Search results

The purpose of this paper is to investigate IPO performance. At announcement, the impact of purchases by informed traders on stock returns and uninformed traders on volatility were assessed. In the post-IPO period, returns were expected to be driven by firms with high returns on equity and the implementation of growth strategies. Return on equity was evaluated further in terms of whether it had a direct effect or was instrumented by volatility, cash flow, profit margin or revenue growth.

All IPOs announced in 2009-2014 were used. Measures were created to demarcate growth firms from risk-averse firms and firms with highly volatile cash flows from their counterparts with cash flows of lesser volatility. Event studies were used to measure abnormal return and abnormal volume, while multiple regressions tested the influence of predictors on abnormal returns, volatility and holding period return. Instruments of return on equity were also assessed.

The offer volume of informed traders significantly explained announcement-day returns, while the offer volume of uninformed traders explained the increase in volatility of IPO stock. The ability to capitalize on growth opportunities and increase shareholder wealth through higher return on equity significantly predicted holding period returns. Return on equity, was explained by volatility, cash flow to assets and profit margin.

The data are highly current with 2014 IPOs being used. The paper clearly distinguishes between fleeting announcement-day returns driven by informed traders and long-term holding period returns in a departure from the prevailing practice of measuring long-term post-IPO performance with abnormal returns. Finally, the paper creates subjective measures of volatility and growth strategies.

The Bureau of Economics in the Federal Trade Commission has a three-part role in the Agency and the strength of its functions changed over time depending on the preferences and ideology of the FTC’s leaders, developments in the field of economics, and the tenor of the times. The over-riding current role is to provide well considered, unbiased economic advice regarding antitrust and consumer protection law enforcement cases to the legal staff and the Commission. The second role, which long ago was primary, is to provide reports on investigations of various industries to the public and public officials. This role was more recently called research or “policy R&D”. A third role is to advocate for competition and markets both domestically and internationally. As a practical matter, the provision of economic advice to the FTC and to the legal staff has required that the economists wear “two hats,” helping the legal staff investigate cases and provide evidence to support law enforcement cases while also providing advice to the legal bureaus and to the Commission on which cases to pursue (thus providing “a second set of eyes” to evaluate cases). There is sometimes a tension in those functions because building a case is not the same as evaluating a case. Economists and the Bureau of Economics have provided such services to the FTC for over 100 years proving that a sub-organization can survive while playing roles that sometimes conflict. Such a life is not, however, always easy or fun.

This paper aims to critique the rationalist theoretical framework of international mediation, which ignores emotions in analyzing the decision by conflict parties to pursue a negotiated settlement or continue fighting, and to present an alternative framework that integrates emotions.

The paper draws on psychology research on emotions and conflict to develop an emotionally informed framework for analyzing conflict parties’ decision-making regarding a settlement. It demonstrates the framework’s validity and value through a case study of the 2000 Camp David mediation to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict.

A rationalist approach to mediation does not have adequate explanatory and predictive power theoretically. In practice, it can reduce the prospect of success.

The paper highlights the necessity for mediation researchers to study the effects of emotion, draw on psychology studies on conflict and explore the emotional implications of different mediation strategies and tactics.

The framework highlights the challenge of designing and conducting mediation in a way that cultivates emotions favorable to a settlement and lessens emotions unfavorable to a settlement.

This is the first study, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, to critique the rationalist framework of international mediation studies and develop an alternative framework that integrates emotions.

The following classified, annotated list of titles is intended to provide reference librarians with a current checklist of new reference books, and is designed to supplement the RSR review column, “Recent Reference Books,” by Frances Neel Cheney. “Reference Books in Print” includes all additional books received prior to the inclusion deadline established for this issue. Appearance in this column does not preclude a later review in RSR. Publishers are urged to send a copy of all new reference books directly to RSR as soon as published, for immediate listing in “Reference Books in Print.” Reference books with imprints older than two years will not be included (with the exception of current reprints or older books newly acquired for distribution by another publisher). The column shall also occasionally include library science or other library related publications of other than a reference character.

This paper aims to hypothesize on the relationship between the Millennial workforce and US firms’ response to the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017. The authors postulate that societal pressure from the younger generational cohorts will motivate socially cognizant corporations to share their newly acquired tax benefits with their workforce to attract, retain and inspire employee productivity and retention, as well as customer loyalty.

The authors empirically examine work-related cultural attitudes of the Millennial generational cohort in the USA, and by exploring related literature on organizational management and supply side economics, the authors aim to connect them to firms’ response to tax cut windfall in a simple theoretical model. The authors complement their methods by using descriptive statistics on firm tax responses that followed the 2017 TCJA.

The authors offer support for the notion that companies are behaving rationally by providing short-term benefits to employees when employees are, on average, younger. The competitive nature of the global market acts as an incentive to avoid permanent obligations such as wage and benefits increases. The data reveal that a significant number of companies had a transitory reaction to the latest tax cut.

The authors encourage future research, once sufficient time elapses, to exploit the time periods before and after the tax cut to provide a better assessment of the empirical impact of the 2017 tax cut on firm responses, conditional on workforce makeup.

The authors examine whether and how the Millennial cohort might shape firm behavior following changes in tax policy.

Argues here that ICANN, as it is currently formed, falls well short of democratic ideals, despite a founding principle of providing “bottom‐up, representative decision‐making”. Defines governance and explains how ICANN engages in governance of the Internet in important ways. Summarizes that if ICANN continues on its current trajectory, the end result is likely to be stability at the expense of democracy.

This paper examines whether financial buyers are more likely to initiate takeovers of inefficient firms. We show that they indeed are and thus conclude that takeovers by financial buyers play a potentially beneficial role in the allocation of corporate assets in the US. economy. Our analysis of determinants of takeovers initiated by financial buyers uses an application of the methodology developed in Trimbath, Frydman and Frydman (2001). In order to illustrate efficiency enhancements introduced by financial buyers, we select Forstmann Little’s acquisition of General Instrument for a brief case study. We show that their aggressive programs of cost management substantially improved the efficiency of General Instrument. Moreover, it allowed General Instrument to expand research and development to become the global leader in high definition television.

Scholars working in the strategy area have long held that one of the primary ways in which organizations adapt to external changes is through strategic choice. Inasmuch as a new CEO can result in a new strategic direction for the firm, the CEO turnover event itself is an important way by which organizations can signal an alteration in the direction of the firm. In this chapter, we explore how and why CEO turnover has become one of the most powerful indicators of adaptation the firm can make and propose a research agenda to guide future work on CEO turnover.

The relationships between women, health, and medicine are complex and contradictory. During the second-wave of the women's movement, feminists struggled to bring women's health issues to the fore. Today, their success is documented by the growing numbers of women practicing medicine, and by the increasing attention and resources devoted to women's health issues. Yet feminists remain critical of the highly gendered nature of medicine and its contribution to social inequalities. Feminists working both from within and outside the growing subfield of medical sociology have used one of its key concepts — medicalization — to explicate the negative consequences of institutional medicine for women.The continuing medicalization of women's lives is related to key ideas about the body and important trends in the structure of medicine, particularly the growing importance and sophistication of technology. The argument is made that some instances of medicalization, including women's legal punishment for fetal abuse and coerced sterilization, herald a new medico-legal alliance that impacts the poorest of women most severely. Feminists relate the growth of the public health paradigm of medicine to the emergence of the medico-legal alliance in that both rely on the power of the state and represent the continuing medicalization of women's lives. Based on these insights, the need for a continuing critical and feminist sociological understanding of medicine is stressed and possible lines of inquiry are set forth.