In this paper we will be studying and backtesting a particular investment strategy by buying and holding dividend stocks. We think dividend stock is an important type of investment to investors and portfolio managers because of its cash implications, especially in a high volatility equity market. Furthermore, we think that consistency in a company’s ability and willingness in distributing dividends to its shareholders is a strong indicator of its financial strength and operational success. How portfolio managers should pick the best performing dividend stocks would then become an important issue. In this paper, we will be testing the historical performance of a portfolio of dividend stocks that we construct and adjust based on a list of parameters associated with companies’ operational performance, cash position, and dividend yield. Hence, the main way we select stocks in the portfolio is based on fundamental analysis. Our research is conducted relying exclusively on the Wharton Research Data Services database (WRDS). In addition to evaluating the investment attractiveness of our portfolio, the strategy may also have implications regarding several other topics including the semi-strong form market efficiency and active portfolio management. Therefore, this paper covers also potential benefits to be gained from the strategy other than its investment payoff.

This thesis describes a domain of interdependencies emerging in within the projects as well as between them, in situations, when these projects are about to reach the same objective using their shared deliverables or resources. In the IT projects area are such project interdependencies rather identified in majority of all ongoing projects - due to this reason, the theoretical part of this thesis describes relationship of areas of project, program and portfolio management as well as managing projects in the multi-project environment and dependency management. Based on the results of the theoretical part and acquired knowledge, the tools and techniques for managing such project interdependencies are presented in the practical part of this work. The aim of the theoretical part is to introduce the issue of management of interrelated projects and to identify the areas, in which the formation of dependencies and linkages occurs and is followed by the subsequent need of their management - then the practical part is focused on the exploration and presentation of the functionality of available tools and methods that can be used to manage projects interdependencies. When selecting the specific tools and methods, the practical part of this thesis further develops the results theoretical part and extends mapping and assignment of specific tools and methods in different areas of interdependencies and management levels. Due to this systematic approach to the interdependencies topic, which is firstly described on a theoretical level, and then extended with the practically - oriented attitude, the thesis points out where the interdependencies are, who is responsible for managing them and which tools and methods can be used to identify, describe control and work with them. A useful overview of this quite unknown area is provided by this thesis.

<p>This dissertation studies the impact of mutual fund managers' beliefs on fund performance in the first chapter and focuses on the impact of firm behavior on stock performance in the second chapter. </p> <p><br></p> <p>In the first chapter, I utilize the Revealed Preference Theory to recover fund manager belief formation directly from their actual trading activities. By relating stock holdings in a fund's portfolio to past factor returns, I document three facts about managers' belief formation: 1. In contrast to belief extrapolation, a substantial fraction of mutual fund managers act as contrarian investors who expect lower factor returns after a good factor performance; 2. Whether a fund trades in an extrapolative or contrarian way is due to its managers' expectation biases rather than fund style investment strategy, fund catering strategy or fund risk preference; and 3. Contrarian managers generate superior performance, are more experienced investors, charge higher expense ratios, and manage smaller US equity funds. The top (contrarian) managers significantly outperform the bottom (extrapolative) managers by a return of 3.4% per annum after adjusting by FFC4 factor models.</p> <p><br></p> <p>The second chapter is co-authored paper with Yan Liu and Feng Zhang. In this chapter, we systematically replicate the bulk of long-run event studies conducted in the last three decades from 1990 to 2020 using extended samples and four long-run performance measures. The final sample contains 62 papers of long-run event studies and 148 corporate events. Our findings suggest that long-run return anomalies documented in the last three decades are not robust, and firms do not earn long-run abnormal returns following various types of corporate events. Only 2% of the 148 corporate events we replicate earn post-event abnormal returns that are statistically significant at the 5% level based on all the four performance measures, and the fraction further shrinks to 0% at the 1% significance level. Viewed together, our findings suggest that these long-run abnormal returns after corporate events are likely the result of data mining or "p-hacking".</p>

The present study focuses on how the European Language Portfolio (ELP) can be used in a Swedish school. More particularly it aims at exploring how a group of teachers have adapted the use of the material to their particular pedagogical situation. It also aims at finding out what the same group of teachers identifies as the ELP’s strengths and possible weaknesses.For this purpose, a case study was carried out in which semi-structured interviews were conducted with four language teachers at an upper secondary school in the south of Sweden. Although the teachers started out using the official ELP 16+, only the language passport has been kept. The teachers have adapted the rest of the material to their own situation. Three different adaptations were identified and presented. Moreover, the teachers identified a number of areas that they saw as the ELP’s strengths. Among these areas were the material’s compatibility with the Swedish steering documents and the language biography (in adapted versions). When asked about the possible weaknesses, the teachers’ main concerns were the standard checklists and the fact that working with the ELP is time-consuming in different ways.