Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
EVIDENCE ON THE INCOMPLETENESS OF MERTON-TYPE STRUCTURAL MODELS FOR DEFAULT PREDICTION

AUTHOR Roger M. Stein One may argue that structural models of default incorporating equity market information, such as the Merton (1974) model, are complete in the sense that univariate (single-factor) models are thought to be sufficient to capture all significant aspects of the future prospects for a firm. This assertion is testable empirically. In this short paper we provide some evidence that unmodified, Merton-type models are not, in fact, complete in the sense that additional information provides better discrimination between defaulters and non-defaulters even when conditioned on Merton-based variables. Using Moody's extensive database of corporate defaults, we first show heuristically that partitioning a standard Merton model by a second variable provides more information about default. We then show that econometric tests of significance refute the assertion that additional information does not help explain default. Finally, we show that even a simple regression-based multi-factor model appears to outperform its single-factor (basic Merton-only) counterpart in rigorous (out-of-sample and out-of-time) validation. This suggests merit to exploring enhancements to the Merton framework such as, for example, those introduced by the Vasicek-Kealhofer model. © 2005 Moody’s KMV Company. All rights reserved. Credit Monitor®, EDFCalc®, Private Firm Model®, KMV®, CreditEdge, Portfolio Manager, Portfolio Preprocessor, GCorr, DealAnalyzer, CreditMark, the KMV logo, Moody's RiskCalc, Moody's Financial Analyst, Moody's Risk Advisor, LossCalc, Expected Default Frequency, and EDF are trademarks of MIS Quality Management Corp. NOTE ON REVISIONS This paper was originally released by Moody's Risk Management Services in 2000, prior to the acquisition of KMV by Moody's. Since that time, Moody's KMV has conducted additional research in this area and we have revised the content of the article to reflect this research. We have also edited some of the language in the paper to better reflect differences between generic Merton-type models of the sort tested in this paper and the VK model to which Moody's did not have access at the time of the original publication; nonetheless, the main results are the same as in previous versions of the paper. Published by: Moody’s KMV Company To Learn More Please contact your Moody’s KMV client representative, visit us online at www.moodyskmv. com, contact Moody’s KMV via e-mail at info@mkmv.com, or call us at: FROM NORTH AND SOUTH AMERICA CALL: 1 866 321 MKMV (6568) or 415 296 9669 FROM EUROPE, THE MIDDLE EAST, AND AFRICA CALL: 44 20 7778 7400 FROM ASIA, NEW ZEALAND, AUSTRALIA AND INDIA CALL: 813 3218 1160
On the deterministic multicast capacity of bidirectional relay networks

In this paper, we completely characterize the deterministic multicast capacity region of the symmetric two-pair bidirectional half duplex relay network with private messages. Towards this end, we first develop a new upper bound on the deterministic capacity region, based on the notion of a one-sided genie. We then proceed to construct novel detour schemes that achieve the upper bound by routing the bits intended for a certain receiver through the network rather than sending it directly. To the best of the authors' knowledge, this scenario corresponds to one of the rare cases where coding, across levels and time, is needed to achieve the deterministic capacity of the network.
Topic, Focus and null subjects in Old French

Abstract Old French subject pronouns (Spro) were omissible if postverbal (Foulet 1928), but not freely so (Vance 1997, Zimmermann 2014). This article addresses their partial omissibility in discourse-syntax terms, following work on partial null subject languages by Holmberg and Nikanne (2002) and Modesto (2008). An observational study of dialogic responses in 13th century prose romances is first reported, finding strong indications of covariation between the Topic/Focus status of an initial non-subject constituent and the expression/omission of post-verbal Spro. A quantitative investigation, in such texts, of preposed discourse-linked anaphoric constituents and preposed intensifiers, taken as diagnostic of Topichood and Focushood respectively, confirmed this analysis. We take null Spro to be available (i) when a null Topic operator targets left-peripheral TopicP, and (ii) with a left-peripheral Focused expression. When a discourse-linked non-subject constituent occupies TopicP, however, Spro must be overt. Résumé En ancien français, on pouvait effacer un sujet pronominal en position postverbale (Foulet 1928), sous certaines conditions (Vance 1997, Zimmermann 2014). M'inspirant des recherches de Homberg et Nikanne (2002) et de Modesto (2008) sur les langues partiellement pro-drop, je propose que cet effacement conditionnel s'analyse en termes de syntaxe discursive. L'article présente d'abord une étude de couplets question-réponse recueillis dans des romans en prose du 13e siècle où on peut observer un rapport étroit entre l'effacement d'un sujet pronominal et le statut discursif – soit topique, soit focus – du syntagme phrastique initial. Une analyse quantitative de ces syntagmes en initiale de phrase qui contiennent d'une part une expression anaphorique et d'autre part un intensificateur vient appuyer cette hypothèse et permet de conclure qu'un Spro non exprimé est légitimé en ancien français en présence, soit (i) d'un opérateur nul Topique ciblant un TopP situé dans la périphérie de gauche, soit (ii) d'une expression focalisée. Par ailleurs, lorsqu'un syntagme discursivement lié (autre que le sujet) occupe la position TopP, un sujet pronominal ne peut être effacé.
Optical Mapping of Sarcoplasmic Reticulum Ca2+ in the Intact Heart: Ryanodine Receptor Refractoriness During Alternans and Fibrillation

Rationale: Sarcoplasmic reticulum (SR) Ca2+ cycling is key to normal excitation–contraction coupling but may also contribute to pathological cardiac alternans and arrhythmia. Objective: To measure intra-SR free [Ca2+] ([Ca2+]SR) changes in intact hearts during alternans and ventricular fibrillation (VF). Methods and Results: Simultaneous optical mapping of Vm (with RH237) and [Ca2+]SR (with Fluo-5N AM) was performed in Langendorff-perfused rabbit hearts. Alternans and VF were induced by rapid pacing. SR Ca2+ and action potential duration (APD) alternans occurred in-phase, but SR Ca2+ alternans emerged first as cycle length was progressively reduced (217±10 versus 190±13 ms; P<0.05). Ryanodine receptor (RyR) refractoriness played a key role in the onset of SR Ca2+ alternans, with SR Ca2+ release alternans routinely occurring without changes in diastolic [Ca2+]SR. Sensitizing RyR with caffeine (200 &mgr;mol/L) significantly reduced the pacing threshold for both SR Ca2+ and APD alternans (188±15 and 173±12 ms; P<0.05 versus baseline). Caffeine also reduced the magnitude of spatially discordant SR Ca2+ alternans, but not APD alternans, the pacing threshold for discordance, or threshold for VF. During VF, [Ca2+]SR was high, but RyR remained nearly continuously refractory, resulting in minimal SR Ca2+ release throughout VF. Conclusions: In intact hearts, RyR refractoriness initiates SR Ca2+ release alternans that can be amplified by diastolic [Ca2+]SR alternans and lead to APD alternans. Sensitizing RyR suppresses spatially concordant but not discordant SR Ca2+ and APD alternans. Despite increased [Ca2+]SR during VF, SR Ca2+ release was nearly continuously refractory. This novel method provides insight into SR Ca2+ handling during cardiac alternans and arrhythmia.
Remembering the Past, Anticipating the Future: Community Learning and Adaptation Discourse in Media Commemorations of Catastrophic Wildfires in Colorado

ABSTRACT Wildfire may be the clearest example to date of a socio-natural hazard that is being exacerbated by climate change, making wildfire an essential lens through which to investigate learning and adaptation in the Anthropocene. Here, we study discourse about simultaneous and recurring catastrophic wildfires in Colorado newspapers. We find that the wildfires’ anniversaries served as opportunities for critical reflection on hazard causality and mitigation in local media, particularly the first anniversary and especially for a community that experienced two catastrophic wildfires in a row. Two mediated prospective memory practices—invoking hindsight as foresight and recognizing a new normal—contributed to this discourse. However, learning and adaptation discourse faded in local media at later anniversaries. These findings contribute to learning and adaptation scholarship by connecting the concept of mediated prospective memory to disaster-related media studies and attending to the intricacies of anniversary commemoration under circumstances of simultaneous and recurring disasters.
Fast breakpoints: design and implementation

We have designed and implemented a fast breakpoint facility. Breakpoints are usually thought of as a feature of an interactive debugger, in which case the breakpoints need not be particularly fast. In our environment breakpoints are often used for non-interactive information gathering; for example, procedure call count and statement execution count profiling [Swinehart, et al.]. When used non-interactively, breakpoints should be as fast as possible, so as to perturb the execution of the program as little as possible. Even in interactive debuggers, a conditional breakpoint facility would benefit from breakpoints that could transfer to the evaluation of the condition rapidly, and continue expeditiously if the condition were not satisfied. Such conditional breakpoints could be used to check assertions, etc. Program advising could also make use of fast breakpoints [Teitelman]. Examples of advising include tracing, timing, and even animation, all of which should be part of an advanced programming environment. We have ported the Cedar environment from a machine with microcode support for breakpoints [Lampson and Pier] to commercial platforms running C code [Atkinson, et al.]. Most of our ports run under the Unix* operating system, so one choice for implementing breakpoints for Cedar was to use the breakpoint facility provided by that system. The breakpoints provided by the Unix operating system are several orders of magnitude too slow (and also several process switches too complicated) for the applications we have in mind. So we designed a breakpoint system that was fast enough for our purposes. Breakpoints for uni-processors running single threads of control used to be fast and simple to implement. This paper shows that breakpoints can still be fast, even with multiple threads of control on multi-processors. This paper describes problems in the design of a breakpoint package for modern computer architectures and programming styles, and our solutions to them for a particular architecture.
A system for unrestricted topic retrieval from radio news broadcasts

The "topic classification" systems described in the speech literature typically partition a collection of spoken messages into a small number of pre-defined topics. As such, they are only useful if the set of message topics does not vary over time. However, the techniques of textual information retrieval (IR) have long allowed for retrieval by arbitrary subject from a document collection. This paper describes experiments in unrestricted retrieval from a collection of radio news broadcasts. A hybrid message indexing strategy, with conventional word recognition and a fast lattice-based wordspotter, allows for the retrieval of news reports concerning any subject. The results show that retrieval can be carried out extremely quickly and that high accuracy is possible, even with recognition output errors.
Stallings Foldings and Subgroups of Amalgams of Finite Groups

In the 1980's Stallings showed that every finitely generated subgroup of a free group is canonically represented by a finite minimal immersion of a bouquet of circles. In terms of the theory of automata, this is a minimal finite inverse automaton. This allows for the deep algorithmic theory of finite automata and finite inverse monoids to be used to answer questions about finitely generated subgroups of free groups. In this paper we attempt to apply the same methods to other classes of groups. A fundamental new problem is that the Stallings folding algorithm must be modified to allow for ``sewing'' on relations of non-free groups. We look at the class of groups that are amalgams of finite groups. It is known that these groups are locally quasiconvex and thus all finitely generated subgroups are represented by finite automata. We present an algorithm to compute such a finite automaton and use it to solve various algorithmic problems.
LIMIT THEOREMS FOR REGENERATIVE EXCURSION PROCESSES

The regenerative excursion process Z(t), t = 0,1,2,. is constructed by two independent sequences X = {Xi,i ≥ 1} and Z = {Ti,(Zi(t),0 ≤ t < Ti),i ≥ 1}. For the embedded alternating renewal process, with interarrival times Xi - the time for the installation and Ti - the time for the work, are proved some limit theorems for the spent worktime and the residual worktime, when at least one of the means of Xi and Ti is infinite. Limit theorems for the process Z(t) are proved, too. Finally, some applications to the branching processes with state-dependent immigration are given.
Social Consumer Neuroscience: Neurophysiological Measures of Advertising Effectiveness in a Social Context

The application of neurophysiological methods to study the effects of advertising on consumer purchase behavior has seen an enormous growth in recent years. However, little is known about the role social settings have on shaping the human brain during the processing of advertising stimuli. To address this issue, we first review previous key findings of neuroscience research on advertising effectiveness. Next, we discuss traditional advertising research into the effects social context has on the way consumers experience advertising messages and explain why marketers, who aim to predict advertising effectiveness, should place participants in social settings, in addition to the traditional ways of studying consumer brain responses to advertising in social isolation. This article contributes to the literature by offering advertising researchers a series of research agendas on the key indicators of advertising effectiveness (attention, emotion, memory, and preference). It aims to improve understanding of the impact social context has on consumers' neurophysiological responses to advertising messages.
Evaluating a Novel Eye Tracking Tool to Detect Invalid Responding in Neurocognitive Assessment

Abstract : Valid symptom report and test performance are essentialprerequisites for the accurate interpretation of neurocognitive or neuropsychologicalassessment data. Unfortunately, base rates of invalid responding in civilian and militarycontexts suggest that symptom exaggeration and underperformance are common in thesetypes of assessments. Many response validity tests (RVTs) have been developed andderived to detect invalid responding, but these measures are limited by lengthyadministration times, limited sensitivity, and susceptibility to coaching. This dissertationproject evaluated a novel eye-tracking tool, the Bethesda Eye and Attention Measure(BEAM), as a method for detecting invalid responding in neurocognitive assessment.
Effect of weaning age upon the slaughter and physicochemical traits of rabbit meat

The effect of the weaning age of rabbits on slaughter traits and physicochemical properties of meat was investigated. Sixteen New Zealand White rabbits (Oryctolagus cuniculus) were used, divided in two groups: group А (n = 8) weaned at the age of 21 days (early weaned) and group В (n = 8) weaned at the age of 35 days (normally weaned). The animals were fed with two categories of pelleted feed: for weaned rabbits up to 50 days of age and for growing rabbits older than 50 days of age. It was established that the early weaning of rabbits resulted in a statistically signifi cantly lower body mass, dressed carcass weight and dressing percentage as compared to normally weaned animals. Also, the pH of meat by the 24th hour after slaughtering and the dry matter of m. longissimus lumborum (LL) were signifi cantly lower in group A. Simultaneously, a statistically signifi cantly higher water-holding capacity, water content and lightness were established in the meat of early weaned compared to normally weaned rabbits. The protein and fat contents of LL and m. semimembranosus (SМ) in rabbits from group A correlated negatively and signifi cantly with water content, and positively with the dry matter. In group B, water content also correlated signifi cantly and negatively with protein content. Fat and ash in SM meat was in a positive statistically signifi cant relationship for both experimental groups. The results from the present study showed that the weaning age infl uenced both the slaughter traits and physicochemical properties of rabbit meat.
Trading Company Finance and the Relationship between Trade Credit and Loans

Japan’s trading company finance is characterized not only by its size, but also by its variety of financial instruments. We utilize the diversity of these instruments to examine the relationship between trade credit and bank loans. Previous studies have looked at this very issue with hypotheses of the relationship falling into two categories: one emphasizing the difference between financial and non-financial institutions, and the other emphasizing the difference between credit instruments. Empirical studies, such as Petersen and Rajan (1997), have been ambiguous about which of these two hypotheses is being tested. By using data where individual trading companies supply both loans and trade credit we examine the importance of the different financial instruments for trading company finance. By controlling for these instruments, we also examine how the differing characteristics of financial and non-financial institutions affect the flow of credit to firms. We find that trade credit and loans differ significantly even when offered by the same institutions, while loans extended by financial institutions and those extended by non-financial enterprises respond similarly. The relevance of the characteristics of financial instruments has not been previously examined in the literature. JEL codes : G21, G29, G32
Decoy effect, anticipated regret, and preferences for work–family benefits

Attracting talent is one of the key challenges for organizations, and offering attractive work-family benefits plays an increasingly important role in succeeding at this challenge. However, behavioral decision theory suggests that when choosing among job offers with different work-family benefits, individuals may fall prey to a decoy effect and this effect may be mediated through anticipated regret. This effect occurs when preferences are influenced by a normatively irrelevant decoy option that is clearly inferior to one of the other options in the choice set, but not the other (i.e., “asymmetrically dominated”). Across two studies, we investigated preferences for two important types of work-family benefits: flexible work arrangements (FWA) and dependent care support (DCS). We predicted and found a decoy effect: preferences for jobs with these benefits were influenced by the presence of a normatively irrelevant decoy option. That is, preferences shifted towards either the FWA option or the DCS option depending on which option the decoy targeted (i.e., the option that asymmetrically dominated the decoy). The effects held over and above variables related to individuals’ work and family situations and values, including role centrality. Moreover, we found that anticipated regret mediated the effect of the decoy option on benefit preferences.
Managing adolescent learners with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder: guidelines for educators

The educational setting is extremely difficult for adolescent learners with attentiondeficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), the core and secondary symptoms of which impair their ability to meet the increasing demands of high school and set them up for academic failure as well as behavioural and social adjustment difficulties. Research reveals that high school educators do not always have an understanding of ADHD driven forms of behaviour, and few have been trained in a set of strategies for managing these or for enhancing the academic performance of learners with this condition. This qualitative study was conducted in the secondary phase of a school in South Africa. By means of participatory action research a programme in the form of a handbook was developed providing comprehensive and practical guidelines to assist educators in the management of adolescent learners with ADHD. The results of the program were positive. Educators reported an increase in knowledge about ADHD which enabled them to more easily identify learners with this condition in their classes as well as enhancing their understanding of and empathy towards these learners. Participation in the programme provided educators with the skills and strategies to better manage adolescent learners with ADHD thereby guiding them into more adaptive ways of responding to the educational environment. Educators felt that they had benefitted from participation in the program as the knowledge and skills gained lead to feelings of empowerment as they became more competent in their role as educators. MANAGING ADOLESCENTS WITH ADHD 3
FSX: a tool for fine-grained incremental unit test generation for C/C++ programs

Automated unit test generation bears the promise of significantly reducing test cost and hence improving software quality. However, the maintenance cost of the automatically generated tests presents a significant barrier to adoption of this technology. To address this challenge, in previous work, we proposed a novel technique for automated and fine-grained incremental generation of unit tests through minimal augmentation of an existing test suite. In this paper we describe a tool FSX, implementing this technique. We describe the architecture, user-interface, and salient features of FSX, and specific practical use-cases of its technology. We also report on a real, large-scale deployment of FSX, as a practical validation of the underlying research contribution and of automated test generation research in general.
SURFACE RECONSTRUCTION ALGORITHMS FOR DETAILED CLOSE-RANGE OBJECT MODELING

Nowadays 3D modeling is generally performed using image or range data. Range sensors are getting a quite common source of data for modeling purposes due to their speed and ability to capture millions of points. In this paper we report about two surface measurement algorithms for precise and detailed object reconstruction from terrestrial images. Photogrammetry has all the potentialities to retrieve the same details of an object that range sensors can achieve. Using advanced measurement techniques, which combine area-based and feature-based matching algorithms we are able to generate dense point clouds of complex and freeform objects, imaged in closely or widely separated images. Different examples are reported to show the potentiality of the methods and their applicability to different close-range data sets.