Search results

Examinar si las firmas no financieras que estuvieron registradas en la Superintendencia de Valores y Seguros de Chile (SVS) manipularon la cifra de beneficios para evitar reportar pérdidas o disminuciones en las ganancias, durante el período 2010-2014.

Se analizó la distribución de los beneficios netos y la distribución de los cambios en los beneficios netos de las firmas, de acuerdo con la metodología de Burgstahler y Dichev (1997).

Los resultados mostraron frecuencias inusualmente bajas de pequeñas pérdidas y de pequeñas disminuciones en los beneficios, y frecuencias inusualmente altas de pequeñas utilidades y de pequeños incrementos en las ganancias. Ambos resultados fueron estadísticamente significativos.

El estudio presentó evidencia de posibles prácticas de earnings management para evitar reportar pérdidas o disminuciones en el beneficio neto durante el período 2010-2014. Estos resultados permitirían identificar empresas “sospechosas” de earnings management, y aumentarían la probabilidad de detectar las firmas que manipularon al alza el beneficio reportado en los estados financieros o que —en un caso extremo— cometieron un fraude aún no revelado.

Los resultados de este tipo de estudios podrían ser útiles para focalizar actividades de monitorización y fiscalización para una mayor transparencia en el mercado bursátil.

Manipulación del beneficio contable, Distribución de frecuencias, Beneficio neto, Pérdida, Umbral de beneficios.

Trabajo de investigación

This paper aims to examine whether a sample of non-financial Chilean firms performed earnings management to avoid the decreases and losses in the earnings during the 2010-2014 period.

The analysis is undertaken using the distributions of earnings changes and earnings, according to Burgstahler and Dichev (1997) methodology.

The results showed unusually low frequencies of small losses and small declines in earnings and unusually high frequencies of small benefits and small increases in earnings. Both results were statistically significant.

The study presents evidence of possible earnings management activity to avoid reporting losses and earnings decreases during the period 2010-2014. These results would allow to identify “suspicious” companies of earnings management and would increase the likelihood of detecting firms that managed upside the reported earnings or that – in an extreme case – would be committing a fraud not disclosed.

The results of these types of studies would be useful to carry out monitoring and control activities, to increase transparency in the stock market.

A way that companies have found to respond to the challenges of customer satisfaction (CS) is the development logistics services quality. In this sense, the purpose of this paper is to estimate the quality of logistical service as a mediator factor in the relationship between logistics capabilities (LC) and CS. For this, an exploratory survey of the descriptive type was carried out with 117 companies in the Brazilian market of lubricant oil. The collected data, modeled in structural equations, have shown evidence that the quality of logistics services totally mediates the relation between the LC and the satisfaction of clients.

In order to respond to the research problem and to meet the stated objective, a study was carried out in two phases. The first used an exploratory qualitative design, and involved recorded in-depth interviews with five clients and five managers of a lubricant oil producer located in the municipality of Umuarama and nearby areas in Paraná state, Brazil. The second used an exploratory survey of the descriptive type was carried out with 117 companies in the Brazilian market of lubricant oil.

The collected data, modeled in structural equations, have shown evidence that the quality of logistics services totally mediates the relation between the LC and the satisfaction of clients.

It is suggested that new studies be conducted in order to increase the size of the sample, since the number of responses obtained (117 respondents), for the number of initial variables (34 measures).

In the pursuit of CS, the managers of lubricant oil producers should make major investments in LC, to enable the company to be active in the search for logistics solutions, integration and provision of reliable information to its customers.

The studies should also be carried out in other market segments, in order to compare the results obtained in the lubricating oil segment of Brazil and corroborate knowledge about the influence of logistical capabilities on the relation between logistics service quality and CS.

The logistics services quality perceived by the customers is derived from the service capacity of the producer’s employees and the quality of information provided to the customers.

The purpose of this paper is to challenge the default portrayal of street trade as an informal occupation and spatial practice, by examining comparatively the changes in the regulatory frameworks of two politically distinct city administrations in Latin America since the introduction of the informal economy debate.

This paper draws from a comparative case study design to synthesize evidence from historical administrative records, secondary research and materials from a two-year fieldwork carried out in Lima and Bogotá in 2008 and 2009.

The author argues that the incorporation of the informal economy framework into local governments’ policymaking has reframed street trade as a subject of policy. Since the 1970s, the author traces a shift from worker-centered initiatives, through the deregulation of street trade, to entrepreneurial-centered approaches. Nowadays, both, Lima’s neoliberal governance focusing on “formalizing” and Bogotá’s socialist/progressive governance aiming at “upgrading” street trade respond more explicitly to distinct assessments about the informal economy – legalist and dualist, respectively. Yet, both cities converge in that the closer street trade is perceived as an informal occupation; the more likely policy initiatives decouple the right to work from the right to access public space, spurring more marginal forms of street vending.

Even though the informal economy framework has helped to draw attention to important policy issues locally, nationally and internationally, this paper calls for a critical revision of such framing at the local level to allow for inclusive urban governance.

This study aims to measure the degree of innovation of micro and small industrial companies in the West and Southwest metropolitan regions of the city of São Paulo, through a survey with 203 firms in the metallurgy sector.

The research had a quantitative and descriptive focus and used as methodology the validated and international approach known as Innovation Radar.

The degree of innovation in these micro and small companies is low; thus, the authors could not characterize them as systemic innovators. Most of them are little innovative, although some were classified as occasional innovators. The dimensions organization, processes, presence, supply chain and added value were the least developed.

To carry out similar studies in other Brazilian regions, to compare results and draw new conclusions, or even check if the degree of innovation present in micro-firms of these regions would not be even lower; to monitor the evolution of companies through a longitudinal study, to detect improvements in the degree of innovation; and to conduct a qualitative research that can deepen questions on the results of our study, such as the reasons why this type of company does not adopt innovative practices, or even the real suitability of the Innovation Radar model for micro and small enterprises (MSEs). We observed that some dimensions proved to be too sophisticated for these companies, such as R&D investments and the adoption of technological advances.

The study shows that the degree of innovation measured by the Innovation Radar is a useful and initial measure to check an innovative attitude in micro and small companies. It can also drive the actions that should be prioritized to stimulate the culture of innovation in SME. However, it does not allow to answer why this type of organization does not adopt innovative practices as a management attitude. Regarding its contribution, the authors expect that the paper may bring an awareness of managers and owners of micro and small companies for the need to foster innovative practices that can help increase the competitiveness and survival of this type of organization.

In Brazil, despite the fact that MSEs represent 98 per cent of the existing companies, and are mainly responsible for job creation, their leaders have a low concern for innovative practices.

The study contributes to identify the degree of innovation of these firms, which comprise a representative and strategic segment of the city’s economy, by checking to what extent an innovative attitude is effectively present in this sector. The theoretical contribution of this study regards the appropriateness of mechanisms or methodologies created to measure the degree of innovation in large organizations. Dimensions such as technological platform, brand, innovative ambience, degree of organization or systematization of processes, which are frequently considered for companies in general, and especially for large ones, are not sufficient or, instead, too sophisticated to allow an effective measurement of the degree of innovation in MSE. Thus, this study provides information for designing more effective ways to evaluate the degree of innovation that take into account MSE’s specificities, which can be considered innovation efforts, such as simple process improvements, professional development of teams, and actions to seize ideas and opportunities, among others.

This study aims to analyze and assess 21 years of media coverage (2000–2020) of Flix, a small industrial village located in an rural area on north-eastern Spain, which has endured in these years a severe environmental and industrial crisis, with a strong potential for stigmatization of the place.

The research is conceptualized under the Social Amplification of Risk Framework, a theoretical/conceptual approach aimed at accounting for the huge gaps that often arise between public perception of technological or environmental risks of some technologies, products and places and the expert estimations of these risks. The authors studied the coverage on Flix by a local, a regional and a national newspaper through a content analysis where the corpus (1,524 news pieces) was coded for several variables, including tone, genre and thematic area.

The studied coverage was in general overwhelmingly negative and strongly focused on “bad news” relating to pollution and deindustrialization, although this was much less the case in the local newspaper than in the regional and, in particular, the national newspaper. Thus, a territorially escalated pattern clearly emerges from our research concerning the stigmatization potential of news media coverage for the specific case under scrutiny.

To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first time such a longitudinal study of media coverage and its potential for place stigmatization is performed with this specific territorial perspective.

This paper aims to analyze the influence of organizational learning (OL) and service innovation (SI) on organizational performance of knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) and examine the mediating role of SI.

Hypotheses were tested using the theoretical OL model of knowledge acquisition, distribution, interpretation and organizational memory (Huber, 1991; Lopez, Peon, & Ordas, 2005; Jiménez-Jiménez & Sanz-Valle, 2011), using structural equation modeling partial least squares analysis of a survey data set of Brazilian architectural firms.

Findings suggest that OL is significantly linked to SI and so is SI to organizational performance. However, neither the direct relationship between OL and organizational performance could be verified, nor the mediating effect of SI.

These results can offer KIBS managers insights that suggest that OL alone does not guarantee a significant impact in organizational performance, but it is a starting point for achieving SIs, that lead to performance improvement and competitive advantages.

This paper contributes to the knowledge production in the following ways: to the understanding of the relationship between OL and SI and its effect on organizational performance, traditionally overlooked in the literature; to the study of SIs, considering the importance of the service sector; and to the study of innovation processes in architectural firms, a sector traditionally understudied, because of the focus on large construction firms.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the relation between estate transformations produced during the governments of the Citizen Revolution (CR) in Ecuador (2007-2017) and welfare regime transformations.

The CR’s project registers an array of specificities that make it a relevant case study to understand it. Among them, it articulated the transformation of the development model with a comprehensive state reform: emphasized both the modernization of the state and the productive structure, and the creation of the basic pillars of a welfare state. The ambitious project materialized in an ambivalent manner, revealing accomplishments and limitations.

The recovery of resources for the state, the efficient organization of resources, decentralization and deconcentration processes, public administration transformations and policy de-corporatization processes accompanied and even propelled important achievements in the social sphere in terms of decommodification, stratification, commodification and defamiliarization. Ecuador’s starting point, as a small and impoverished country with pubic and communal goods and services dismantled through neoliberal reforms, was quite precarious. But, progress was made. Beyond the identified limitations, its accomplishments must be highlighted because they are novel in comparison to other progressive government experiences, especially in the context of Central Andean countries.

This article vindicates the need to link state transformation processes to welfare regime transformations, as well as the academic literature that informs both fields. The description of what took place in Ecuador in the field of social welfare during the ten years of the CR continues to confirm the theoretical potential of the concept of welfare regime with the necessary translations and appropriations that allow for the analysis of countries in the region. It enables an approach to a more theoretically and methodologically elusive object that is at the same time tremendously potent in analytical terms and in its contributions to social transformations. An object that alludes to areas gravely affected during neoliberal hegemony, linked to public institutionality, state capacity and state autonomy. This is why everything that affects the state and the management of public goods and services must be incorporated into the analysis.