4,564 research outputs found
Attacking Anonymity Set in Tornado Cash via Wallet Fingerprints
No full textopenTornado Cash is a decentralized application (dApp) that runs on Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) compatible networks to enhance users’ privacy in terms of user transaction history over the blockchain. The dApp achieves this goal by enabling users to deposit currencies into designated pools and subsequently withdraw them, severing the link between depositor and withdrawer addresses. At deposit time, Tornado Cash communicates to users the level of privacy they will benefit from (anonymity set) by depositing currencies into one of its pools. Existing analyses have indicated discrepancies between the claimed anonymity set and the actual level of privacy provided, primarily attributed to users’ incorrect utilization of the dApp. The current project aims to explore a new way to challenge the dApp proposed anonymity set by examining wallet fingerprints, a factor not directly related to user behavior within the application. The findings of this research shed light on the potential for creating links between clusters of users in TC according to the new proposed approach and raise a privacy concern within the Ethereum network
Incentivising Safe Sex: A Randomised Trial of Conditional Cash Transfers for HIV and Sexually Transmitted Infection Prevention in Rural Tanzania.
No full textThe authors evaluated the use of conditional cash transfers as an HIV and sexually transmitted infection prevention strategy to incentivise safe sex. An unblinded, individually randomised and controlled trial. 10 villages within the Kilombero/Ulanga districts of the Ifakara Health and Demographic Surveillance System in rural south-west Tanzania. The authors enrolled 2399 participants, aged 18-30 years, including adult spouses. Participants were randomly assigned to either a control arm (n=1124) or one of two intervention arms: low-value conditional cash transfer (eligible for 20 per testing round, n=615). The authors tested participants every 4 months over a 12-month period for the presence of common sexually transmitted infections. In the intervention arms, conditional cash transfer payments were tied to negative sexually transmitted infection test results. Anyone testing positive for a sexually transmitted infection was offered free treatment, and all received counselling. The primary study end point was combined prevalence of the four sexually transmitted infections, which were tested and reported to subjects every 4 months: Chlamydia trachomatis, Neisseria gonorrhoeae, Trichomonas vaginalis and Mycoplasma genitalium. The authors also tested for HIV, herpes simplex virus 2 and syphilis at baseline and month 12. At the end of the 12-month period, for the combined prevalence of any of the four sexually transmitted infections, which were tested and reported every 4 months (C trachomatis, N gonorrhoeae, T vaginalis and M genitalium), unadjusted RR for the high-value conditional cash transfer arm compared to controls was 0.80 (95% CI 0.54 to 1.06) and the adjusted RR was 0.73 (95% CI 0.47 to 0.99). Unadjusted RR for the high-value conditional cash transfer arm compared to the low-value conditional cash transfer arm was 0.76 (95% CI 0.49 to 1.03) and the adjusted RR was 0.69 (95% CI 0.45 to 0.92). No harm was reported. Conditional cash transfers used to incentivise safer sexual practices are a potentially promising new tool in HIV and sexually transmitted infections prevention. Additional larger study would be useful to clarify the effect size, to calibrate the size of the incentive and to determine whether the intervention can be delivered cost effectively. NCT00922038 ClinicalTrials.gov
Food Stamp Benefits Adjust to Earnings with and without Cross-Program Effects from TANF and SSI Cash Assistance
No full textAs households participating in the Food Stamp Program and other public assistance programs work more, the additional earnings are partially offset by a reduction in food stamp benefits and cash assistance from Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) or Supplemental Security Income (SSI). The rate at which food stamp benefits and TANF or SSI cash assistance are reduced with an increase in earnings is referred to as the programs effective benefit reduction rate (EBRR). This report derives FSP EBRRs for earnings with and without cross-program effects from adjustments to TANF or SSI cash assistance due to the additional earnings. The estimated FSP EBRRs are combined with TANF EBRRs and SSI EBRRs to estimate an effective tax rate on earnings in terms of these program benefits. With the authority for TANF programs devolved to States in 1996 Welfare Reform Law, FSP and TANF EBRRs as well as effective tax rates on earnings will vary by State. This report illustrates the treatment of earnings among these programs and the variation in treatment across states.Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,
Strategic Liquidity Supply and Security Design
No full textWe study how securities and trading mechanisms can be designed to optimally mitigate the adverse impact of market imperfections on liquidity. Asset owners seek to obtain liquidity by selling their claims on future cash-flows, on which they have private information. Our analysis encompasses both the cases of competitive and monopolistic liquidity supply. In the optimal trading mechanism associated to an arbitrary given security, issuers with low cash-flows sell their entire holdings of the security, while issuers with larger cash-flows are typically excluded from trade. By designing the security optimally, issuers can eshew exclusion altogether. The optimal security is debt. Because of its low informational sensitivity, debt mitigates the adverse selection problem. Furthermore, by pooling all issuers with high cash-flows, debt also reduces the ability of a monopolistic liquidity supplier to exclude them from trade in order to better extract rents from issuers with low cash-flows.Security design, liquidity, mechanism design, adverse selection, financial markets imperfections.
Does Industry Affect the Cash Flow Statement Presentation Format?
No full textThe statement of cash flows of a business can be presented by using either the direct method (DM) or the indirect method (IM). In United States, only a small portion of businesses use the DM. Compared to the IM, the DM has been shown to provide incremental information in predicting future cash flows. Furthermore, the DM can also improve the ability to compare the individual component of cash receipts and cash payments among similar companies over a period of time. This study finds that firms choosing the DM tend to be in high tech industries.</jats:p
Economic determinants and consequences of direct method cash flow disclosure
No full textThe statement of cash flows of a business can be presented by using either the direct method (DM) or the indirect method (IM). In United States, only a small portion of businesses use the DM. Compared to the IM, the DM has been shown to provide incremental information in predicting future cash flows. Furthermore, the DM can also improve the ability to compare the individual component of cash receipts and cash payments among similar companies over a period of time. However, the direct method is more costly to implement. Given the high costs associated with the DM, why do some firms continue to use the DM? What are the benefits in choosing the DM? This study investigates how firms choose between the DM and the IM. In order to answer this question, this study explores the economic determinants and consequences if firms adopt the DM instead of the IM. This study finds that firms choosing the DM tend to (1) be in high tech industries, (2) be in relatively less competitive industries, (3) have higher leverage ratio and (4) have higher earnings quality. This study further explores the possible consequences if firms select the DM. The results indicate that analysts' cash flow forecasts are more accurate for firms employing DM than those using IM to present the statement of cash flows. Finally, this study shows that firms with the DM cash flow disclosure will have lower cost of debt in comparison to those choosing the IM. This study provides comprehensive empirical evidence about the determinants and consequences of firms' decisions of using DM. This study contributes to the current literature in identifying the underlying reasons behind in the selection process among the two methods.Ph.D
Paternalism and the alleviation of poverty
No full textTypically the tools available for redistribution are price subsidies and direct cash transfers. Conventional economic theory indicates that the efficiency loss is minimized if cash transfers are used instead of price subsidies. But in almost all economies, including advanced economies, price subsidies are implemented and cash transfers are seldom used. The author argues that taxpayers enjoy the poorer citizen's specific consumption package more than improving the poorer citizen's general economic welfare. Her objective is to identify the conditions under which price subsidies represent a more efficient way of alleviating poverty than cash payments, given taxpayers'paternalistic preferences. She concludes that when the taxpayers'prevalent behavior is paternalism, and taxpayers have more weight in society, the option for redistribution would be to target price subsidies to the poor. This brings about a greater improvement in overall social welfare and happier taxpayers than any other policy. With this solution, the poor are somewhat better off, even though they would rather receive cash transfers, which would represent the same financial cost to the economy.Safety Nets and Transfers,Services&Transfers to Poor,Rural Poverty Reduction,Economic Theory&Research,Environmental Economics&Policies
Are There Financing Constraints for R&D and Investment in German Manufacturing Firms?
No full textUsing a newly constructed panel dataset of German enterprises, I estimate R&D and capital investment equations for the time period from 1990 to 1994. Simple accelerator specifications indicate considerable sensitivity of R&D and investment to cash flow for relatively small firms. Much of this effect vanishes already once error-correcting behavior is taken into account, but a significant positive relationship between cash flow and investment remains for relatively small firms. In the case of R&D, weak but significant cash flow persist both for small and large firms. The evidence from Euler equation estimates is not conclusive. The investment Euler equation for large firms appears to perform relatively well and yields results close to those expected under the null hypothesis of no financing constraints. The estimates from the Euler equation for R&D are not informative. Additional evidence from survey data suggests that the cash flow sensitivity of investment in small firms is likely to reflect financing constraints.
Further Evidence On The Relationship Between Firm Investment And Financial Status
No full textThe interpretation of the significant relation between business investment spending and cash flow has been controversial. A large body of research has found that investment/cash flow sensitivities are higher for financially constrained firms. This fundamental result underlying the finance constraints hypothesis has been challenged recently by Kaplan, Zingales, and Cleary. The latter author introduces an important new element to this debate by using discriminant analysis, which allows creditworthy firms to be identified using an objective ex-ante criterion based on dividend payouts. Consistent with the Kaplan and Zingales critique, investment/cash flow sensitivities are lower for financially constrained firms. This short paper documents that the use of discriminant analysis does not necessarily lead to lower sensitivities. Our contrasting results are traceable to the use of the firm's creditworthiness as the discriminating variable and appropriate adjustments for endogenous regressors and serially correlated residuals. We document that the investment/cash flow sensitivity is higher for financially constrained firms. -- Die Interpretation der signifikanten Beziehung zwischen unternehmerischen Investitionsausgaben und dem Cash-Flow ist umstritten. Eine größere Anzahl von Forschungsarbeiten kommt zu dem Ergebnis, dass die Sensitivität der Investitionen bezüglich des Cash-Flow bei finanziell beschränkten Unternehmen höher liegt. Dieses für die Theorie finanzieller Beschränkungen grundlegende Resultat wurde in jüngerer Zeit von Kaplan, Zingales und Cleary in Zweifel gezogen. Der letztgenannte Autor führte ein wichtiges neues Element in die Debatte ein: Finanziell beschränkte Unternehmen werden von ihm mit Hilfe eines diskriminanzanalytischen Verfahrens identifiziert, also eines objektiven ex-ante Kriteriums. Im Einklang mit der Kritik von Kaplan und Zingales findet er bei finanziell beschränkten Unternehmen eine geringere Cash-Flow-Sensitivität. Dieses kurze Papier dokumentiert, dass eine diskriminanzanalytische Vorgehensweise nicht notwendigerweise zu einem derartigen Resultat führt. Unsere abweichenden Ergebnisse basieren einerseits auf der Identifikation finanziell beschränkter Unternehmen auf der Basis ihrer Kreditwürdigkeit, andererseits aber auf der Berücksichtigung endogener Regressoren und seriell korrelierter Residuen bei der Schätzung. Wir zeigen auf, dass die Cash-Flow-Sensitivität der Investitionsausgaben bei finanziell beschränkten Unternehmen höher ist.
Valuation of the company dm drogerie markt s.r.o.
No full textThe aim of this thesis is to determine the value of the company dm drogerie markt s.r.o. by the date 30st of September 2016 for the needs of managers and owners. The thesis is considered of the theoretical part, methodology, data and the practical part. The theoretical part describes the basic concepts used for a valuation of the company. In the methodology are described methods of strategic and financial analysis and procedure of the valuation of the comapny. In the practical part, the methodology is applied to data of dm drogerie markt s.r.o. The practical part includes the description of the company, strategic nad financial analysis, SWOT analysis, analysis and prognosis of generators of the value and financial plan. For the valuation of the company was chosen the method of discounted cash flow FCFF (Free Cash Flow to the Firm). The objectified value of the company dm drogerie markt s.r.o. is 12 588 610 thousands of CZK to the date 30.9.2016.Cílem této diplomové práce je stanovit objektivizovanou hodnotu společnosti dm drogerie markt s.r.o. k datu 30.9.2016 pro potřeby managementu a vlastníků. Práce je členěna na teoretickou část, metodiku, data a na praktickou část. V teoretické části jsou popsána teoretická východiska pro ocenění podniku a základní pojmy spojené s procesem oceňování. V metodice jsou vysvětleny metody pro strategickou i finanční analýzu a popsán postup ocenění podniku. V praktické části práce jsou metody aplikovány na data společnosti dm drogerie markt s.r.o. Praktická část obsahuje popis společnosti, strategickou a finanční analýzu, SWOT analýzu, analýzu a prognózu generátorů hodnoty, které jsou stěžejní pro sestavení finančního plánu. Jako hlavní metoda ocenění společnosti byla zvolena výnosová metoda diskontovaných peněžních toků pro vlastníky a věřitele FCFF (Free Cash Flow to the Firm). Objektivizovaná hodnota společnosti k datu 30.9.2016 činí 12 588 610 tis. Kč
- …
