Search results for: financial reporting quality

Authors: Feddaoui Amina

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Through this study we will try to shed light on the theoretical framework proposed for understanding creative accounting as a financial numbers game and one of the most important techniques of accounts manipulation, its main actors and its practices. We will discover the role of the modified Jones model (1995) in detecting creative accounting practices using discretionary accruals. Finally we will try to confirm the importance and the need to address this type of practices using corporate governance as a main control system and an important defense line to reduce these dangerous accounts manipulation.

Keywords: financial numbers game, creative accounting, modified Jones model, accounts manipulation

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Authors: Scott Rawlings

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Victoria’s first State of the Bays report is an historic baseline study of the health of Port Phillip Bay and Western Port. The report includes 50 assessments of 36 indicators across a broad array of topics from the nitrogen cycle and water quality to key marine species and habitats. This paper discusses the processes for determining and assessing the indicators and comments on future priorities identified to maintain and improve the health of these water ways. Victoria’s population is now at six million, and growing at a rate of over 100,000 people per year - the highest increase in Australia – and the population of greater Melbourne is over four million. Port Phillip Bay and Western Port are vital marine assets at the centre of this growth and will require adaptive strategies if they are to remain in good condition and continue to deliver environmental, economic and social benefits. In 2014, it was in recognition of these pressures that the incoming Victorian Government committed to reporting on the state of the bays every five years. The inaugural State of the Bays report was issued by the independent Victorian Commissioner for Environmental Sustainability. The report brought together what is known about both bays, based on existing research. It was a baseline on which future reports will build and, over time, include more of Victoria’s marine environment. Port Phillip Bay and Western Port generally demonstrate healthy systems. Specific threats linked to population growth are a significant pressure. Impacts are more significant where human activity is more intense and where nutrients are transported to the bays around the mouths of creeks and drainage systems. The transport of high loads of nutrients and pollutants to the bays from peak rainfall events is likely to increase with climate change – as will sea level rise. Marine pests are also a threat. More than 100 introduced marine species have become established in Port Phillip Bay and can compete with native species, alter habitat, reduce important fish stocks and potentially disrupt nitrogen cycling processes. This study confirmed that our data collection regime is better within the Marine Protected Areas of Port Phillip Bay than in other parts. The State of the Bays report is a positive and practical example of what can be achieved through collaboration and cooperation between environmental reporters, Government agencies, academic institutions, data custodians, and NGOs. The State of the Bays 2016 provides an important foundation by identifying knowledge gaps and research priorities for future studies and reports on the bays. It builds a strong evidence base to effectively manage the bays and support an adaptive management framework. The Report proposes a set of indicators for future reporting that will support a step-change in our approach to monitoring and managing the bays – a shift from reporting only on what we do know, to reporting on what we need to know.

Keywords: coastal science, marine science, Port Phillip Bay, state of the environment, Western Port

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Authors: Anam Noshaba, Mahr Muhammad Saeed Akhtar

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The aim of this study was to find out the relationship between quality education and organizational culture. The population of this study was all the teachers of Public Degree Colleges located in Punjab. A sample of 400 teachers was selected by using a simple random sampling technique. Quality Education Assessment Questionnaire (QEAQ) and Organizational Culture Assessment Instrument (OCAI) were used for data collection. Out of all, 90% of teachers responded. Findings showed that quality education and organizational culture are positively correlated. Results indicated that there is no difference in quality education and organizational culture by demographic variables of teachers. Future research is needed to study the viewpoint of other stakeholders of education regarding quality education and organizational culture.

Keywords: quality education, minimum quality standards, organizational culture, college level

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Authors: Angrita Denziana, Haninun, Hepiana Patmarina, Ferdinan Fatah

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The aims of the study are to determine the effect of the company's financial performance with Return on Asset (ROA) and Return on Equity (ROE) indicators. The macroeconomic factors with the indicators of Indonesia interest rate (SBI) and exchange rate on stock returns of non-financial companies listed in IDX. The results of this study indicate that the variable of ROA has negative effect on stock returns, ROE has a positive effect on stock returns, and the variable interest rate and exchange rate of SBI has positive effect on stock returns. From the analysis data by using regression model, independent variables ROA, ROE, SBI interest rate and the exchange rate very significant (p value < 0.01). Thus, all the above variable can be used as the basis for investment decision making for investment in Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX) mainly for shares in the non- financial companies.

Keywords: ROA, ROE, interest rate, exchange rate, stock return

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Authors: Abeer Toheed Quadri, Maria Abubakar, Mehreen Sirshar

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Component Based Software Development (CBSD) is a new trend in software development. Selection of quality components is not enough to ensure software quality in Component Based Software System (CBSS). A software product is considered to be a quality product if it satisfies its customer’s needs and has minimum defects. Authors’ survey different research papers and analyzes various techniques which ensure software quality in component based software development. This paper includes an investigation about how to improve the quality of a component based software system without effecting quality attributes. The reported information is identified from literature survey. The developments of component based systems are rising as they reduce the development time, effort and cost by means of reuse. After analysis, it has been explored that in order to achieve the quality in a CBSS we need to have the components that are certified through software measure because the predictability of software quality attributes of system depend on the quality attributes of the constituent components, integration process and the framework used.

Keywords: CBSD (component based software development), CBSS (component based software system), quality components, SQA (software quality assurance)

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Authors: Muhammad Shehu Garba

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The financial statements of the firms between the periods of 2013 and 2022 were collected using the secondary method of data collection, and the study aims to investigate the effect of ownership structure on the financial performance of listed industrial goods companies in Nigeria. 10 firms were used as the study's sample size. The study used panel data variables of the study. The ownership structure is measured with managerial ownership, institutional ownership and foreign ownership, while financial performance is measured with return on asset and return on equity; the study made use of control variables leverage and firm size. The result shows a multivariate relationship that exists between variables of the study, which shows ROA has a positive correlation with ROE (0.4053), MO (0.2001), and FS (0.3048). It has a negative correlation with FO (-0.1933), IO (-0.0919), and LEV (-0.3367). ROE has a positive correlation with ROA (0.4053), MO (0.2001), and FS (0.2640). It has a negative correlation with FO (-0.1864), IO (-0.1847), and LEV (-0.0319). It is recommended that firms should focus on increasing their ROA. Firms should also consider increasing their MO, as this can help to align the interests of managers and shareholders. Firms should also be aware of the potential impact of FO and IO on their ROA.

Keywords: firm size, ownership structure, financial performance, leaverage

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Authors: Michelo Obrey

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Traditionally, mutual funds have long been esteemed as stand-alone entities in the U.S. However, the prevalence of the fund families’ affiliation to financial conglomerates is eroding this striking feature. Mutual fund families' affiliation with financial conglomerates can potentially be an important source of superior performance or cost to the affiliated mutual fund investors. On the one hand, financial conglomerates affiliation offers the mutual funds access to abundant resources, better research quality, private material information, and business connections within the financial group. On the other hand, conflict of interest is bound to arise between the financial conglomerate relationship and fund management. Using a sample of U.S. domestic equity mutual funds from 1994 to 2017, this paper examines whether fund family affiliation to an investment bank help the affiliated mutual funds deliver superior performance through private material information advantage possessed by the investment banks or it costs affiliated mutual fund shareholders due to the conflict of interest. Robust to alternative risk adjustments and cross-section regression methodologies, this paper finds that the investment bank-affiliated mutual funds significantly outperform those of the mutual funds that are not affiliated with an investment bank. Interestingly the paper finds that the outperformance is confined to holding return, a return measure that captures the investment talent that is uninfluenced by transaction costs, fees, and other expenses. Further analysis shows that the investment bank-affiliated mutual funds specialize in hard-to-value stocks, which are not more likely to be held by unaffiliated funds. Consistent with the information advantage hypothesis, the paper finds that affiliated funds holding covered stocks outperform affiliated funds without covered stocks lending no support to the hypothesis that affiliated mutual funds attract superior stock-picking talent. Overall, the paper findings are consistent with the idea that investment banks maximize fee income by monopolistically exploiting their private information, thus strategically transferring performance to their affiliated mutual funds. This paper contributes to the extant literature on the agency problem in mutual fund families. It adds to this stream of research by showing that the agency problem is not only prevalent in fund families but also in financial organizations such as investment banks that have affiliated mutual fund families. The results show evidence of exploitation of synergies such as private material information sharing that benefit mutual fund investors due to affiliation with a financial conglomerate. However, this research has a normative dimension, allowing such incestuous behavior of insider trading and exploitation of superior information not only negatively affect the unaffiliated fund investors but also led to an unfair and unleveled playing field in the financial market.

Keywords: mutual fund performance, conflicts of interest, informational advantage, investment bank

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Authors: Joel Vilca Tarazona, Igor Aguilar-Alonso

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The problem of this research related to business intelligence is the lack of a tool that supports automated and efficient financial analysis for decision-making and allows an evaluation of the financial statements, which is why the availability of the information is difficult. Relevant information to managers and users as an instrument in decision making financial, and administrative. For them, a business intelligence solution is proposed that will reduce information access time, personnel costs, and process automation, proposing a 4-layer architecture based on what was reviewed by the research methodology.

Keywords: decision making, business intelligence, Google Cloud, Microsoft Power BI

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Authors: Andrea Paltrinieri, Alberto Dreassi, Stefano Miani, Alex Sclip

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The financial crises caused a collapse in prices of most asset classes, raising the attention on alternative investments such as Sukuk, a smaller, fast growing but often misunderstood market. We study diversification benefits of Sukuk, their correlation with other asset classes and the effects of their inclusion in investment portfolios of institutional and retail investors, through a comprehensive comparison of their risk/return profiles during and after the financial crisis. We find a beneficial performance adjusted for the specific volatility together with a lower correlation especially during the financial crisis. The distribution of Sukuk returns is positively skewed and leptokurtic, with a risk/return profile similarly to high yield bonds. Overall, our results suggest that Sukuk present diversification opportunities, a significant volatility-adjusted performance and lower correlations especially during the financial crisis. Our findings are relevant for a number of institutional investors. Long term investors, such as life insurers would benefit from Sukuk’s protective features during financial crisis yet keeping return and growth opportunities, whereas banks would gain due to their role of placers, advisors, market makers or underwriters.

Keywords: sukuk, zero beta asset, asset allocation, sukuk market

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Authors: R. K. Yadav, S. Baral, H. R. Paudel, R. Basnet

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The Public-Private Mix (PPM) approach is a strategic initiative that involves engaging all private and public healthcare providers in the fight against tuberculosis using international healthcare standards. For tuberculosis control in Nepal, the PPM approach could be a milestone. This study aimed to explore the barriers to a public-private mix approach in the management of tuberculosis cases in Nepal. A total of 20 respondents participated in the study. Barriers to PPM were identified in the following three themes: 1) Obstacles related to TB case detection, 2) Obstacles related to patients, and 3) Obstacles related to the healthcare system. PPM implementation was challenged by following subthemes that included staff turnover, low private sector participation in workshops, a lack of training, poor recording and reporting, insufficient joint monitoring and supervision, poor financial benefit, lack of coordination and collaboration, and non-supportive TB-related policies and strategies. The study concludes that numerous barriers exist in the way of effective implementation of the PPM approach, including TB cases detection barriers such as knowledge of TB diagnosis and treatment, HW attitude, workload, patient-related barriers such as knowledge of TB, self-medication practice, stigma and discrimination, financial status, and health system-related barriers such as staff turnover and poor engagement of the private sector in workshops, training, recording, and re-evaluation. Government stakeholders must work together with private sector stakeholders to perform joint monitoring and supervision. Private practitioners should receive training and orientation, and presumptive TB patients should be given adequate time and counseling as well as motivation to visit a government health facility.

Keywords: barrier, tuberculosis, case finding, PPM, nepal

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Authors: Disha Batra

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With the advent of economic reforms in India in 1992, economic journalism in India has undergone a sea change along with the rise in the Indian economy. Squeezing out of economic news stories (economy-in-general) over business (individual corporate stories) and financial (financial and equity markets) news stories have been done and are still underway. The objective of the study is to explore how economic journalism – news stories about macroeconomic issues or economy-in-general has changed over the past three decades with the emergence of LPG (Liberalisation, Privatisation, and Globalisation) policies in India. The purpose of the study is to examine to what extent business and financial news are constricting economic news which is done by analysing news stories and content of business papers. The study is based on the content analyses of the top three Indian business dailies as per IRS (Indian Readership Survey) 2017. The parametric analysis of the different parameters (source of information, sub-topic, a dominant source in economic news, layout and framing, etc.) has been done in order to come across with the distinct adaptations and modifications by these dailies. The paper significantly dwells upon the thematic analysis of these newspapers in order to explore and find out the coverage given to various sub-themes of EBF (economic, business, and financial) journalism. The study revealed that stories concerning broader issues about the economy which are likely to be of public concern had been dropped. The paper further indicates an upward trend for the stories concerning individual corporate, equity, and financial markets. Findings of the study raise concern over the indicated disparity between economic and business news stories which may further limit the information that people need in order to make well-versed decisions.

Keywords: business-papers, business news, economic news, financial news

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Authors: Malki Nadia Fatima Zahra, Kellal Chaimaa, Brahimi Houria

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Quality is one of the most important modern management patterns that organizations seek to achieve in all areas and sectors in order to meet the needs and desires of customers and to remain continuity, as they constitute a competitive advantage for the organization, and among the most prominent organizations that must be available on the quality factor are health organizations as they relate to the most valuable component of production It is a person and his health, and that any error in it threatens his life and may lead to death, so she must provide health services of high quality to achieve the highest degree of satisfaction for the patient. This research aims to study the quality of health services and the extent of their impact on patient satisfaction, and this is through an applied study that relied on measuring the level of quality of health services in the university hospital center of Algeria and the extent of their impact on patient satisfaction according to the dimensions of the quality of health services, and we reached a conclusion that the determinants of the quality of health services. It affects patient satisfaction, which necessitates developing health services according to patients' requirements and improving their quality to obtain patient satisfaction.

Keywords: health service, health quality, quality determinants, patient satisfaction

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Authors: Sunday Odunaiya

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The statistics of banks in operation in this current dispensation compared to some decades ago has brought about a lot of changes on the face of the financial system. The demand of customers, technological advancement, and government policies among others has therefore generated a lot of heat for financial sector’s growth, sustenance and survival. This paper discusses mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in banking sector using West Africa as a yardstick of evaluation. It explains rigorously the conditions that warrant mergers and acquisitions in the banking sector, its effect, and how to ensure mergers and acquisitions effectiveness in the banking sector. The conceptual and empirical review of the relevant literature were done systematically while value-increasing and value-decreasing theories were used to substantiate the discourse. Findings of this paper show that mergers and acquisitions is a practical and conscious activity in Nigeria, Ghana and Ivory Coast from earliest time till date with tremendous turnaround in the financial sector. It was found out that M&A is consensually arrived at by the targets and the acquirer on a value-based account. In other words, merger and acquisition is a deliberate decision reached by the management of such bank for a ‘just cause’.

Keywords: acquisitions, merger, management, financial sector

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Authors: Nada Hamed, Mariam Aldhaheri, Sonia Abdennadher

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Islamic Finance is not a new term that emerging in the global market, but it is still under scope by many countries. Its characteristics and regulation are not widely clear and implemented. In 2015, The United Nation announced a plan about potential benefits of using Islamic Finance as a sustainable development approach. Enhancing its application in financial markets could protect from unexpected crisis that might be created from the traditional tools of finance. This paper focuses on this area to test if Islamic finance could be used for maintaining sustainable development and if the term of 'Green Islamic Finance' could be implemented to minimize the deficiencies and 'pollution’ generated from traditional techniques and tools of finance. This paper intends to measure the impact on financial performance and sustainability when financial institutions use Islamic finance or better practice it. The objective of this explanatory research is to measure the performance of Islamic Finance with using a case study of an Islamic bank. The paper would analyze and compare the behavior of financial institutions that used traditional financing tools and converted to Islamic banking system. The methodology used is based on a case study of an Islamic bank in Dubai with comparing its performance before implementing Islamic Finance and after. The selected case study represents the first national bank in Emirates Arab Unis who adopt the Islamic finance approach. Based on a time series analysis, a quantitative analysis would be also used through looking at various set of ratios that are routinely used to measure bank performance.

Keywords: Islamic finance, financial stability, green finance, Islamic finance practices, financial ratios

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Authors: Yasmin Umar Assegaf, Falikhatun, Salamah Wahyuni

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This study aims to provide empirical evidence about the influence of Islamic Corporate Social Responsibility Disclosures of the financial performance of Islamic banking with the characteristics of the company, as a control variable in Islamic banking in Indonesia. ICSR disclosures are an independent variable, while the Financial Performance is the dependent variable (proxied by Return on Assets (ROA), Return on Equity (ROE), Income Expense Ratio (IER), and Non-net Interest Margin (NIM). The control variables used are firm size, firm age and the type of audit. The population of the study was all Islamic Banks (BUS) operate in Indonesia. The research sample is Islamic Commercial Bank which has existed in Indonesia since 2002 and publishes financial statements between the years of 2007-2011. The sample of the study were include 31 Annual Report published. The results of this study concluded that there are significant influences between the ICSR Disclosures and financial performance. The disclosure is partially effect on ROA, IER and NIM, whereas there is no influence on ROE. Further result shows that all control variables (Firm Size, Age, and Type of Audit Companies) does not have any influence on ICSR Disclosures in Indonesia. This research gives a suggestion for further research to compare these ICSR disclosures in Indonesia with ICSR disclosures in other countries that have Islamic banking, by using other measure variables of financial performance, to get more comprehensive model and real picture.

Keywords: ROA, ROE, IER, NIM, company size, age of the company, audit type, Islamic banking

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Authors: Antoine F. Dedewanou, Eric N. Ekpinda

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We investigate whether and how deposit insurance program affects savings decisions in the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS). Specifically, using the World Bank’s 2014 and 2011 Global Financial Inclusion (Global Findex) databases, we apply special regressor approach. We find that the deposit insurance program increases significantly, everything else equal, the probability that people save their money at a financial institution by 11 percentage points in Gabon, by 22.2 percentage points in DR Congo and by 15.1 percentage points in Chad. These effects are matched with positive effects of age and education level. But in Cameroon, the effect of deposit insurance is not significant. The policies aimed at fostering financial inclusion will be more effective if there is a deposit insurance scheme in place, along with awareness among young people, and education programs. JEL Classification: G21, O12, O16

Keywords: deposit insurance, savings, special regressor, ECCAS countries

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Authors: Silvija ŠIljeg, Ante ŠIljeg, Ivan Marić

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Measuring housing quality is being done on objective and subjective level using different indicators. During the research 5 urban and housing indicators formed according to 58 variables from different housing, domains were used. The aims of the research were to measure housing quality based on GIS approach and to detect critical points of housing in the example of Croatian coastal Town Zadar. The purposes of GIS in the research are to generate models of housing quality indexes by standardisation and aggregation of variables and to examine accuracy model of housing quality index. Analysis of accuracy has been done on the example of variable referring to educational objects availability. By defining weighted coefficients and using different GIS methods high, middle and low housing quality zones were determined. Obtained results can be of use to town planners, spatial planners and town authorities in the process of generating decisions, guidelines, and spatial interventions.

Keywords: housing quality, GIS, housing quality index, indicators, models of housing quality

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Authors: Sadegh Abedi, Ali Yaghoubi, Hamidreza Mashatzadegan

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This paper proposes an approach to identify key processes required by an organization in the field of knowledge management and aligning them with organizational objectives. For this purpose, first, organization’s most important non-financial objectives which are impacted by knowledge management processes are identified and then, using a quality house, are linked with knowledge management processes which are regarded as technical elements. Using this method, processes that are in need of improvement and more attention are prioritized based on their significance. This means that if a process has more influence on organization’s objectives and is in a dire situation comparing to others, is prioritized for choice and improvement. In this research process dominance is considered to be an influential element in process ranking (in addition to communication matrix). This is the reason for utilizing DEA techniques for prioritizing processes in quality house. Results of implementing the method in Khuzestan steel company represents this method’s capability of identifying key processes that require improvements in organization’s knowledge management system.

Keywords: knowledge management, organizational performance, fuzzy data, envelopment analysis

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Authors: Harsh Panchal, Saurabh Amrutkar

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Quality management is an essential part of any project that has directly related to the performance of a project. Quality management is depended on multiple factors at different stages in a project, right from time management to construction logistics. A project is a mixture of various components that include iternary management, health and safety, crew productivity, and many more. From the survey conducted, we came to the conclusion that advancement in technology and indigenous approach to any project will result in maximum quality standards and better project performance. In this paper, we discuss various components of the factors above that lead to compromise the quality of a project and how it can be controlled in order to achieve maximum quality assurance using quality planning and total quality management. The paper also focuses on limitations and problems faced in each factor responsible for quality management and to tackle them using techniques and processes based on activities and identifying the sequence, approaching critical path, and duration. The project management concept that deals with the sequence of scope cost time give us an overview regarding the ongoing quality management, in a nutshell, giving us hints to regulate the current procedure for maximum achievable quality. It also deals with the problems faced by engineers that make the mundane work process slow, reducing the quality outcome drastically.

Keywords: management, performance, project, quality

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Authors: Petr Gurný

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One of the most important tasks in the risk management is the correct determination of probability of default (PD) of particular financial subjects. In this paper a possibility of determination of financial institution’s PD according to the credit-scoring models is discussed. The paper is divided into the two parts. The first part is devoted to the estimation of the three different models (based on the linear discriminant analysis, logit regression and probit regression) from the sample of almost three hundred US commercial banks. Afterwards these models are compared and verified on the control sample with the view to choose the best one. The second part of the paper is aimed at the application of the chosen model on the portfolio of three key Czech banks to estimate their present financial stability. However, it is not less important to be able to estimate the evolution of PD in the future. For this reason, the second task in this paper is to estimate the probability distribution of the future PD for the Czech banks. So, there are sampled randomly the values of particular indicators and estimated the PDs’ distribution, while it’s assumed that the indicators are distributed according to the multidimensional subordinated Lévy model (Variance Gamma model and Normal Inverse Gaussian model, particularly). Although the obtained results show that all banks are relatively healthy, there is still high chance that “a financial crisis” will occur, at least in terms of probability. This is indicated by estimation of the various quantiles in the estimated distributions. Finally, it should be noted that the applicability of the estimated model (with respect to the used data) is limited to the recessionary phase of the financial market.

Keywords: credit-scoring models, multidimensional subordinated Lévy model, probability of default

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Authors: A. Bolaji Adesoye, Alimi Olorunfemi

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This paper examines the impact of small and medium-scale enterprises (SMEs) credit financing and financial market development and their shocks on the output growth of Nigeria. The study estimated a VAR model for Nigeria using 1970-2013 annual data series. Unit root tests and cointegration are carried out. The study also explores IRFs and FEVDs in a system that includes output, commercial bank loan to SMEs, domestic credit to private sector by banks, money supply, lending rate and investment. Findings suggest that shocks in commercial bank credit to SMEs has a major impact on the output changes of Nigeria. Money supply shocks also have a sizeable impact on output growth variations amidst other financial instruments. Lastly, neutrality of investment does not hold in Nigeria as it also has impact on output fluctuations.

Keywords: SMEs financing, financial development, investment, output, Nigeria

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Authors: Joseph Roberson, Carina Kleynhans, Willie Coetzee

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The low entry barriers of the restaurant industry lead to an extremely competitive business environment. In this volatile business sector it is of the utmost importance to implement a strategy of quality differentiation. Vital aspects of a quality differentiation strategy are total quality management, benchmarking and service quality management. Ultimately, restaurant success depends on the continuous support of customers. Customers select restaurants based on their expectations of quality. If the customers' expectations are met, they perceive quality service and will re-patronize the restaurant. The restaurateur can manage perceptions of quality by influencing expectations while ensuring that those expectations are not inflated. The management of expectations can be done by communicating service quality to customers. The aim of this research paper is to describe the development of a grading process for restaurants. An assessment of the extensive body of literature on grading was conducted through content analysis. A standardized method for developing a grading system would assist in successful grading systems that could inform both customers and restaurateurs of restaurant quality.

Keywords: benchmarking, restaurants, grading, service quality, total quality management

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Authors: Atul Dev, Pankaj Jha

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Dr. Genichi Taguchi looked at quality in a broader term and gave an excellent definition of quality in terms of loss to society. However the scope of this definition is limited to the losses imparted by a poor quality product to the customer only and are considered during the useful life of the product and further in a certain situation this loss can even be zero. In this paper, it has been proposed that the scope of quality of a product shall be further enhanced by considering the losses imparted by a poor quality product to society at large, due to associated environmental and safety related factors, over the complete life cycle of the product. Moreover, though these losses can be further minimized with the use of techno-safety interventions, the net losses to society however can never be made zero. This paper proposes an entirely new approach towards defining product quality and is based on Taguchi’s definition of quality.

Keywords: existing concept, goal post philosophy, life cycle, proposed concept, quality loss function

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Authors: Hasna Elalaoui Elabdallaoui, Abdelaziz Elfazziki, Mohamed Sadgal

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Outlines: The social economy is a moral approach to solidarity applied to the projects’ development. To reconcile economic activity and social equity, crowdfunding is as an alternative means of financing social projects. Several collaborative blockchain platforms exist. It eliminates the need for a central authority or an inconsiderate middleman. Also, the costs for a successful crowdfunding campaign are reduced, since there is no commission to be paid to the intermediary. It improves the transparency of record keeping and delegates authority to authorities who may be prone to corruption. Objectives: The objectives are: to define a software infrastructure for projects’ participatory financing within a social and solidarity economy, allowing transparent, secure, and fair management and to have a financial mechanism that improves financial inclusion. Methodology: The proposed methodology is: crowdfunding platforms literature review, financing mechanisms literature review, requirements analysis and project definition, a business plan, Platform development process and implementation technology, and testing an MVP. Contributions: The solution consists of proposing a new approach to crowdfunding based on Islamic financing, which is the principle of Mousharaka inspired by Islamic financing, which presents a financial innovation that integrates ethics and the social dimension into contemporary banking practices. Conclusion: Crowdfunding platforms need to secure projects and allow only quality projects but also offer a wide range of options to funders. Thus, a framework based on blockchain technology and Islamic financing is proposed to manage this arbitration between quality and quantity of options. The proposed financing system, "Musharaka", is a mode of financing that prohibits interests and uncertainties. The implementation is offered on the secure Ethereum platform as investors sign and initiate transactions for contributions using their digital signature wallet managed by a cryptography algorithm and smart contracts. Our proposal is illustrated by a crop irrigation project in the Marrakech region.

Keywords: social economy, Musharaka, blockchain, smart contract, crowdfunding

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Authors: Manmeet Kaur, Madhu Vij

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The Board of Directors in a firm performs the primary role of an internal control mechanism. This Study seeks to understand the relationship between internal governance and performance of banks in India. The research paper investigates the effect of board structure (proportion of nonexecutive directors, gender diversity, board size and meetings per year) on the firm performance. This paper evaluates the impact of corporate governance mechanisms on bank’s financial performance using panel data for 28 listed banks in National Stock Exchange of India for the period of 2008-2014. Returns on Asset, Return on Equity, Tobin’s Q and Net Interest Margin were used as the financial performance indicators. To estimate the relationship among governance and bank performance initially the Study uses Pooled Ordinary Least Square (OLS) Estimation and Generalized Least Square (GLS) Estimation. Then a well-developed panel Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) Estimator is developed to investigate the dynamic nature of performance and governance relationship. The Study empirically confirms that two-step system GMM approach controls the problem of unobserved heterogeneity and endogeneity as compared to the OLS and GLS approach. The result suggests that banks with small board, boards with female members, and boards that meet more frequently tend to be more efficient and subsequently have a positive impact on performance of banks. The study offers insights to policy makers interested in enhancing the quality of governance of banks in India. Also, the findings suggest that board structure plays a vital role in the improvement of corporate governance mechanism for financial institutions. There is a need to have efficient boards in banks to improve the overall health of the financial institutions and the economic development of the country.

Keywords: board of directors, corporate governance, GMM estimation, Indian banking

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Authors: G. C. Surya Bahadur, Ranjana Kothari

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The paper attempts to analyze linkages between corporate governance and firm performance in India. The study employs a panel data of 50 Nifty companies from 2008 to 2012. Using LSDV panel data model and 2SLS model the study reveals that that good corporate governance practices adopted by companies is positively related with financial performance. Board independence, number of board committees and executive compensation are found to have positive relationship while ownership by promoters and financial leverage have negative relationship with performance. There is existence of bi-directional relationship between corporate governance and financial performance. Companies with sound financial performance are more likely to conform to corporate governance norms and standards and implement sound corporate governance system. The findings indicate that companies can enhance business performance and sustainability by embracing sound corporate governance practices.

Keywords: board structure, corporate governance, executive compensation, ownership structure

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Authors: Muhammad Fanseem E. M., Rama Satya Satish Kumar, Indrajeet Bhausaheb Bhavar, Deepak M.

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Keeping the right balance of electricity between the supply and demand sides of the grid is one of the most important objectives of electrical grid operation. Power generation and demand forecasting are the core of power management and generation scheduling. Large, centralized producing units were used in the construction of conventional power systems in the past. A certain level of balance was possible since the generation kept up with the power demand. However, integrating renewable energy sources into power networks has proven to be a difficult challenge due to its intermittent nature. The power imbalance caused by rising demands and peak loads is negatively affecting power quality and dependability. Demand side management and demand response were one of the solutions, keeping generation the same but altering or rescheduling or shedding completely the load or demand. However, shedding the load or rescheduling is not an efficient way. There comes the significance of virtual power plants. The virtual power plant integrates distributed generation, dispatchable load, and distributed energy storage organically by using complementing control approaches and communication technologies. This would eventually increase the utilization rate and financial advantages of distributed energy resources. Most of the writing on virtual power plant models ignored technical limitations, and modeling was done in favor of a financial or commercial viewpoint. Therefore, this paper aims to address the modeling intricacies of VPPs and their technical limitations, shedding light on a holistic understanding of this innovative power management approach.

Keywords: cost optimization, distributed energy resources, dynamic modeling, model quality tests, power system modeling

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Authors: Ruth Hegarty, Noel Connaughton

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Sustainability reporting has become a priority for many global multinational companies. This is associated with ever-increasing expectations from key stakeholders for companies to be transparent about their strategies, activities and management with regard to sustainability issues. The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) encourages reporters to only provide information on the issues that are really critical in order to achieve the organisation’s goals for sustainability and manage its impact on environment and society. A key challenge for most reporting organisations is how to identify relevant issues for sustainability reporting and prioritise those material issues in accordance with company and stakeholder needs. A recent study indicates that most of the largest companies listed on the world’s stock exchanges are failing to provide data on key sustainability indicators such as employee turnover, energy, greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs), injury rate, pay equity, waste and water. This paper takes an indepth look at the approaches used by a select number of international sustainability leader corporates to identify key sustainability issues. The research methodology involves performing a detailed analysis of the sustainability report content of up to 50 companies listed on the 2014 Dow Jones Sustainability Indices (DJSI). The most recent sustainability report content found on the GRI Sustainability Disclosure Database is then compared with 91 GRI Specific Standard Disclosures and a small number of GRI Standard Disclosures. Preliminary research indicates significant gaps in the information disclosed in corporate sustainability reports versus the indicator content specified in the GRI Content Index. The following outlines some of the key findings to date: Most companies made a partial disclosure with regard to the Economic indicators of climate change risks and infrastructure investments, but did not focus on the associated negative impacts. The top Environmental indicators disclosed were energy consumption and reductions, GHG emissions, water withdrawals, waste and compliance. The lowest rates of indicator disclosure included biodiversity, water discharge, mitigation of environmental impacts of products and services, transport, environmental investments, screening of new suppliers and supply chain impacts. The top Social indicators disclosed were new employee hires, rates of injury, freedom of association in operations, child labour and forced labour. Lesser disclosure rates were reported for employee training, composition of governance bodies and employees, political contributions, corruption and fines for non-compliance. The reporting on most other Social indicators was found to be poor. In addition, most companies give only a brief explanation on how material issues are defined, identified and ranked. Data on the identification of key stakeholders and the degree and nature of engagement for determining issues and their weightings is also lacking. Generally, little to no data is provided on the algorithms used to score an issue. Research indicates that most companies lack a rigorous and thorough methodology to systematically determine the material issues of sustainability reporting in accordance with company and stakeholder needs.

Keywords: identification of key stakeholders, material issues, sustainability reporting, transparency

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Authors: Joyly Jill Apud

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Corruption is an all-encompassing issue worldwide. Many attempts have been done to address such cases especially by the government through increasing transparency. The Philippine government increased the mechanism of transparency by opening to public its financial transactions through Full Disclosure Policy – mandating all local governments to post in their websites all financial transactions (Philippine Public Transparency Reporting Project, 2011). For transparency to be fully realized, the challenge lies in creating a mechanism where the constituents are encouraged to engage as social auditors. In line of the said challenge, the study focused in Davao City, Philippines measuring the respondent’s awareness, access and utilization of Full Disclosure Policy (FDP). Particularly, this study determined the significant difference on the awareness, access and utilization of respondents when grouped according to sector and the significant relationship between respondents’ awareness and in the access and utilization of FDP reports. The study used descriptive-correlation, Mean, Anova and Pearson R as statistical treatment. The 120 respondents are from the different sectors of Davao City. These are the Academe, Youth, LGUs, NGOs, Business, and Church groups. The awareness of the respondents was measured in three main categories: Existence of the Policy, Content of the Policy and the Manner of Publication. Access and Utilization of the FDP reports is divided into three: Budget Reports, Procurement Reports and Special Purpose Fund Reports. Results showed that the respondents are moderately aware of the Policy. Though it manifested that the respondents are aware of the disclosure, they are unaware of the Full Disclosure Policy and Full Disclosure Policy Portal. Moreover, the respondents seldom access and utilize all the FDP reports. Further results revealed that there is a significant difference in the awareness and the access and utilization of FDP when grouped according to sector. Moreover, significant relationship in the awareness and the access and utilization of the FDP is evident. It showed that the higher the awareness on FDP, the higher the level of access and utilization on the FDP reports.

Keywords: corruption, e-governance, budget transparency, participation

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Authors: Urszula Malaga-Toboła, Marek Gugała, Rafał Kornas, Robert Rusinek, Marek Gancarz

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The work focused on presenting the elements that determine the quality of fresh milk in the context of the quality of its transport. The quality of the raw material depends on the quality of transport. Milk transport involves many activities in which, apart from the temperature and sterility of the means of transport, it is important not to expose the raw material to shocks. Recently, there have been changes in the milk supply chain, thus affecting the logistics processes between its links. Based on the conducted research and analyses, it was found that the condition of the road surface on which milk is transported affects its quality. For the T1 milk transport route- gravel roads of very poor and poor quality, the lowest number of bacteria and the highest number of somatic cells, fat content, and temperature of the transported milk were obtained. A well-organized integrated transport system is a real need for most companies today. The analysis showed significant differences in the quality of milk delivered to the dairy.

Keywords: fresh milk, transport, milk quality, dairy

Procedia PDF Downloads 81