1,720,963 research outputs found
Spending Policies of Italian Banking Foundations
Full text linkItalian banking foundations are important institutional investors and not-forprofit institutions in Italy. Foundations finance their activities with the returns they get by investing their endowments on the financial markets. The financial management of foundations has to meet two conflicting aims: maintaining a consistent and sufficient spending level in the short run and preserving the real value of the endowment fund in the long run. During the financial crisis, the tension between these aims has strongly emerged. This paper is about the results of an analysis of the spending decisions of ten main foundations, from 2004 to 2016, based on balance sheet and market value data. We propose an error-component model that allows to evaluate the relative importance of spending stability versus preserving the endowment value. Our estimates reveal that, on average, foundations followed stable spending policies across the financial crises, as they did not change their long-term rate of consumption of assets but gradually started to smooth spending over the short term. Because their granting activity sharply declined from 2008 to 2012, the joint effect of these decisions was to persistently reduce spending until 2016. This conservative stance, if carried over beyond the short-term, may violate intergenerational neutrality
Is public information really public? The role of newspapers.
Full text linkOur paper offers evidence that printed media can affect stock prices by covering public news (nonevents) even without resorting to spin or emphasis. However, the price reaction is limited to small caps, suggesting that small investors still obtain public information mainly through newspapers. The absence of spin or emphasis is the core element that differentiates our study from existing evidence, making it unique, to the best of our knowledge, in the financial literature on the media and asset pricing
The Forecasting Performance of Dynamic Factor Models with Vintage Data
Full text linkWe present a comparative analysis of the forecasting performance of two dynamic factor models, the Stock and Watson (2002a, b) model and the Forni, Hallin, Lippi and Reichlin (2005) model, based on vintage data. Our dataset that contains 107 monthly US “first release” macroeconomic and financial vintage time series, spanning the 1996:12 to 2017:6 period with monthly periodicity, extracted from the Bloomberg database† . We compute real-time one-month-ahead forecasts with both models for four key macroeconomic variables: the month-on-month change in industrial production, the unemployment rate, the core consumer price index and the ISM Purchasing Managers’ Index. First, we find that both the Stock and Watson and the Forni, Hallin, Lippi and Reichlin models outperform simple autoregressions for industrial production, unemployment rate and consumer prices, but that only the first model does so for the PMI. Second, we find that neither models always outperform the other. While Forni, Hallin, Lippi and Reichlin’s beats Stock and Watson’s in forecasting industrial production and consumer prices, the opposite happens for the unemployment rate and the PMI
Gaddy an d Ickes M od el of Russian Barter Economy: Some Criticisms and Considerations
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Is sustainability a cost, an obligation, or an opportunity? Evidence on sustainable entrepreneurship orientation from Poland
Full text linkObjective: The objective of the article is to find if Polish managers exhibit a sustainable entrepreneurship orientation and to comprehend the factors driving this orientation. Research Design & Methods: We conducted a factor analysis and regression analysis on data from an original survey on 301 managers of Polish companies. Findings: We identified two orientations towards sustainability, i.e. as an opportunity, and a cost. Personal values, demographic characteristics, personal experience, and education affect perceptions of sustainability. Implications & Recommendations: Some managers who work for large and middle enterprises see sustainability as an opportunity and are ready to take responsibility for facing social and environmental challenges. Companies and government need to find a way to unlock this potential. Having international experience and working for a company that is regularly involved in corporate social responsibility promotes such orientation. Contribution & Value Added: This study is the first to diagnose sustainable entrepreneurship orientation in Poland - a country which urgently needs to adopt a sustainable development model. It is also the first study to analyse the societal factors behind sustainable entrepreneurship orientation
Attitudes, Personality factors and household Debt decision: A study of consumer credit
Full text linkIl contributo analizza l'influenza dei fattori caratteriali, degli atteggiamenti e dei fattori della personalità sulla propensione all'indebitamento dei consumator
Platforms' partner networks: the missing link in crowdfunding performance
Full text linkPurpose: A network of partners helps and assists a crowdfunding platform (CFP) in scouting, assessing and selecting projects. This cooperation increases the number of successful projects by attracting a sizable number of investors, proponents and attracting marginal investors when a campaign falls short of the threshold for success. This study examines the role of partner networks in a platform ecosystem, specifically in terms of number of different partners and their diversity in the performance of the crowdfunding campaign. Design/methodology/approach: Using logistic and linear regressions, we analyze a sample of 233 projects, both funded and not funded, launched by 10 Italian equity CFPs between 2014 and 2018. Findings: Our findings indicate that the variety of partners in a platform's network influence the probability of campaign success and how much capital the proponent company raises. CFPs are resource-constrained new ventures, and a network with a wider variety of partners ensures the strategic resources and competencies that are required in an early stage market, thus facilitating campaign funding. Practical implications: The variety of partner networks could help CFPs to offer unique and strategic value propositions and define the competitive positioning of platforms. Originality/value: This study provides a deeper understanding of the determinants of equity crowdfunding campaign performance by emphasizing the role of CFP's network of partners on the entire crowdfunding ecosystem and its underlying organizational elements
Rischio di insolvenza e congiuntura economia nell'industria della provincia di Modena
No full textIl contributo si pone all’interno del filone di ricerca relativo alla capacità predittiva dei modelli di rating, al fine di prevenire le crisi aziendali. Dopo aver articolato un’esaustiva rassegna delle ricerche sul tema delle insolvenze aziendali in Italia, è stato presentato un modello di rating originale, sviluppato per valutare il rischio di insolvenza e la probabilità di default nel caso di imprese industriali. Alla base della procedura di valutazione vi è un ampio campione originale di società di capitali italiane, la cui rilevazione ha coperto il quinquennio 2003-2007. Il modello utilizzato, di tipo Logit, ha impiegato tre tipi di variabili per stimare il fenomeno delle insolvenze: indici di bilancio, caratteristiche anagrafiche (dimensione, localizzazone, età), la congiuntura economica nazionale. Dal confronto con altri modelli e con la letteratura affermatasi, le capacità predittive e interpretative del modello si sono collocate su livelli eccellenti
Predicting employee attrition and explaining its determinants
Full text linkAn increased focus on utilizing data analytics to tackle human resource (HR) issues and make more informed and data-driven decisions is spreading in firms and public institutions. One of the major challenges faced by orga-nizations is employee turnover, which can have negative impacts on productivity, performance, and overallcorporate reputation. In light of these considerations, this study endeavors to predict employee attrition bydeploying Machine Learning (ML) models on real-world data obtained from a prominent Italian financial cor-poration. Although the use of ML to predict attrition and investigate the main employers-employees features isdocumented in literature, what characterizes our study is the investigation of the crucial dimension of featuredirection. Nonetheless, recognizing this directional aspect is pivotal for HR managers entrusted with makinginformed decisions. In our research, we employ the SHAP (SHapley Additive exPlanation) algorithm to not onlyidentify feature contributions but also to assess their direction. Beyond mere algorithm implementation, ourstudy interprets the outcomes within the specific context of HR decision-making. This comprehensive approacheffectively highlights the inherent limitations of standalone algorithms, which may produce only partial results,capturing the importance of a feature, but missing its direction. Indeed, sometimes, while the feature is wellknown, its direction is somehow counterintuitive, thus requiring a deeper investigation and understanding. In a period like the present one, where the new production paradigms and the Covid-19 pandemic altered the consolidated labor market, new phenomena are emerging and only a profound understanding of the contextual novel dynamics can foster well-informed decision-making processes
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