Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Model for Selecting Commercial Bank Government Security Portfolios

T HE object of this paper is to formulate a normative model for selecting a bank's Government security portfolio. Two major problems arise in constructing a model of bank portfolio selection. First, the model must handle uncertainty. This includes not only uncertain future events but also the decision maker's preferences for the outcomes associated with these events. Second, it must recognize the intertemporal or multi-period character of the decision making process. This means that a decision made in one period will influence subsequent decisions and hence, that subsequent decisions must be considered in arriving at the present one. The present paper applies Bayesian and sequential decision theory to handle both the expectationally stochastic and the dynamic aspects of this important decision problem simultaneously and consistently. No previous model of commercial bank portfolio selection handles either or both problems satisfactorily. Porter's model of bank asset selection recognizes uncertainty by treating future cash flows and security prices as random variables, but it is only one period in length. Moreover, it does not consider the decision maker's preferences. ' Since the objective function is linear, the model produces a portfolio diversified between securities and loans only through the selection of distribution functions describing the random variables. These transform the function into a nonlinear one upon integration. Cheng's model of bank security portfolio selection is, in effect, a one period formulation also.2 It incorporates uncertainty and the decision maker's preferences through Markowitz's efficient portfolio concept.3 An efficient portfolio is one which maximizes expected return for a given variance of return (or minimizes the variance of return for a given expected return). As Tobin points out, however, this criterion assumes, quite restrictively, that either the variable return is normally distributed or that the decision maker has a quadratic utility function.4 Cheng also makes the highly unrealistic assumption that securities are held to maturity. Multi-period bank portfolio selection models are all based on the assumption that future events are known with certainty. One such model formulated by Chambers and Charnes attempts to reflect the risk inherent in different portfolio configurations by including the Federal Reserve's capital adequacy formula as a constraint.5 Used in the supervision of banks, the capital adequacy formula allocates a bank's capital to designated asset categories on a fractional basis. The values of the fractions are designed to measure the percent by which the different asset categories would decline in market value if they had to be liquidated quickly.6 The choice of these values is somewhat arbitrary. Moreover, the formula itself implicitly assumes a particular preference structure and a certain probabilistic occurrence of future events. Neither assumption is likely to represent accurately either the decision maker's preferences or expectations.7
Was muten sich Arbeitslose zu?: Lohnkonzessionen von ALG-II-Empfängern

"The paper examines wage requirements of recipients of Unemployment Benefit II (ALG II), taking up former evaluations by Christensen on wage demands of the unemployed in Germany. Unlike Christensen, we did not base our analyses on the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP). Instead, we used the cross-sectional data provided by the Institute for Employment Research (IAB) in a survey focused on the living conditions and social security aspects ('Lebenssituation und soziale Sicherung') of recipients of ALG II, carried out at an early stage after the reform of unemployment benefit and social assistance in Germany. We were especially interested in finding out whether the unemployed have become more prepared to reduce their wage demands since the introduction of the German Social Code II (SGB II) compared to the period up to 2000 (cf. Christensen). To do so, we particularly investigated the ratio between wages paid before unemployment and reservation wages, the dependency of this ratio on the duration of unemployment as well as the factors determining the reservation wage level. Analyses of the most recent IAB survey of ALG II recipients demonstrate that the preparedness to accept lower wages has not (yet) increased significantly since the introduction of SGB II. Descriptive results show that the reservation wage level tends to be independent of the recipient's current employment status. Instead, the wage level demanded is rather determined by whether the recipient lives on his or her own or in a multiparty household. The indicated reservation wage level increases with the number of children in the household. Taking the Reservation Wage Ratio (RWR) as a basis as in Christensen's study, it emerges that respondents state they are prepared to accept employment only on provision of a net hourly wage rate increase of 13% on average compared to that previous to unemployment. Another outcome is that the RWR does not decrease in line with the duration of unemployment. Recipients' personal circumstances are also fundamental to the reservation wage level in the multivariate estimations, the wage received before unemployment being the most significant indicator. The present results must be considered preliminary for two reasons: firstly, there is still potential for more detail in the multivariate analyses. Secondly, due to initial difficulties in implementing the new SGB II-based legislation on the part of the responsible bodies, it is unlikely that the available data as yet fully reflect the impacts of the reform, in particular with respect to indications on reservation wages. Ultimately, we will only be in a position to learn more about the preparedness of ALG II recipients to reduce wage requirements when we have access to data on the issues in focus over a sequence of several years, which is planned by the IAB. " (Autorenreferat, IAB-Doku)
Comparison of interferon γ release assays and conventional screening tests before tumour necrosis factor α blockade in patients with inflammatory arthritis

Objective: To compare the performance of two interferon γ release assays (IGRAs) and conventional screening tests in patients with inflammatory arthritis undergoing screening for latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI) before treatment with anti-tumour necrosis factor α (anti-TNFα) compounds. Methods: Successive patients were subjected to conventional LTBI screening, including a tuberculin skin test (TST). The T-SPOT.TB test was performed on all patients and the QuantiFERON-TB Gold test was performed on a large subset. The results of the IGRAs were compared with the results of conventional screening tests. Results: A total 150 patients were evaluated. The majority (57.9%) had rheumatoid arthritis. Previous vaccination with Bacille Calmette–Guerin was confirmed in 82% of patients. No patient had received prior anti-TB treatment. A total of 57 patients (38.0%) had at least one positive conventional risk factor. In contrast, an unequivocally positive T-SPOT.TB test was seen in only 14/143 (9.8%). There was 98.2% agreement between the two IGRAs. Statistically significant associations were found between each of the IGRAs and both TST and risk history, but not chest x-ray (CXR). A positive IGRA result was significantly associated with increased age. TB was not reactivated in any patient during the follow-up period. Interpretation: This study suggests that IGRAs may be useful when screening for LTBI before anti-TNFα therapy in patients with immune-mediated inflammatory diseases. The observations reported here also highlight the inadequate performance of CXR as a marker of LTBI.
Resource Fungibility, the Flypaper Effect, and the Expenditure Impact of Grants-in-Aid

The typical assumption that intergovernmental grants-in-aid alter a recipient's budget constraint according to the legal provisions of grant programs was first challenged by McGuire (1975, 1978) in a model where local officials are able to convert some fraction of conditional aid into pure fungible resources. This paper develops a model of local government expenditure decisions based on McGuire's original work and applies it to data for large U.S. city governments. The results lend strong support to the fungibility hypothesis. Additionally, and importantly, the results provide very little evidence in support of the so-called "flypaper effect" of unconditional grants. This is due to a more appropriate specification of the unconditional aid variable.
Local compensation payments for agri-environmental externalities: a panel data analysis of bargaining outcomes

We analyse local compensation payments made to farmers for providing landscape amenities in Alpine tourist communities. These payments result from political bargaining at the municipal level. Panel data estimation shows that the probability of introducing compensation payments depends positively on the benefits of landscape amenities. Although no impact of service provision cost is found, transaction costs at different levels of the bargaining process reduce the probability of payments. Compensation payments mainly occur in communities where the provision of agricultural landscape services is perceived as relatively low and the diversity of the countryside seems to be endangered. We argue that municipal compensation payments are an important supplement to national and European Union policy measures in support of less-favoured areas.
Ignoring the Multi-species Aspect of Labor Supply Decisions in Spatially Explicit Bio-economic Fishery Models

This paper analyzes the bias associated with ignoring the multi-species aspect of labor supply decisions in spatially explicit bioeconomic fishery models. Recent advancements have been made to simultaneously model the biology of a marine species and the strategic behavior of harvesters over both time and space in order to more accurately predict the effect of regulatory policies on harvester effort and resource population. These models assume a nested choice structure in which the harvester first faces a dichotomous decision between fishing for the target species or not on a given day and then chooses a location to fish conditional on participation. This structure implicitly groups all non-target species options together in the first nest forcing participation-specific coefficients to be the same for all outside options, including fishing for an alternative species and staying home, two very different choices. Using a complete 15-year panel of all fishing trips made by fishermen possessing a Florida spiny lobster license, including non-lobster trips, I show that the simplifying assumption of a dichotomous choice structure in the first nest is not innocuous and that the participation probabilities can change substantially with the addition of another species as an outside alternative.
Controller involvement in management: an empirical study in large Italian corporations

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to report the findings of a study designed to understand how involved controllers are in management decision processes, what causes more or less involvement in those processes, and whether involvement is significantly associate with performance.Design/methodology/approach – To test the research propositions developed from a review of prior literature, data were collected from large Italian corporations using a questionnaire survey.Findings – The results show that most of the controllers are at least somewhat involved in management decision processes, and some are highly involved. A complex set of factors determine the extent and breadth of controller involvement. Controller involvement in either strategic decisions, operating decisions, or both types of decisions is positively related to some situational variables, including capital intensity, operating interdependency, line managers' financial competence, formalization of strategic planning and budgeting processes.
European spatial development policy and evolving forms of territorial mobilisation in the United Kingdom

Although the UK is often characterised as one of Europe’s classic unitary states, the 1990s saw the emergence of a ‘new territorial governance’ (Roberts, 2000) at the sub-state level, with increased devolution to Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and London and the creation of new and strengthened institutions in the remaining English regions. Whilst mirroring wider trends towards decentralisation and regionalisation across Europe, these developments also serve to highlight the continued importance of the domestic dimension of regionalisation, as longstanding issues of national identity in the constituent parts of the UK, political domination by the centre, and economic disparities in national space have provided key drivers to the process. This paper evaluates how European contexts and policies have contributed to, and interacted with, the evolution of distinctive sub-state spatial planning strategies and frameworks in UK in the wake of increased devolution to the ‘Celtic nations’ (Roberts & Beresford, 2003, p. 23) and increased decentralisation to the English regions. More particularly, the paper explores the role played by the European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP) (Commission of the European Communities (CEC), 1999) in terms of how subnational actors have interpreted and applied its policy discourse to address the specific agendas and issues relating to their territories when developing spatial strategies.
Information Systems Development: A Conceptual Model and a Comparison of Methods Used in Singapore, USA and Europe

Organizations, big or small, are still plagued with ageold problems of software development: too much backlog, projects being late and costing more than the budget, implemented systems not meeting user needs, and IS maintenance costs continuing to be very high. A conceptual model presented in this article, argues that, within the context of an organization and specific systems development project, optimal deployment of â€œpeopleâ€ and â€œmethodsâ€ has the potential of alleviating these problems. Several researchable issues emerge out of this conceptual model. This paper then focuses on a comparison of IS development methods used in Singapore, USA, and Europe. For Singapore, a survey instrument was developed, pre-tested, validated and administered to 250 member organizations of DPMA in Singapore. For USA and Europe, existing data from previous studies were utilized. Important findings include: (1) large organizations adopt state-of-the-art methods significantly earlier than small organizations; (2) when comparing use of methods across different countries, organizational profile in terms of size, revenue level, and number of employees is an important intervening variable; (3) proactive planning and strategizing by the governments of developing countries can significantly increase the rate of transfer of state-of-the-art IS development methods from the advanced countries; (4) some differences in use of methods can be attributed to cultural and political differences
Intrinsically unstructured N‐terminal domain of bZIP transcription factor HY5

The Arabidopsis HY5 protein is a basic leucine zipper (bZIP) transcription factor that promotes photomorphogenesis. HY5 binds directly to the promoters of light responsible element containing the G‐box and thus regulates their transcriptional activity. The level and activity of HY5 are negatively regulated, in a light‐dependent manner, by interaction with the COP1 protein, which targets HY5 for proteasome‐mediated degradation in the nucleus. Despite its essential roles in plant development, no structural information exists for HY5. In this article, we report the first structural and biophysical characterization of HY5. Using limited proteolysis in combination with mass spectrometry, circular dichroism, and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, we have deduced that the N‐terminal 77 amino acids of HY5 form a premolten globular structure, while amino acids 78–110, which constitute the basic region (BR) of the protein, exist in a molten globule state. Our studies also revealed that the overall structural features of full‐length HY5 are dominated largely by the disordered N‐terminal domain, despite the existence of a bZIP domain at its C‐terminus. We propose that HY5 is a member of the intrinsically unstructured protein (IUP) family, and that HY5 functions as an unstructured protein and benefits from being the same, in vivo. Proteins 2006. © 2006 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Changes in Canadian Agricultural Marketing and Trade Policy: The Impacts of New Trade Rules and New Institutions

The Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement (CUSTA) and the subsequent North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) have contributed to increasing concentration of agricultural trade between the United States and Canada. This has heightened bilateral trade tensions and trade conflicts for numbers of Canadian farm products. These conflicts, and the need to accommodate domestic marketing policies to the obligations of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and its successor, the World Trade Organization (WTO), have encouraged changes in Canadian agricultural marketing policies. Pressures to reduce government expenditures have also provided a compelling reinforcing impetus to changes in numbers of Canada's agricultural marketing programs. However, despite some changes in the ways that the programs for the Canadian supply-managed farm products are organized and administered, there has been no reduction in the levels of policy-induced support provided to this group of producers. Indeed, adjustments in marketing and trade policy for dairy, poultry and eggs have increased the levels of protection for these sectors. High levels of protection for supply-managed farm products reflect the strong influences of regional political pressures in Canada; this is an influence that is expected to continue in the future. In contrast to the supply-managed dairy and poultry sectors, major changes have been made in marketing programs for the export-oriented Canadian grains and red meats sectors in response to trade and budgetary pressures. These have involved the removal of longstanding rail freight subsidies for grains and the phasing down or termination of several stabilization and safety net programs.
The South African Equity Risk Premium

Abstract This report estimates the expected equity risk premium for South African by comparing the historical realised risk premium between 1900 and 2004 against results for two fundamental models that use dividend and earnings growth as unbiased estimators of long term equity price growth. The dividend model result of 6.6% based on data for the 1960-2004 period is proposed as the best unbiased estimate of the expected average annual equity premium over the risk free rate. The evidence provided suggests a decline in the expected South African equity risk premium, and a lower expected premium for the future than in the past.
Unemployment benefits and the duration of unemployment in East Germany

This paper studies the impact of unemployment benefits on unemployment duration for East Germany using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel. It concentrates on exit from unemployment into employment. Estimation results of a discrete-time hazard rate model imply that moderate cuts in the replacement rate raise the hazards by little. The effect of the replacement rate on the hazards becomes weaker the longer people are unemployed. The threat of periods of benefit sanction could explain this. The hazards are not generally declining in time until exhausting unemployment insurance (UI) benefits, but rise just prior to exhausting UI.
High Performance Complex Number Multiplier Using Booth-Wallace Algorithm

This paper presents the methods required to implement a high speed and high performance parallel complex number multiplier. The designs are structured using radix-4 modified Booth algorithm and Wallace tree. These two techniques are employed to speed up the multiplication process as their capability to reduce partial products generation to eta/2 and compress partial product term by a ratio of 3:2. Despite that, carry save-adders (CSA) is used to enhance the speed of addition process for the system. The system has been designed efficiently using VHDL codes for 16 times16-bit signed numbers and successfully simulated and synthesized using ModelSim XE II 5.8c and Xilinx ISE 6.1i. As a proof of concept, the system is implemented on Xilinx Virtex-II Pro FPGA board.
Adaptive neural network control for a Robotic Manipulator with unknown deadzone

In this paper, adaptive neural network control is designed for a robotic manipulator with unknown dynamics. Neural networks are used to compensate for the unknown deadzone effect faced by the manipulator's actuator. State-feedback control is proposed first and high-gain observer is then designed to make the proposed control scheme more practical. The deadzone effect is approximated by a Radial Basis Function Neural Network (RBFNN) and the tracking error for the deadzone effect is bounded and converging. The unknown dynamics of the robotic manipulator is estimated with another RBFNN. Compensating for the estimated deadzone effect in the control law then leads to our proposed control. The proposed control is then verified on a two-joint rigid manipulator via numerical simulations.
Disease-avoidant behaviour and its consequences

Medical conditions that are non-contagious, but that appear contagious, seem to result in the sufferer being avoided. Error management theory (EMT), suggests that such false alarms occur because the cost of infection poses a greater threat to ones fitness than avoidance. Study 1 attempted to demonstrate a disease-related false alarm effect by asking participants, to evaluate a series of vignettes, featuring people with infectious diseases, non-infectious diseases that looked infectious and non-infectious diseases that did not. Judgements of contracting infection under varying levels of contact, and desire to avoid were obtained. Consistent with EMT, a false alarm effect was evident. Study 2 examined the importance of the face as a key indicator of real and apparent infection, by determining whether facial symptoms result in a greater desire to avoid people with infectious and non-infectious diseases. Consistent with expectation, participants reported a greater desire to avoid people with facially displayed symptoms. Together, these results support the idea that humans have evolved a general tendency to avoid individuals with disease signs, especially if displayed upon the face. One consequence is that where a facially displayed disease sign persists, even if known to be benign, its bearer will experience chronic avoidance.
Optimal Capacity, Product Substitution, Linear Demand Models, and Uncertainty

We study the capacity, pricing, and production decisions of a monopolist producing two substitutable products with flexible capacity. Although the capacity decision needs to be made ex ante, under demand uncertainty, pricing and production decisions can be postponed until after uncertainty is resolved. We show how key demand parameters (the nature of uncertainty, market size, and market risk) impact the optimal capacity decision under the linear demand function. In particular, we show that if the demand shock is multiplicative, then in terms of the “invest or not” decision, the firm will be immune to forecast errors in parameters of the underlying demand distribution. Furthermore, incorrectly modeling the demand shock as additive, when, in fact, it is multiplicative, may lead to overinvestment. On the other hand, although the concept of a growth in market size leads to similar conclusions under both additive and multiplicative demand shocks, how market risk affects the optimal capacity decision depends critically on the form of the demand shock as well as its correlation structure. Our analysis provides insights and principles on the optimal capacity investment decision under various demand settings.