Farmers’ markets are venues that can reflect the activity and composition of the hosting community. Within certain guidelines, WIC, FMNP, and SNAP can be utilized at participating farmers’ markets. My study examines how farmers’ markets managers and vendors decide whether to accept food entitlement program coupons, especially comparing the decision-making process between participating and non-participating markets. The influence of community ties and addressing local hunger needs in the decision-making process and the level of cooperation in making that decision are also investigated. Fourteen semi-structured interviews with managers and vendors of eight Midwestern farmers’ markets were conducted. Findings indicate that farmers’ markets with goals to improve local food security and that are collaborative and seek to build consensus, knowledgeable about food entitlement programs while also holding them in positive regard, and exhibit strong interpersonal relationships between market actors and community residents display greater tendencies to accept food entitlement program coupons. / Department of Sociology

Resumé Irena Valentová Financial Markets Supervision Fragmented, and therefore insufficient, and ineffective regulation of and supervision over financial markets was blamed to be one of the main sources of the recent economic crisis, that manifested in 2008. The main theme of the present thesis consists of the changes in the institutional framework of financial markets supervision in the European Union introduced as a reaction to the recent economic crisis. The first part of the present thesis composed of chapters two, three, and four, deals with definition of some expressions used in the second part of the thesis, namely: financial markets, regulation and supervision of financial markets. The concept of financial market is explained, its components as well as structure described. Next, several reasons leading to need of effective regulation are brought and discussed and, finally, the concept of supervision as used in the context of financial markets is established. The second part of the thesis composed of chapters five and six, describes the current status of institutional framework of financial markets supervision. First, in chapter five, current situation in the Czech republic is briefly described. Chapter six, in turn, deals with the naissance of European System of Financial Supervision. The...

M.Comm. / This study investigates the extent to which South African financial markets are globalised and thus, during the period 1994–2008, integrated with global financial markets. The impact of globalisation on the South African economy is complex. South Africa re-entered the international economy from isolation at a time when the forces of globalisation, especially for developing countries, seemed to gain momentum. The following study focus on equity, foreign exchange and bond markets. The period under study is divided between 1994-2008 and 2000-2008, with the exception of the bond market where the data was challenging to source. Empirical evidence suggests that South African financial markets together with those in emerging economies became increasingly globalised during the period 1994–2008. Analysis finds that South Africa’s equity markets were integrated as common/global factors influenced the markets during the period 1994-2008. According to the findings, SA was even more integrated than the average emerging economies in our sample as global/common factors influenced more of SA equity returns than in emerging economies. However, in general, developed economies were more globalised in both periods under study. However, analysis indicates that common factors play a larger role in determining the fluctuations in the foreign exchange market rather than in equity markets. This implies that foreign exchange markets are more globalised and integrated than equity markets. Global factors only determined 48% of the movement South Africa’s currency during the period 1994-2008, while global factors were more significant in the movement of developed and emerging economies’ currencies during the same period. However, SA foreign exchange market’s integration into the global markets increased with 2000-2008 variance share increasing to 0.97, implying that global factor were responsible the 97% of the variation in the exchange rate – higher than the average variance share recorded for developed and emerging economies. Finally, results for the bond markets show that SA bond market was also closely integrated with global markets although the level of integration was less than that recorded in the foreign exchange rate markets during the 2000-2008.

Magister Commercii - MCom / Since the discovery of herding behaviour in financial markets in the 1990s, it has become an area of interest for many investors, practitioners and scholars. Herding behaviour occurs when investors and market participants trade in the same direction during the same time period, as a result of the influence of other investors. Studies on herding behaviour have been undertaken in both the developed and developing economies and majority of these studies have confirmed the existence of herding behaviour in the stock markets. Despite its tremendous growth, the South African financial markets are not immune to such market anomaly. Herding behaviour on the JSE was first investigated in 2002 focusing in the unit trust industry on the South African stock market. Motivated by this, this study assessed the presence of herding behaviour using the Johannesburg Securities Exchange tradable sector indices. Four indices were employed, namely Financials, Industrials and Resources and were benchmarked against the JSE All Share Index for the period from January 2007 to December 2017. The industrials index ((FINI15) constitutes of 25 largest industrial stocks by market capitalization, the financials index (FINI15) comprises of 15 largest financial stocks by market capitalization, the resources index (RESI10) which represents 10 largest resources stocks by market capitalization and lastly the FTSE/JSE All Share Index defined as a market capitalization-weighted index which is made up of 150 JSE listed companies and is the largest index in terms of size and overall value JSE. The FTSE/JSE All Share Index was used as a benchmark for investors to check how volatile an investment is. The South African economy experienced the effects of the 2008 global financial crisis from 01 July 2007 to 31 August 2009. This study split the examination period into three categories namely before the global financial crises which was the period starting from 1 January 2007 to 30 June 2007, then the period during the global financial crisis which was from 1 July 2007 to 31 August 2009 and lastly the period after the global financial crises which was from 1 September 2009 to 31 December 2017. Apart from the diversity of the indices, the length of the examination period also had a significant influence towards the magnitude of herding behaviour on the JSE.

Thesis (M.M. (Finance & Investment))--University of the Witwatersrand, Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, Graduate School of Business Administration, 2015. / Researchers have suggested that emerging markets’ activity is driven largely by unlisted companies. These companies are dynamic, and show a relatively equitable income distribution. However, they operate under severe challenges which can be a deterrent to their success. In spite of these difficulties, the companies form exceptional investment targets due to their innovative abilities, ability to customize products and formulate business models that reduce bottlenecks and input costs as well as take advantage of economies of scale and scope. Important risk factors such as: political, currency, corporate governance and information risks, amongst others, should be factored in during the valuation process of emerging market companies. In this paper, several criteria are used to assess thirteen popular emerging market valuation models’ ability to effectively incorporate these risks. Based on the outcomes of the assessment a best fit model is selected. However, none of the emerging market valuation models explicitly factor in irrationality of market participants. In order to address this, the study focuses on seven behavioural approaches to valuation under the assumption of investor rationality and managerial overconfidence and/or optimism, with a purpose to select one to include in the above mentioned “best fit” emerging market valuation models. Next, assessment mechanisms for adapting these two models for private company valuation were flagged by discussing approaches currently used in academia and corporate finance. Finally, possible means of combining the three objectives, and assessing the success of doing so, as an area for further research, were recommended. Key Words: emerging markets, valuation, risk premium, country risk, systematic risk, unsystematic risk, private companies, managerial overconfidence, managerial optimism, irrationality, efficient markets, capital asset pricing model

A pesquisa toma como objeto os discursos e práticas utilizados por participantes do mercado de cervejas artesanais, surgido no Brasil a partir dos anos 1990, a fim de explorar como estes estabelecem uma identidade própria do artesanal, classificando-o como categoria à parte no mundo dos bens e, logo, um mercado à parte no universo das cervejas. Esta análise permite refletir acerca do papel dos discursos e das interações entre produtores e consumidores para o estabelecimento de uma identidade própria, dialogando com a literatura em sociologia econômica preocupada com as dinâmicas de emergência e estabelecimento de nichos de mercado ou mercados em si. Assim, também é perpassada por uma preocupação com a dimensão cultural destes processos, entendida como um trabalho ativo de classificação e valoração dos bens. Estes discursos e suas implicações são captados por meio de entrevistas e etnografias realizadas em feiras e eventos de cerveja, momentos em que os discursos de produtores entram em contato diretamente com consumidores, e permitem observar as implicações práticas destas dimensões discursivas. Nestas, um elemento central de análise é a figura do outro, com a noção de alteridade e oposição atribuída às grandes empresas do ramo cervejeiros, referidas como grandes indústrias. Ao restituir como se dá o processo de construção destas identidades partidas entre o grande e o artesanal, bem como quais as dinâmicas que se formam neste universo, exploramos novas possibilidades na interpretação dos processos de competição e emergência de mercados. / The object study for this research are the discourses and practices from craft beer Market agents, which emerged in Brazil in the 1990s, in order to explore how this agents establish their own craft identity, being able to classify it as a new consumption category in the world of goods, apart from common beer. This analysis allows reflection upon the role discourses and interactions among producers and consumers for the establishment of this own identity, in conversation with the wider literature in Economic Sociology which focuses on the emergence and establishment of new markets or Market niches. This work is thus also permeated by the cultural dimension of these processes, which are to be understood as active classification and valuation works. Discourses and their implications are captured through interviews and ethnographic incursions in beer events, moments in which producers may directly talk to consumers, which allow us to perceive practical implications of these discursive dimensions. Among them, one of the key elements is the role of the other, with otherness and oppositions attributed to the big beer companies. By recapturing the process of how identities split between craft and big are built, we explore new opportunities of interpreting competition and emerging markets.

O objetivo desta dissertação é analisar a evolução, principalmente nas últimas três décadas, e a configuração atual da indústria siderúrgica no Brasil sob a ótica do paradigma estrutura-conduta-desempenho (ECD), desenvolvido por Joe Bain, e das teorias de estrutura de mercado (em especial das teorias de submercados e de rotas tecnológicas) de John Sutton (1991 e 1998). Pretende-se elucidar as seguintes indagações: o por quê das usinas integradas se manterem no Brasil frente à ascensão das aciarias elétricas (mini-mills) que ocorre no cenário mundial? Qual é a evolução tecnológica dessa indústria e seus impactos sobre sua estrutura? E, por fim, quais são as razões para o uso tanto de carvão vegetal quanto de carvão mineral na produção de aço bruto em grande escala no Brasil, mas não em outros países? Os dois arcabouços teóricos considerados auxiliam na explicação de na indústria siderúrgica do Brasil haver dois submercados independentes que se diferenciam por suas rotas tecnológicas (usinas integradas versus usinas semi-integradas) e por sua classe de produtos (aços planos versus aços longos). Sob a ótica da teoria de Sutton (1998) ainda é possível fazer algumas inferências quanto à tomada de decisão em nível da empresa, a qual se depara com duas estratégias distintas: a de escalada e a de proliferação. A primeira diz respeito ao montante ao ser investido em P&D e a segunda se refere em quantas trajetórias e diferentes grupos de produtos a empresa irá atuar. Diante dessa segmentação da indústria buscou-se, a partir de análise econométrica, considerando os anos de 1996 a 2009, fundamentar as premissas de que tais submercados (aços longos versus planos) têm dinâmicas distintas nas relações entre concentração e investimentos, sendo possível identificar relação causal positiva entre investimentos em tecnologia e concentração na produção, principalmente no submercado produtor de aços longos, ou seja, à medida que aumentam os investimentos em tecnologia, a indústria tem sua estrutura alterada, passando a integrar suas rotas tecnológicas e, consequentemente, elevando a concentração do mercado. Já no submercado de aços planos, fica ilustrada a maturidade deste segmento da indústria siderúrgica no Brasil, com a concentração sendo marginalmente reduzida diante de variações no tamanho do mercado e nos investimentos. Além disso, os resultados econométricos mostram que, em ambos os submercados analisados (aço planos e longos), o papel do BNDES não foi fundamental em afetar a concentração no período de 1996 a 2009, apesar de ter tido esse papel em anos anteriores. / The objective of this dissertation is to analyze the evolution of the steel industry, mainly in the last three decades, and its recent configuration in Brazil under structureconduct- performance paradigm and Sutton\'s theories. It is aimed to answer some questions, such as: why the integrated mills still exist in Brazil as the mini-mills are surging in the world scenario; what is this industry technology evolution and how does it affect the industry structure? And so far, which are the main reasons to the existing of steel mills based on charcoal and coal at the same time, rather than in other countries? The two theoretical frameworks interact in the explanation of the existing of two independent submarkets in the steel industry in Brazil that are distinguished by their technological trajectories (integrated versus mini-mills) and by their list of products (flat versus long steel). From the Sutton\'s theory perspective, it is still possible to highlight some topics related to the firm decisionmaking level, which is faced with two distinct strategies: the escalation and the proliferation parameters. The first is related to the amount to be invested in R&D and the later refers to how many trajectories and groups the company will operate. Based on econometric analysis, in the time period from 1996 to 2009, are valid the assumptions that these submarkets have different dynamics in the relationship between concentration and investments. Also it is possible to identify positive causal effects concerning technology investments and industry concentration mainly on the long steel submarket, reflecting that as investments are increased, the industry structure is amended to integrate their technology trajectories and thus increasing industry concentration. About flat steel submarket it is showed the maturity of this segment as the concentration is marginally reduced in response to variations in market size and investment. Furthermore, in both submarkets (flat and long steel) it is evident that the BNDES\'s role was not crucial in affecting the concentration in the time period from 1996 to 2009, despite having had this role in previous years.

A sinalização, formação e descoberta de preços agrícolas são adequadas se refletem rapidamente todas as informações recebidas pelos seus participantes. Então, quando o mercado é eficiente, possibilita eficiência alocativa, redução de imprecisão nas decisões dos agentes e dos custos informacionais. Entretanto, os agentes do agronegócio podem tomar decisões errôneas de produção, comercialização e estocagem, sujeitas ao conjunto de informações incompletas contidas nos preços passados, se os mercados forem não eficientes. Nesse contexto, o objetivo geral foi analisar a eficiência dos mercados futuros de commodities. Para atingi-lo, estruturou-se esta pesquisa em três ensaios. No primeiro, objetivou-se testar a hipótese de passeio aleatório a contratos futuros agropecuários negociados na BM&FBOVESPA. Refutá-la significa possível previsibilidade e, por conseguinte, os mercados não seriam fracamente eficientes. Correlações seriais e testes de razão de variância foram utilizados para verificá-las. Os resultados deram suporte à hipótese de passeio aleatório nos mercados futuros de café e da soja, eficientes na forma fraca, e evidências contrárias foram encontradas nos mercados do boi gordo, milho e etanol. No segundo, o objetivo foi investigar a eficiência e formações de clusters nos contratos futuros do complexo soja (soja, farelo de soja e óleo de soja) negociados nas bolsas de commodities: argentina, brasileira, chinesa, indiana, japonesa, norte-americana e sul-africana. Com base na métrica obtida por distância euclidiana de razões de variância, evidenciaram-se dependências similares dos mercados, as quais podem ser interpretadas como efeito espraiamento da eficiência informacional. Os agentes devem, portanto, manter percepções em relação aos diversos mercados devido às sinalizações interdependentes dos preços. No terceiro, objetivou-se analisar a eficiência dos mercados futuros agropecuários brasileiros, sob a hipótese adaptativa de mercado. Utilizando propostas recentes à não linearidade e razão de variância, encontrou-se que as elevadas rejeições à hipótese de diferença martingal se encontram nos mercados em que as intervenções governamentais se fazem presentes: milho e etanol. Nos mercados de café, boi gordo e soja ocorreram menores rejeições à hipótese martingal e, portanto, houve maior eficiência informacional. Essas evidências--consistentes com a hipótese adaptativa dos mercados--justificam operações de hedge dinâmicas, bem como a gerência de carteiras de investimentos de forma ativa. / Agricultural prices\' formation, discovery and signalling only are accurate when they can rapidly reflect all new information faced by its market agents. Thereby, when a given market is efficient, it allows for allocative efficiency, reducing inefficiencies both in decision-making process and in informational costs. On the other hand, when markets are said not to be efficient, agribusinesses\' agents can make mistaken production, marketing and storage decisions, once such decisions are due to incomplete information contained in past prices. In this context, the main purpose of this study is to analyze the efficiency in future markets of commodities. In order to achieve its final goal, the study has been structured in three essays. In the first essay, the random walk hypothesis has been tested for agricultural future contracts from Brazilian Securities, Commodities and Futures Exchange (BMF&BOVESPA). Refusing the hypothesis for a given commodity implies some degree of predictability, therefore inconsistent even with a weak notion of efficiency. These tests were carried out using serial correlations and variance ratios. The results show the presence of random walks in coffee and soybean future markets, and contrary evidences (absence of random walks) in live cattle, corn and ethanol future markets. In the second essay, it has been analyzed the efficiency and the presence of clusters in the soybean complex future contracts (soybean, soybean meal and soybean oil) traded in the following future markets: Argentina (MTB), Brazil (BVMF), China (DCE), India (NCD), Japan (TKT), US (CBT) and South-Africa (SAF). Based on the metrics obtained by Euclidian distances of variance ratios, similar dependencies have been found for all markets, which suggest informational efficiency spreading. Agents, therefore, shall maintain perceptions over several international markets, given the interdependence found for prices in distinct future markets. In the third one, the adaptive market hypothesis has been tested for agricultural future markets in Brazil. Applying more recent approaches to Nonlinearity and Variance Ratio tests, high rejections to martingale difference hypothesis took place in agricultural markets which governmental interference is highly persistent, i.e., corn and ethanol. In coffee, live cattle and soybeans markets, weaker rejections to the martingale hypothesis hint higher informational efficiency. These evidences, consistent with the adaptive market hypothesis, justify dynamic hedge operations, as well as an active management of investment portfolios in such markets.

Cheng Koon Chung Vincent. / "Architecture Department, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Master of Architecture Programme 1998-99, design report." / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 93-94). / Programming report / Synopsis --- p.3 / Objectives --- p.4-5 / Planning in a living quarter / Proposal / Background --- p.6-13 / Hui - a traditional Chinese market place / Urbanization in Tuen Mun / Shopping/ retailing mode in living quarter / Pedestrianization in a living quarter / Summary / Site and context --- p.14-20 / General background / Zoning in central Tuen Mun district / Historical background / Social background / Ongoing development / Physical condition --- p.21-26 / Regional geography / Town center and its neighborhood / Pedestrian flow / Transportation / Pedestrian network / Traffic system / Fabric of San Hui / Local walking journey / Problems and opportunities --- p.27-29 / Urban deficiencies / Social deficiencies / Renewal and redevelopment potential / Client profile --- p.30-31 / Client scenario / Client's goal / User identification / Constraints --- p.32-34 / Use control / Density control / Programming method --- p.35 / Mission --- p.36 / Issues --- p.37-44 / Pedestrian circulation / Image / Interaction / Convenience and connection / Activities scenario --- p.45 / Schedule of accomodation --- p.46 / Budget estimation --- p.47 / Case study --- p.48-56 / Design report / Project goals --- p.57 / Urban proposal --- p.58-64 / Phase one / Phase two / Phase three / development / conclusion / Building design --- p.65-69 / concept / conceptual layout / functional relationship / massing studies / circulation diagram / Structural consideration --- p.70 / Building services consideration --- p.71 / Final Presentation --- p.72-83 / Appendix --- p.84-90 / Notes --- p.91-92 / Bibliography --- p.93-94

Thesis. 1976. M.ArchAS--Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Architecture. / Microfiche copy available in Archives and Rotch. / Bibliography: leaves 72-73. / M.ArchAS