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The purpose of this paper is to explore how hedge fund database biases developed during the 2007‐2009 financial crisis.

The sample consists of 8,935 hedge funds from the Lipper TASS Hedge Fund Database for the January 2002‐September 2010 time period. The theoretical foundation of this paper draws from Fung and Hsieh who argue that time series of funds of hedge funds should be less prone to some of the documented database biases. The paper uses a sampling technique to create hedge fund portfolios, and then compares them using fund of fund data.

The paper finds empirical evidence that fund of hedge fund data is less biased than single hedge fund data, and that the impact of the survivorship and backfilling biases has increased since the financial crisis. It also finds that the attrition rate for hedge funds has nearly doubled since the financial crisis, and that an elevated attrition rate has a negative impact on the quality and representativeness of hedge fund data due to the liquidation bias. The liquidation bias increased strongly in the aftermath of the financial crisis. It also fluctuates over time, and it can account for an overestimate of performance of over 10 percent p.a.

Given this increase and the volatile nature of hedge fund biases, we believe investors (for benchmarking) and academics (for empirical studies) should consider refraining from using single hedge fund index data.

In the build-up of an investment decision, the existence of both active and passive investment vehicles triggers a puzzle for investors. Indeed the confrontation between active and index replication equity funds in terms of risk-adjusted performance and alpha generation has been a bone of contention since the inception of these investment structures. Accordingly, the objective of this chapter is to distinctly underscore whether an investor should be concerned in choosing between active and diverse passive investment structures.

The survivorship bias-free dataset consists of 776 equity funds which are domiciled either in America or Europe, and are likewise exposed to the equity markets of the same regions. In addition to geographical segmentation, equity funds are also categorised by structure and management type, specifically actively managed mutual funds, index mutual funds and passive exchange traded funds (‘ETFs’). This classification leads to the analysis of monthly net asset values (‘NAV’) of 12 distinct equally weighted portfolios, with a time horizon ranging from January 2004 to December 2014. Accordingly, the risk-adjusted performance of the equally weighted equity funds’ portfolios is examined by the application of mainstream single-factor and multi-factor asset pricing models namely Capital Asset Pricing Model (Fama, 1968; Fama & Macbeth, 1973; Lintner, 1965; Mossin, 1966; Sharpe, 1964; Treynor, 1961), Fama French Three-Factor (1993) and Carhart Four-Factor (1997).

Solely examination of monthly NAVs for a 10-year horizon suggests that active management is equivalent to index replication in terms of risk-adjusted returns. This prompts investors to be neutral gross of fees, yet when considering all transaction costs it is a distinct story. The relatively heftier fees charged by active management, predominantly initial fees, appear to revoke any outperformance in excess of the market portfolio, ensuing in a Fool’s Errand Hypothesis. Moreover, both active and index mutual funds’ performance may indeed be lower if financial advisors or distributors of equity funds charge additional fees over and above the fund houses’ expense ratios, putting the latter investment vehicles at a significant handicap vis-à-vis passive low-cost ETFs. This chapter urges investors to concentrate on expense ratios and other transaction costs rather than solely past returns, by accessing the cheapest available vehicle for each investment objective. Put simply, the general investor should retreat from portfolio management and instead access the market portfolio using low-cost index replication structures via an execution-only approach.

The battle among actively managed and index replication equity funds in terms of risk-adjusted performance and alpha generation has been a grey area since the inception of mutual funds. The interest in the subject constantly lightens up as fresh instruments infiltrate financial markets. Indeed the mutual fund puzzle (Gruber, 1996) together with the enhanced growth of ETFs has again rejuvenated the active versus passive debate, making it worth a detailed analysis especially for the benefit of investors who confront a dilemma in choosing between the two management styles.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a clear understanding of the features that increase the probability of condos’ sale, with a focus on design-related features.

The present research uses survival analysis (SA) and the Cox proportional-hazards regression (CPHR) to analyze condo sales data provided by the REALTORS® Association of Edmonton (RAE) (Alberta, Canada).

The analysis of the provided data shows that the listed price, building age, appliances and condo fees have less effect on the time a condo spends on the market compared to the condo’s physical features, such as construction material, interior finishing and heating type and source.

The data used in the present research comes from one geographical area (i.e. Edmonton, Canada). Furthermore, the data provided by the RAE does not include any real estate transactions not involving a realtor. Additionally, the present research, owing to its focus on design-related features, does not control features related to the external environment, such as community and transportation proximity.

The findings of the present research help construction practitioners (e.g. architects, builders and realtors) better understand the features that influence condo buyers’ decisions. This knowledge helps to develop designs and marketing strategies that increase the likelihood of selling and decrease the time listed condos spend on the market.

The present research expands our knowledge of the drivers influencing the purchasers’ decisions concerning the building’s physical features that can be controlled during the design stage. Also, analyzing the provided data by using SA and CPHR, as followed in this paper, facilitates the inclusion of records that are listed but not sold, which helps to overcome the survivorship bias and avoid the over-optimism that exists in the present literature.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the literature on angel investors. Research on angel investors is sparse because data are sparse. Most comprehensive studies of angel investors have focused on the USA and UK. In these studies, definitions of angel investors and estimates of returns on angel investments vary dramatically. What can one make of this wide range of reported returns?

The authors examine the literature and find that the calculations of reported results are vague.

Most researchers do not explicitly report if their estimates are equal-weighted or value-weighted, nor do they say whether the results are weighted by the duration of the investment. The authors show that the unit of analysis – investment, project or angel – affects interpretations.

Limitations on the comparability between various studies of angel investing returns leave the current literature incomplete. They also offer opportunities for future study in the area.

The authors are the first to examine the angel investing literature in a comprehensive fashion, comparing between various returns found across all major studies of the subject done to date.

The board of directors of an organization can contribute considerably to the transition to a sustainable global economy by accommodating environmental, social and governance (ESG) measures in the directors' business model. Along these lines, the purpose of this research is to understand the nexus between the board's structural attributes and sustainability disclosures in an emerging economy such as India.

The authors investigate this link using the system generalized method of moments (SGMM) panel regression on a sample of firms from the National Stock Exchange (NSE) Nifty 100 Index from 2013 to 2020. This econometric framework controls endogeneity among the variables, which has been a gap in the previous studies.

The authors find that board structural attributes, like board size, gender diversity, chief executive officer (CEO) duality and independence, have little bearing on sustainability disclosures of Indian companies. However, the board of directors, through the board's company's social responsibility (CSR) committee, strives for sustainability practices in Indian organizations. The authors also find that larger companies are more willing to disclose on ESG efforts than smaller ones, but the financial performance of the smaller ones (as proxied by Tobin's Q) does not matter.

This study is restricted to a sample of large cap listed companies and specific environment, resulting in the non-generalizability of the findings to different contexts because countries vary in their state of economic development, internal policy, regulations and governance.

A mandated CSR committee has helped Indian businesses to publicize their sustainability efforts. Besides the frontrunner in CSR regulations, Indian organizations have paid least attention to the environmental pillar of the ESG framework. Accordingly, the board of directors should put more emphasis on the environmental aspects of their business' sustainability efforts to help achieve sustainable development goals (SDGs) in the medium term and net neutrality in the long term.

From the standpoint of an emerging economy like India, which has statutory CSR mandates for firms, this research adds a fresh perspective on the relationship between corporate governance and corporate responsibility by employing stakeholder theory, which is further substantiated by the use of system GMM as a robust methodology. This study also emphasizes the significance of a mandatory CSR committee as a facilitator of sustainability practices and reporting in emerging economies.

The purpose of this paper is to compare the fund flow – performance relationship for Islamic and conventional equity funds in Malaysia.

The authors use panel regression models to estimate the relationship between fund flows and performance for Islamic and conventional equity funds in Malaysia from 2001 to 2009. The data for each fund include fund flows, assets under management, management expenses, fund age, portfolio turnover, fund risk and return and the number of funds in the fund’s family. The authors also include market returns and year effects. The sample consists of 127 Malaysian equity funds with at least 65 per cent domestic equity holdings comprising 35 Islamic and 92 conventional equity funds.

Islamic fund investors respond to performance in much the same way as conventional fund investors, increasing fund flows to better performing funds and decreasing fund flows to poorer performing funds. However, there is also evidence that Islamic fund investors are relatively less responsive toward poorly performing Islamic funds, suggesting an asymmetry in the expected positive fund flow – performance relationship, but only for Islamic fund investors. When choosing funds based on other fund attributes, Islamic fund investors again exhibit similar behaviour, and like conventional fund investors direct larger percentage fund flows into smaller funds as well as funds with larger past fund flows and higher expense ratios.

The authors were only able to access data on annual net fund flows not quarterly or monthly fund inflows and outflows as usual in developed markets and this may obscure some important aspects of investor decision-making. There is also insufficient data for matched-sample techniques, which may better control for fund-specific characteristics.

Islamic funds like conventional funds will experience increased fund flows with better performance and vice versa. However, Islamic fund investors appear somewhat less likely to remove monies from poorly performing funds. The authors believe this is because investors either place a premium on the non-return attributes of Shariah-compliant funds and/or wish to avoid search costs in finding another suitable Islamic fund. Apart from this, Islamic and conventional fund investors behave in a similar manner, and the authors believe that this is possible in Malaysia given the size and diversity of its Islamic fund sector.

This paper is one of the very few empirical studies concerning the behaviour of Islamic investors, particularly in Malaysia, primarily because of limitations in data availability.

The primary objective of this research is to provide evidence that there are two distinct layers of investor sentiments that can affect asset valuation models. The first is general market-wide sentiments, while the second is biased approaches toward specific assets.

To achieve the goal, the authors conducted a multi-step analysis of stock returns and constructed complex sentiment indices that reflect the optimism or pessimism of stock market participants. The authors used panel regression with fixed effects and a sample of the US stock market to improve the explanatory power of the three-factor models.

The analysis showed that both market-level and stock-level sentiments have significant contributions, although they are not equal. The impact of stock-level sentiments is more profound than market-level sentiments, suggesting that neglecting the stock-level sentiment proxies in asset valuation models may lead to severe deficiencies.

In contrast to previous studies, the authors propose that investor sentiments should be measured using a multi-level factor approach rather than a single-factor approach. The authors identified two distinct levels of investor sentiment: general market-wide sentiments and individual stock-specific sentiments.

The purpose of this study is to analyse the impact of two different financial reporting models (revenue-expense vs asset-liability) on several earnings attributes.

The analysis compares the earnings attributes of non-financial private firms using the Italian generally accepted accounting principles (Italian GAAP, based on a revenue-expense model) with those of the Italian non-financial private firms voluntarily adopting the international financial reporting standards (IFRS, based on the asset-liability model). To address major methodological concerns, the research design is based on a single-country analysis and on three different samples as follows: firms voluntarily adopting IFRS; a matched sample of Italian GAAP firms; Italian GAAP firms belonging to the Elite programme, and therefore, comparable to the IFRS adopters in terms of incentives towards financial reporting transparency.

The results show that firms reporting under a revenue-expense model are characterized by a stronger revenue-expense matching degree, along with higher earnings’ persistence, earnings’ predictability and conditional conservatism than firms adopting an asset-liability model. In addition, contrary to the expectations, Italian GAAP firms do not present smoother earnings and do not report greater abnormal accruals than IFRS adopters do. Overall, the findings suggest that the switch from a revenue-expense model to an asset-liability model negatively affects several earnings attributes of non-financial private companies, shedding new light on the drawbacks associated with the adoption of the IFRS accounting model.

This study addresses a theme characterized by sparse research efforts, adding new insights to the debate on the decline in the quality of earnings and on the drawbacks associated with the adoption of the IFRS accounting model.

This paper aims to investigate private pension fund investor sentiment against fund performance and cost in an environment of frequent regulatory changes. The analyses are conducted in a low return, high-cost private pension fund market environment, which makes it easier to observe the relationship between investor sentiment to return and cost.

This paper conducts fixed effect, random effect and random effect within between effect panel data analyses of all Turkish private pension funds from 2011 to 2019. This paper conducts the analyses using aggregate data and subsets based on fund characteristics and pre-post regulation periods.

When regulations provide compensation and improve market efficiency in a pension fund market, investor focus shifted from performance to cost. Investors allocated assets with respect to return realization when adequately compensated for risk or had favorable cost contract clauses. Consequently, investors in pension funds with lower expected returns and no special fee reduction clauses tended to adopt the strategy of cost minimization.

The overlap of regulatory change periods could complicate the ability to distinguish the impact of any one specific change. The findings therefore cannot be generalized to differently structured markets.

Regulatory changes could lead to a switch of investor objectives. When regulatory changes compensate investors and increase market efficiency, investors objective could switch from performance to cost.

This study investigates investor sentiment in a relatively young private pension fund market, in which the relevant regulatory body ambitiously implements frequent changes in regulation. The selected market is unique in the sense that it has negative real returns and high costs, which make investor focus to return and cost more readily apparent.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the model that explains the new venture emergence in China by examining the effects of experience and innovativeness of entrepreneurial opportunities on the new venture emergence, as well as the moderating effect of munificence.

Based on the dynamic data from the Chinese Panel Study of Entrepreneurial Dynamics (CPSED) where nascent entrepreneurs were randomly sampled and were followed for three years, this paper uses the COX proportional hazard model to answer the research questions.

Those who have successful entrepreneurial experience are able to more rapidly create new ventures, whereas the relevant industry experience and innovativeness of entrepreneurial opportunities have a negative effect on the new venture emergence. Moreover, munificence negatively moderates the effects of entrepreneurial experience and innovativeness of entrepreneurial opportunities on the new venture emergence.

This paper only measures whether entrepreneurs have relevant industry experience, and does not reflect on the different degrees of it. In addition, small time interval of dynamic follow-up survey may bias the results.

This paper revealed that not all kinds of experience promote the venture emergence, and a more innovative entrepreneurial opportunity is not always better. Entrepreneurs should accumulate experience and evaluate innovativeness of entrepreneurial opportunities rationally.

New venture emergence relies on the mutual influence of entrepreneurs, entrepreneurial opportunities and entrepreneurial environment. However, most studies explored the new venture emergence from a single perspective which led to a plethora of conflicting conclusions. This paper attempts to examine the effects of experience and innovativeness of entrepreneurial opportunities on the venture emergence, as well as the moderate effect of munificence.