger countries. Furthermore, it shows that the influence of rating is more significant for “closed” than for “open” countries, and the market sentimental effect of flight-to-quality magnifies in the bad state that US equity market return has the strongest influence for small countries indicating stronger economic ties of smaller countries to larger countries with diverse economies in the bad state. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

For the past forty-two years, the debate has raged over the optimal use of debt in the firm?s capital structure. Numerous studies have looked at the factors that affect a firm?s capital structure, in both the domestic and foreign markets. Many of these studies have focused their attention on the U.S. and developed countries. Similarities and differences between the U.S. and other industrialized countries have been explored and noted. The objective of this study is to determine if there are similarities between the factors that determine capital structure in emerging markets and those of more developed nations. Are the determining factors different for emerging markets and what are possible explanations for these difference? This study attempts to determine if factors that have been shown to influence the capital structure of developed nations are, in fact, influential in emerging market. The study also incorporates additional factors that may be particular to emerging markets to determine if they have an impact of the firm?s choice of capital structure. This study finds that capital structure determinants are more portable to firms in Asian markets than in Latin American markets. The study also finds that the means by which debt is measure does, in fact, have a bearing on the significance of the explanatory variables.

Emerging market enterprises (EMMs) are on the rise and are quickly becoming significant contributors to the global economy. The fast-paced growth of EMMs generates an interest in understanding the impact of home country advantages that EMMs have and how they use them. Emerging markets, in different ways and forms, experience institutional voids within their markets. This can be in the form of, among others, an inefficient regulatory system, a lack of skilled labor force or poor infrastructure. The different advantages and disadvantages the EMMs have can be explored by applying the OLI framework. Which details different advantages in the form of ownership-specific, location-specific and internalization advantages. Therefore, the aim of this thesis is to gain a deeper understanding how different EMMs use their OLI advantages in order to more effectively plug institutional voids. This has been answered through a semi-structured interview and collected transcripts from EMM leaders. The findings of this study indicates that EMMs most important advantage is the knowledge and inventive thinking possessed by the managers.

Yes / Purpose: Despite the potential of social media in emerging markets (EMs), only few studies published in high quality information systems (IS) journals that have addressed issues related to social media in the context of EMs. This study aims to analyse existing research related to social media published in high quality IS journals for exploring initial research trends, emerging themes, limitations and future research directions in the context of emerging markets. Design/methodology/approach: This study conducted systematic review of 22 articles on social media, which were published in the “Senior Scholars Basket of IS Journals and Information Systems Frontiers” from 1997 to 2017. Manual literature search approach (i.e. screening through table of contents of each journal) was employed to identify relevant articles. The content of relevant articles was systematically analysed and synthesised along with keyword analysis to understand research trends on social media related issues in the emerging markets context. Findings: The study identified four major themes from existing research on the social media in the context of emerging markets, namely: 1) Social media frameworks; 2) Social media and consumers; 3) Social media and organisations; and 4) Social media and society with majority of the studies focusing on consumers. Single Subject was found as the major limitation with studies analysed focusing on single platform/country/domain hindering the generalizability whereas including new exogenous variable to improve the validity of existing studies emerged as main future research direction. Originality/value: This study conducted literature review on social media in EMs, which has not been undertaken yet. Moreover, it employed manual search (an effort and time intensive approach) to overcome the shortcomings of keyword search to identify, locate, select and analyse the social media literature in the context of emerging markets.

Since continuously the companies in developed country always acquire the companies in emerging country in order to cost down or diversification. Under global competition, the emerging country becomes better and better. According to KPMG¡¦s data, the companies in emerging country acquire the developed country accelerated, especially product and natural resource are the largest goal; in the other hands, the multinational acquisitions are going down for two years. The amount of the company in emerging market acquires the company in developed country is 47 percentage of the amount the company in developed market acquires the company in emerging country. It¡¦s the highest statistic in KPMG since 2003. The study try to understand the strategy which the company in emerging market acquires the company in developed country as follows, what drove the decision to ¡§ go global¡¨, how did the company strike the balance between using foreign country management teams, and what is the challenge? How did the company accomplish integration and leverage synergies with overseas business? What advice would you give other emerging market companies on how to be successful in developed markets? The result show: the emerging market is seek to develop brand to international brand, avoid trade tax and get the core skill from oversea enterprise. Non-traditional buyer should accept the acquired company totally. In the beginning, the leader of oversea management team should be the executive officer from the acquired company to keep the loyal customers and reduce the rate of key men. To use the double brand strategy, the loyal customer could feel the innovation of R&D and set up the headquarter in oversea to let the customer feel the brand is new

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Emerging adulthood is a time of significant change where behaviors are adopted that can have significant long term effects on health. The most dramatic increases in weight are occurring among emerging adults, especially those with some college education. Emerging adults are also at an increased risk for substance use and abuse. The current study examined the relationship between BMI and substance use among college students. Participants included 703 undergraduate students at a large public U.S. university (M age=20.6, 58.7% Non-Hispanic White, 59.8% female). Students completed an online survey with items on substance use behaviors such as smoking, alcohol use, marijuana use, and binge drinking. Tobacco, alcohol, marijuana use, and binge drinking were assessed with one question asking students how many days over the past month they had used the specific substance (range 0-30 days). Binge drinking was assessed using one question: “Over the last two weeks, how many times have you had five or more drinks of alcohol at a sitting?” Responses ranged from 0 to 10 or more times. Substance use behaviors were coded to no use/any use in the past month. Body mass index was calculated through the student’s self reported height and weight. BMI was significantly related to past month tobacco use with an odds ratio of 1.06 (95% CI: 1.01-1.12). Specifically, with every one unit increase in BMI, the odds of past month tobacco use increased by 6%. However, BMI was not significantly associated with past month alcohol use, marijuana use, or binge drinking (p>.05). As BMI increases, college students’ odds of using tobacco increase. This finding is particularly problematic given that weight gain is common among undergraduate students and cigarette use has been cited as a common weight management practice among this group as well. Future research should consider the role of BMI as a factor in decreasing tobacco use. / text

Pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) enter aquatic ecosystems through multiple pathways including human excretion into sewage systems, disposal of surplus drugs, and the therapeutic treatment of livestock. Because PPCPs are designed to have a physiological effect, it is likely that they may also influence aquatic organisms. The objectives of this research were to quantify PPCP abundance in near-shore habitats of Lake Michigan and identify factors related to PPCP abundance. Stratified sampling was conducted seasonally at four southern Lake Michigan sites. All sites sampled had measurable PPCP concentrations, but they varied significantly among time and location. Concentrations of PPCPs did not differ with site or water depth. Multiple regression analyses revealed that temperature, total carbon, total dissolved solids, dissolved oxygen, and ammonium controlled total PPCP concentrations. These data indicate PPCPs are ubiquitous in southern Lake Michigan with continued research needed to assess potential effects on aquatic organisms and humans. / Department of Biology