Finance and Financial Management Commons^™

Evaluating The Impacts Of Respondent Errors In Arms: A Case Of Farm Service Agency Loans, Louise Nicole Mcminn

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Many studies have used the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Agricultural Resource Management Survey (ARMS) to research various aspects involving the agricultural sector in the United States. Since nonresponse and inaccurate reporting may cause significant bias in statistical analysis, research was conducted to determine the magnitude of response error on the farm debt section of the ARMS Phase III. A multinomial logit model identified demographic, structural, and financial characteristics of FSA Farm Loan Program (FLP) borrowers who refused to indicate if they had end of year farm debt, or who accurately or inaccurately classified their farm operations as having end …

Determinants Of Hedge Fund Performance, Jun Duanmu

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation consists of three essays which focus on the determinants of hedge fund performance. The first essay defines two distinct styles of active portfolio management: alpha active and beta active. I develop measures of beta activity and find ample evidence that top beta active managers deliver superior out-of-sample performance. In addition, I find that beta activity measure successfully captures the time varying nature of beta exposures that can be interpreted as the common factor driving the long term out-of-sample predictive power of both Systematic Risk and R2.

The second essay attempt to span the space of potential risk factors …

Food Waste At Retail, Erin G. Killeen Davis

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Food waste at retail represents forgone sales and embodies store management and disposal costs. Fresh produce is the largest contributing sector to food waste at retail and bulky, seasonal products are an added challenge when stores experience a high waste event. In order to improve, retailers need to better understand the costs of food waste, as well as how management strategies can impact these costs.

Using pumpkins as an example of bulky, seasonal products, a twofold research project was conducted to better understand contributors to, and costs of food waste at the retail level. In part one, using data from …

Examining The Predictors Of Fbs Football Revenue, Hayden Redd

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

College football, specifically the Football Bowl Subdivision, is an ever growing industry. As revenues continue to rise, it is important to be able to predict these revenues. A series of correlations and least square analysis were run on data from 2007-2011 to test their significance to football revenue. The analysis found strong correlations between all-time wins and all-time bowl appearances, average attendance, and historical grade. Strong correlations are seen between all-time bowl appearances and average attendance, historical grade, and recent grade. Strong correlations are seen between wins from 2007-2011 and recent grade. Strong correlations are seen between average attendance and …

High School Seniors' Financial Knowledge: The Impact Of Financial Literacy Classes And Developmental Assets, Kathy Ngoc Nguyen

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Low levels of financial literacy among high school students are a growing concern in the United States. High school students lack the financial knowledge to make important financial decisions. Financial literacy and money management skills are important for high school students as they transition into an ever-changing economy. High school students, who are financially literate, are likely to develop positive financial behaviors and make positive financial decisions. Previous studies show that financial literacy classes can increase financial knowledge.

The present study has three objectives. First, this study examined whether the Money Management Skills for Young Adults Class increased high school …

Does Analyst Experience Affect Their Understanding Of Non-Financial Information? An Analysis Of The Relation Between Patent Information And Analyst Forecast Errors, Taiwhun Taylor Joo

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study examines whether analyst experience affects the relation between patent information and analyst forecast errors. U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles require that firms expense all in-house research and development (R&D) costs. This means that even when R&D activities produce intangible assets with future economic benefits, firms cannot capitalize R&D costs as assets. Consequently, financial statements are largely deficient in the information they provide regarding the output of R&D activities. However, patent information is one type of non-financial information about R&D output that is publicly available.

Using updated patent data, I confirm the results of prior studies that find a …

The Determinants And Consequences Of Ceo Cheap Stock In Ipos, Michael Dennis Stuart

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The term "cheap stock" describes undervalued stock options granted to CEOs and other key employees prior to initial public offerings (IPOs). Pre-IPO firms have incentives to issue cheap stock as compensation because it results in lower compensation expense on the income statement and in large cash windfalls to CEOs subsequent to the IPO. Because cheap stock results in an overstatement of earnings, the Securities and Exchange Commission frequently challenges the valuations of these grants, which makes cheap stock a key accounting issue in many IPOs. Using a sample of firms that completed IPOs between 2004 and 2007, I investigate the …

Determinants And Consequences Of Risk Management Committee Formation, Chris Hines

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This paper examines the determinants and consequences of financial institutions voluntarily forming risk management committees (RMCs). Specifically, I determine whether RMCs are related to a change in risk outcomes, an increase in profitability, a change in hedging and trading derivative structures, and greater financial reporting quality during the post-committee formation period compared to a control group. I use a sample of financial institutions that form a RMC in any year from 1994 through 2008 and a control sample of financial institutions that do not form a RMC during the sample period. The results provide evidence to suggest that financial institutions …

Too Big Not To Fail: United States Corporate Media And The 2008 Financial Crisis, Justin Lars Bergh

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis investigates United States newspaper coverage of the 2008 financial crisis, with a particular focus on the debate that took place in press coverage surrounding the proposed 700 billion dollar Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP). Specifically, this study aims to understand how, when faced with a crisis that threatened hegemony, the state and economic elites, working in and through media, were able to effectively convince the subordinate classes to consent to state intervention aimed at perpetuating a financial system that has historically profited from the relative financial insecurity of the subordinate classes. In order to understand media's role in …

Essays On Mergers And Acquisitions And Governance, Rwan Ibrahim Talib El-Khatib

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

There is a recent strand of corporate finance literature that explores the impact of executives and directors' Social connections on firm value, performance, and governance. Those studies document that such Social connections could be beneficial when they enhance the sharing of information and knowledge, but could also be detrimental when associated with CEOs, as they could provide the CEO with a source of influence that makes her more entrenched and powerful.

In the first essay, I use four common measures of network centrality to compute the position of the CEO within the Social network of all executives and directors of …

Three Essays On Opacity, Corporate Governance, And Credit Ratings, Yiwen Gu

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In the first essay, utilizing a more recent and expanded 20-year sample 1991-2010 of dual-rated bonds issued, I confirm Morgan's (2002) finding that banks are relatively more opaque than nonbanks. The likelihood of a rating split is higher, and the magnitude of the rating gap is larger, for banks than nonnbanks. Moreover, rating agency disagreements are more significant for banks with relatively higher loan and trading securities holdings and maintain lower capital, and for banks engaged in mortgage securitization. Importantly, I find that rating agency disagreements reflect market proxies of information uncertainty. Further, opacity makes external financing more costly. Equity …