No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

Le secteur bancaire libanais constitue, à côté du tourisme et de l’immobilier, le socle et la clé de voûte de l’économie libanaise. Ce secteur donne l’apparence d’avoir survécu, sans grands dégâts, aux destructions des différentes guerres et crises politiques qui ont détruit une grande partie de l’infrastructure du pays. Cette résilience apparente est clamée dans les discours des dirigeants qui affirment une dichotomie entre les perturbations de l’environnement politique et la stabilité et la performance du secteur bancaire libanais. Après avoir présenté les concepts théoriques nécessaires pour l’analyse de la résilience, cette thèse a analysé la résilience de ce secteur à plusieurs niveaux : d’abord au niveau des banques libanaises, à travers un modèle à deux régimes ayant pour échantillon l’ensemble des grandes banques, en distinguant entre la performance des banques cotées et non cotées ; ensuite à travers une étude VAR, reliant les variables bancaires aux variables macroéconomiques, et estimant leur réaction aux impulsions simulant les chocs. Les résultats ont confirmé la résilience du secteur bancaire libanais face aux crises. Cependant, des renforcements aux conditions qui améliorent la résilience sont à apporter. / The Lebanese banking sector is the cornerstone of the Lebanese economy, next to tourism and real estate. This sector gives the impression of having harmlessly survived the numerous destructions of different wars and political crisis that have battered the Lebanese environment. This apparent resilience is omnipresent in the speeches of political leaders of Lebanon, who claim a dichotomy between the perturbations of political environment and the performance and stability of the Lebanese banking sector. Once the study has been situated in its Lebanese context, and the theoretical concepts necessary for the study of resilience have been presented, this research studies this sectors’ resilience at multiple levels: First, at the level of the Lebanese banks, through a 2 stages model, distinguishing between the performances of the listed and non-listed Lebanese banks. Once the resilience of the banking sector was proven, the second step is to confirm it at the level of the macroeconomic determinants of the banking performance through a study using the VAR methodology, testing the interaction between the banking variables and the macroeconomic data, and their reaction to impulsions, simulating exogenous shocks. Our results confirmed the resilience of the Lebanese banking sector to shocks; although numerous measures are still to be taken to improve the governance and the resilience of the sector.

No / This paper seeks to contribute to the existing business strategy and the environment literature by examining the effect of governance structures on environmental performance within a unique context of improving environmental governance, policies, regulations and management. Specifically, we investigate the extent to which corporate board gender diversity, including the proportion, age and level of education of female directors, affect environmental performance of Chinese publicly listed corporations. Using one of the largest Chinese datasets to-date, consisting of a sample of 383 listed A-shares from 2011 to 2015 (i.e., observations of 1,674), our findings are three-fold. First, we find that the proportion and age of female directors have a positive effect on the overall corporate environmental performance. Second, our findings indicate that the proportion and age of female directors also have a positive effect on the three individual environmental performance components, namely environmental (i) strategy, (ii) implementation and (iii) disclosure, respectively. Finally, and by contrast, we do not find any evidence that suggests that the level of education of female directors has any impact on environmental performance, neither the overall environmental performance measure nor its individual components. Our findings have important implication for regulators and policy-makers. Our evidence is robust to controlling for alternative measures, other governance and firm-level control variables, and possible endogeneities. We interpret our findings within a multi-theoretical framework that draws insights from agency, legitimacy, neo-institutional, resource dependence, stakeholder, and tokenism theoretical perspectives.

The thesis examines the efficacy of the provisions of Saudi Company Law 1965 in terms of protecting the rights of minority shareholders in joint stock companies (JSCs). The aim is to assess the effectiveness of the current form of SCL 1965 in this regard and to suggest a reform scheme. This research finds that SCL 1965 does not adequately provide minority shareholders with all the rights that they should enjoy. Accordingly, minority shareholders are often subject to the controlling influence of majority shareholders, who are generally in charge of the company’s management. As a result, minority shareholders either do not exercise or do not enjoy certain rights, and they therefore forfeit their natural and intended role under this law, which is to oversee and control the activities of the board of the company, and in so doing to defend their interests. Despite the Saudi government intentions to conduct a range of reforms, particularly in the field of trade, SCL 1965 has not been modified to any significant degree; it is still not sufficiently effective, and does not address many important points relating to shareholders’ rights in listed companies. Therefore, there are important decisions that need to be made on the part of the Saudi legislature in terms of improving the investment environment in KSA, including improving the level of protection for investors in JSCs; these decisions will help to attract more investors into the Saudi financial market. This thesis suggests ways in which to improve the level of protection for minority shareholders in Saudi listed companies against any encroachment on their interests within the company. In this respect, it suggests recasting the provisions relating to minority shareholders, especially SCL 1965.

The thesis aims to examine how well two standardised methods in nature conservation, namely natural value assessment and key biotope inventory, perform in terms of recognising an area with a high amount of red listed and bioindicator fungi. The two methods are compared to see if any method is superior to find areas with high presence of red listed and bioindicator fungi and if a larger area automatically means a larger number of species. A natural value assessment inventory is conducted on study sites with a performed key biotope inventory, with an addition of an inventory on fungi. Statistical tests are completed to give information about occurring correlations. The results display that the key biotope inventory and the natural value assessment do not differ in their evaluations of an area. Analysis also shows that there is no relationship between the forest sites area and the assessment performed by the natural value assessment. However, if the assessment is performed by the key biotope inventory there exist a relationship with the forest sites area. Further on, there is no correlation between the area and its number of species. The tests also indicate that neither of the methods predict presence or the number of red listed and bioindicator species in a forest. Based on the results, the presence of bioindicator and red listed species alone are not good indicators of forest nature value. In order to give more credible answers to these questions, more studies with increased number of replicates should be conducted. / Avhandlingen syftar till att undersöka hur bra två standardmetoder inom naturvården (Skogsbiologernas naturvärdesbedömning och Nyckelbiotopsinventering) är på att upptäcka ett områdes förekomst av rödlistade svampar och signalarter. Metoderna jämförs för att upptäcka om någon metod är överlägsen den andra angående att finna områden med stor förekomst av rödlistade svampar och signalarter samt om ett större område automatiskt innebär fler arter. Detta undersöks genom att Skogsbiologernas naturvärdesbedömning utförs på områden som redan inventerats utifrån en Nyckelbiotopsinventering med tillägg av en svampinventering. Statistiska analyser genomförs därefter för att ge svar om förekommande samband. Analyser visar att Nyckelbiotopsinventeringen och Skogsbiologernas naturvärdesbedömning inte skiljer sig angående bedömningen av skogsområden. Utförda statistiska testerna tyder även på att det inte förekommer något samband mellan bedömda områdens areal och dess bedömning enligt Skogsbiologernas bedömning, däremot finns det ett samband mellan områdenas areal och Nyckelbiotopsinventeringens bedömning. Det förekommer dock inget art-area samband. Utförda tester indikerar även att ingen av metoderna kan förutsäga mängden rödlistade svampar samt signalarter i ett skogsområde. Baserat på detta resultat ger förekomsten av signalarter samt rödlistade svamparter ingen bra indikation på en skogs naturvärde. För att ge mer trovärdiga svar på dessa frågor krävs mer studier med en ökad mängd replikat.

The first essay examines the impact of investor protection, market monitoring, and liquidity on the firm-level and country-level earnings management using a sample of 432 firms from 34 countries cross-listed in the U.S. The major findings are as follows: First, cross-listed firms from countries with strong legal system, strong outside investor rights, more institutional investors, and higher financial transparency are less likely to engage in earnings management. In addition, in countries with strong investor protection or market monitoring, the level of earnings management is more pronounced for illiquid firms as compared to liquid firms. Second, cross-listed firms following IFRS have lower propensity in earnings management than those following the U.S. GAAP. Third, the degree of earnings management for cross-listed firms is greater in the home country than in the U.S. market. Fourth, cross-listed firms have higher earnings management in the pre-listing period than in the post-listing period. Fifth, foreign firms listed in U.S. major markets have lower propensity to engage in earnings management than those listed in the OTC market. The findings remain robust with the inclusion of industry fixed effects and GMM estimation. All findings are largely consistent with my hypotheses that better investor protection, greater market monitoring, and higher liquidity reduce the extent of earnings management. The second essay examines the relative contribution to price discovery process of EURO/USD currency futures traded on two major exchanges: Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) and Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), using the intraday data in 2010. The relative contribution to price discovery is estimated using the information share approach of Hasbrouck (1995). Empirical findings indicate that CME accounts for approximately 87% of price discovery in the EURO/USD market and its contribution is substantially larger in the morning than that in the afternoon. This study also examines the effect of trading characteristics, including volume, quoted bid-ask spread, and price volatility, on information share. CME’s price discovery leadership is attributed to its high trading activity, low transaction costs, and lower volatility. The results support the liquidity hypothesis that a market with greater liquidity contributes more to price discovery.

L’objectif de cette thèse est de discerner les originalités des sociétés familiales non cotées par rapport au gouvernement d’entreprise. On s’intéresse aux sociétés non cotées parce que les préoccupations sur le gouvernement d’entreprise se focalisent plutôt sur les grandes entreprises multinationales. Cependant, les sociétés familiales non cotées, actuellement la forme la plus répandue de l’initiative privée, posent de problèmes particuliers de gouvernement d’entreprise, parce que le lien entre famille et entreprise génère de conflits d’intérêts que la grande société cotée ne connaît pas. Premièrement, on expose les raisons pour lesquelles le gouvernement d’entreprise prend une importance plus cruciale dans ces sociétés. Il s’agit de montrer l’existence d’un particularisme s’agissant de la configuration de propriété, de gestion et de contrôle, puisque ces sociétés comportent la particularité de se trouver au croisement de deux systèmes ; la famille et l’entreprise (TITRE I). L’entreprise familiale se comporterait différemment vu que la composante familiale prédomine et influence le processus de prise de décision et les mécanismes de contrôle de la direction. LE TITRE II est consacré à la proposition d’ un ensemble de mesures susceptibles, à notre avis, de rendre son efficacité au système de gouvernance de la société familiale non cotée : une modification de la culture qui prévaut au sein des conseils; un renforcement de l’expertise et une amélioration de l’information des administrateurs ; la stricte séparation des fonctions de direction et de contrôle. / This thesis aims to discern the particularities of family non -listed companies in relation to corporate governance. It isspecially focussed in non-listed companies, because research on corporate governance has been so far focussed on largemultinational firms. Non-listed family firms, nowadays the most common form of private initiative, pose particular problems of corporate governance, since the interconnection between family and company is a source of conflicts of interest that a public company does not face. Initially, the reasons why corporate governance has a crucial importance in this type of enterprise – due to its unique nature- are presented. This is to demonstrate the existence of uniqueness with regard to the configuration of ownership, management and control, as these companies have the distinction of being at the crossroads of two divergent systems: family and enterprise (Part I). The family business behaves differently because the family component predominates and undoubtedly influences the processes of decision making, control mechanisms and overall management. Part 2 is devoted to the proposal of a set of measures which, make ensure the effectiveness of the governance system of a non-listed family enterprise. It essentially entails a step change in the prevailing culture of the boards, a strengthening of expertise and improved information and management. The strict separation of management and control is also proposed.

Nesta dissertação entende-se Governança Corporativa como um conjunto de práticas empresariais potencialmente relacionadas com o desempenho operacional e o desempenho frente ao mercado de capitais, seguindo estudos que têm sugerido essa relação. A pesquisa se propôs a investigar, no caso das companhias abertas brasileiras, a significância do pertencimento aos segmentos diferenciados de listagem da Bolsa de Valores do Estado de São Paulo (BM&FBOVESPA) sobre os indicadores de resultado operacional das empresas listadas no Brasil, mais especificamente em relação aos retornos sobre ativos (ROA) e sobre patrimônio líquido (ROE), e a outros indicadores lastreados no lucro antes de juros e impostos (EBIT) e no lucro antes de juros, impostos, depreciação e amortização (EBITDA). Empregaram-se, aqui, métodos quantitativos em um modelo de regressão linear. O trabalho teve como referência principal o artigo de Brown e Caylor (Corporate Governance and Firm Operating Performance, 2009). Os resultados foram mistos e inconclusos em termos de significância, ao modelar ROA, ROE e indicadores baseados em EBIT e EBITDA, contra os segmentos de listagem, mesmo empregando variáveis de controle como o valor de mercado, a razão entre o patrimônio líquido e o valor de mercado, e o endividamento das empresas. Recomenda-se, assim, para estudos futuros, aprofundar a análise e a determinação das variáveis de controle, além de buscar atenuar as limitações devidas à endogeneidade e à causalidade reversa, pelo uso de variáveis instrumentais, e pelo emprego de métodos econométricos mais robustos, como equações estruturais. / In this research, we understand corporate governance as a set of corporate practices potentially related to the operational performance and to the capital market performance of the firm, following several studies that have suggested such a relationship. The research intended to investigate whether there is a significant relationship between the listing in BM&FBOVESPA’s higher corporate governance segments, and the operational indicators of listed Brazilian companies, more specifically, return on assets (ROA) and return on equity (ROE), as well as other earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) and earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) related indicators. Quantitative methods – linear regressions – were employed. The main reference for the research was Brown and Caylor’s article (Corporate Governance and Firm Operating Performance, 2009). The results were mixed and not conclusive in terms of significance, when modeling ROA, ROE and the other performance indicators in relation to the listing segments, despite market value, equity divided by market value, and debt to equity ratio as control variables. The study recommends future deeper analyses and selection of control variables, as well as addressing endogeneity and reverse causality limitations through the use of instrumental variables, and more robust econometric models such as structural equations modeling (SEM).