This thesis investigates whether luxury handbags in secondary markets make for viable invesments. Reasoning for the investment potential of designer handbags is primarily based on the excessive retail price increases of luxury goods. Prices of handbags were collected from FashionPhile, a source that provides product authentication. The analysis attempts to understand characteristics of the FashionPhile market and how prices changed from April 28, 2006 to March 2, 2011. This thesis identifies which brands and models of handbags had the highest returns and which brands have the highest resale potential. Insight into when the highest and lowest market prices for handbags occurred for each brand is also included.

Active versus passive investing is a popular topic within the investment community and beyond. In particular, many are concerned with fund flows in and out of active and passive investments. Existing research suggests that recent returns are a reason for the capital flow from active to passive and that fees also impact flows negatively. With U.S. equity mutual funds as a proxy for active investing and U.S. equity ETFs as a proxy for passive investing, I show that prior month flows have a positive and significant relationship with current flows for both ETFs and mutual funds, as well as for flows from ETFs to mutual funds. I also show that mutual fund monthly returns have a positive relationship with flows of mutual funds and flows from ETFs to mutual funds, while ETF monthly returns have a negative relationship with flows from ETFs to mutual funds. This supports prior literature. I also find that the differential in mutual fund and ETF returns (rMF – rETF) is insignificant and negative for net fund flows into ETFs. I find a generally positive relationship between mutual fund expense ratios and flows into mutual funds, as well as with flows from ETFs to mutual funds. Finally, I find a negative relationship between ETF expense ratios and flows into ETFs, as well as with flows from ETFs to mutual funds. The relationships between expense ratios and flows mostly contradict prevailing literature, except for the relationship between ETF expense ratios and ETF flows. This suggests passive investors are potentially more price-conscious than active investors, as passive investors experience negative flows as expense ratios increase, while flows into mutual funds do not have that relationship with expense ratios. Higher fees for mutual funds may also suggest a change in the composition of mutual funds, as funds similar to ETFs exit and new mutual funds become even more active.

The thesis is focused on the area of personal finance and discusses the financing possibilities of an apartment for further renting. The thesis describes the construction of saving products and mortgage loans, law regulation, risks associated with doing business in this field and static as well as analytical methods for assessing investments. The practical part evaluates benefits of investing in a particular apartment in terms of both the above mentioned methods.

This paper considers the problematic of business cycles. The author aggregates historical findings and development of opinions of business cycles. Author also evaluates methods of business cycle measurements with the use of economic indicators, including their analysis and understanding of their logic. Goal of the paper is to find a way to analyze economic cycles for use in asset allocation for portfolio management purposes.

In the first essay, in contrast to some earlier studies, I document statistically significant within-country style effects in several emerging Asian equity market portfolios. Small capitalization and value stocks tend to outperform their style counterparts. However, there are considerable periods of time when large capitalization and growth stocks outperform. Overall, single style strategies are risky when applied to each individual market. In the second essay, I report that average return correlations among the zero-cost style portfolios are low - emphasizing the value of an intra-regional diversification strategy. These correlations exhibit significant variation over time. Measures of integration for the style portfolios are also low on average but tend to vary over time. Style returns in the original ASEAN-5 markets exhibit much higher correlations following the Asian financial crisis, and, these correlations remain elevated for several years. These results suggest that while diversification is helpful on average, there are some periods of time when a regional style rotation strategy is warranted and other times when country-specific rotation strategies are reasonable. In the third essay, I conduct bootstrap experiments on significant winner and loser continuations for each style and the style triplets in Asian emerging equity markets. I provide only modest evidence of style continuation in Asian emerging markets. I also test for style-level momentum in emerging Asia and condition style momentum returns on January, market state, monetary policy and cross-sectional dispersion. I find significant conditional style-level momentum in some Asian emerging markets but not others. I attribute the weaker style momentum results in emerging Asia to a lack of country-level style-specific derivatives in these markets.

This study was designed to yield three types of information: (1) The degree of perfection prevailing in the parimary and secondary convertible bond markets; (2) the profit potential of various investing and hedging techniques in the convertible bond market; and (3) a judgment on whether each technique can be classified as rational or irrational.

In the recent years, a new type of investments called Impact Investing has been growing rapidly. Those investments are made with the intention to improve social and/or environmental conditions in the world while generating financial returns. In this case, financial metrics are not enough to measure whether the investor objective was reached, and tools for measuring the social performance of the investments are needed. From that need, various measurement approaches were created, but the fragmentation of methods leads to a huge inefficiency in the impact investing industry. Efforts towards creating standards for measuring and reporting social performance are emerging, but there is still little understanding among impact investors about the real benefits and possible challenges the standardization would bring. In this context, an important question arises, which is the subject of study in this research: What are the potential consequences of establishing social performance standards for the impact investing industry? The purpose of this research is to analyze the possible consequences of establishing social performance standards on the impact investing industry. Qualitative approach and interpretive paradigm were chosen to be followed in this research. Primary data was collected in the form of interviews with impact investors and specialists in social performance measurement. Secondary data comes from books, articles, journals and websites. The data was analyzed using the consequences of innovations framework presented by Rogers (2003). The results suggest that obviously there are potential desirable and undesirable direct consequences, but also indirect consequences that are not perceived without a thorough analysis. Key words: Impact Investing, social performance, social performance standards, social businesses.

Triggered by the negative economic and social consequences of the 2008/09 global financial crisis, critical questions about how financial markets operate and how they benefit society have received renewed attention. In response to these questions, new investment strategies whose objectives go beyond pure financial return have emerged. Impact investing, a concept which closely co-exists with investment strategies such as socially responsible investing and responsible investing, is the latest attempt to combine financial return with a contribution to the sustainable development of society. Although still in the early days of its development, impact investing is a maturing field to the extent that it has developed into a global phenomenon with an emerging global support structure. While impact investing still occupies a tiny niche in South Africa's investment market, there is, at least compared to other developing countries on the African continent, a large community of South African impact investors who are looking to invest locally and beyond. This research investigates how far the understanding and practice of impact investing in South Africa is influenced by global efforts to build the field and to what extent context specific factors are shaping the way in which it is currently evolving. In other words, how both global convergence and local divergence mechanisms interplay to form what is the South African impact investing market. The research findings suggest that while the international movement towards the standardisation of impact investing practices has reached South Africa, context specific factors such as, among others, the social, racial and political legacy of apartheid and the existence of a sophisticated financial system are central to the way in which the field is taking shape.

Kenya has over the last few years witnessed tremendous growth as an emerging market with the GDP growing at 5% and the capital markets having a year on year growth of 19%. Despite the growth and sophistication of the financial markets, a host of hurdles have kept Kenya off the mainstream Responsible Investing agenda. This has resulted in no Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) fund assets and none of the market players being signatories to the United Nations Principles for Responsible Investing (PRI). One of the building blocks to this journey could be introducing a Sustainability Index for listed companies on the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE). This would form a basis for integrating Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) aspects into the private sector and other proponents of the society, including the public sector. This research is thus aimed at linking the growing sophistication of the financial markets in Kenya with the possible creation of a Sustainability Index. In this sense, financial markets are seen to have the power to affect social, economic, and environmental outcomes in which a Sustainability Index could become a good tool in measuring such outcomes. The study adopted a qualitative research design which was used to obtain information based on the key research questions of the study. The research findings suggest that Responsible Investing (RI) is understood within the realm of business ethics and corporate governance. RI is inferred to as a manner of doing business that goes beyond short term financial returns and also takes into account the needs of other stakeholders. ESG aspects identified from the study provide for the requisite issues out of which a Sustainability Index can be developed for measuring the impact of Responsible Investing. Within the framework of a Sustainability Index, it is clear that companies will be made more accountable; redefine their corporate boundaries and through shared value, measure the social and environmental impact of their business model. However, there is still need for increased awareness on RI, stakeholder activism and an improved regulatory framework. Embedding Responsible Investing in Kenya will entail understanding the system of actors, so as to look at opportunities of Creating Shared Value whilst setting this up in the right disclosure model.

One of the family's responsibilities is to conduct activities of early childhood education and child care which prepare children for further education and human capital development. This study focused on family behavior in allocation of time and income for investment in children. This study used a pre-existing database with a total sample of 301 rural families with one child aged 2-5 years from three villages of Agam (West Sumatera) and two villages of Wonogiri (Central Java). Interviews and testing were conducted at each sample's home. The data were analyzed using descriptive and statistical analyses. Rich and small families invested significantly more time and money in children than poor and large families. Mother's working time, child's age, and family type had negative and significant influence on the amount of time spent on children. The families that devote more time in children spend and invest less money in children. Javanese families in the study invested less money but more time in children, while Minangese families invested more money but less time. The amount of time spent for children had a positive and significant influence on the child's nutritional status, and an insignificant impact on the child's IQ score. Besides the amount of time devoted to children, the child's nutritional status also was influenced by the child's age and gender. Also, the child's IQ score was significantly and positively influenced by the father's education and negatively by family size, family type, and the child's age. Based on the findings, it was apparent that poor families may be continuously trapped in poverty, because of less ability to invest in children. Parental investment in children may lead to better child quality. This study provides evidence that mother's time spent outside the home may lead to less time investment, and less time investment may negatively influence the child's nutritional status. As policy is formulated, non-economic as well as economic aspects should be considered. Additional research is needed to further explore the most appropriate measure of child quality and the variables which influence child quality. / Ph. D.