Business Commons^™

Using Hybrid Machine Learning Models For Stock Price Forecasting And Trading., Ahmed Khalil

Theses and Dissertations

Trading stocks of publicly traded companies in stock markets is a challenging topic since investors are researching what tools can be used to maximize their profits while minimizing risks, which encouraged all researchers to research and test different methods to reach such a goal. As a result, the use of both fundamental analysis and technical analysis started to evolve to support traders in buying and selling stocks. Recently, the focus increased on using Machine learning models to predict stock prices and algorithmic trading as currently there is a huge amount of data that can be processed and used to forecast …

From Pasture To Pavement: Urban Expansion And Its Environmental Consequences In Perth, Anastasia Charelishvili

Student Theses 2015-Present

This thesis addresses the pressing issue of ecological problems of urban sprawl and its intricate impacts on urban health, with a particular focus on vulnerable communities in Perth, Australia. Chapter 1 presents the city's historical background and emphasizes the depletion of ecosystem services, underscoring the need for environmental justice. It also introduces the causes and effects of the sprawl in Perth and draws upon a diverse range of environmental problems created by suburbia, such as air pollution, biodiversity loss, water pollution, and runoff. As these threats translate into urban health declines, such as respiratory problems and increased healthcare issues, Chapter …

Effects Of Humorous Language In Social Media And Fandom Levels On Sport Consumers’ Merchandise Value Perceptions, Conner Martin

Honors College Theses

Licensed sports merchandise is a sports business sector that is projected to surpass $39.8 billion by 2027. This study examines the influence of humor in social media posts on consumers’ perceived valuations of licensed sport merchandise—specifically, apparel—with consideration to their team fandom. Guiding by Cue Utilization Theory (CUT), the research model assessed the extrinsic cues of team fandom and humor in shaping consumer perceptions, while controlling for product type (high-cost, low-cost), humorous caption (version 1, version 2), generation (Zoomers, Millennials, Gen Xers, and Boomers), and gender (male, female, non-binary). Fans of South Georgia Tormenta FC, a professional soccer club, served …

A Compilation Of Accounting Case Studies, Mason Everett

Honors Theses

In my honors accounting thesis, I meticulously examined contemporary issues within the accounting and finance industries by integrating case studies from various current events. These real-world examples provided insightful perspectives into the dynamic challenges faced by professionals in these fields. Additionally, I delved into the intersection of political matters and regulatory frameworks, exploring how they shape and influence accounting practices and financial decision-making. By incorporating both theoretical concepts and practical applications, my thesis aimed to provide a comprehensive understanding of the complexities inherent in today's accounting landscape, offering valuable insights for future research and professional practice.

Creating Documentation And Continuity For Northern Star Staff, Rachel Z. Cormier

Honors Capstones

The Northern Star is NIU’s student-run newspaper which covers a variety of news including NIU campus news, DeKalb news, NIU Huskie sports, northern Illinois entertainment and more. The Star is split into four different departments of news coverage that students can report on and two multi-media departments along with one department for copy editors.

The “student-run” aspect of the paper leads students to often join with varying levels of experience. Currently the continuity at the Northern Star has a great foundational start, but it is lacking in key areas. A majority of the training for new employees is done once …

Empowering Women In Informal Cross-Border Trade: Challenges And Opportunities In Developing Countries, Marie Claire Abayisenga

Harrisburg University Dissertations and Theses

The study " Empowering women in informal Cross-border trade: challenges and opportunities in developing countries" examined the challenges and opportunities faced by women engaged in Informal Cross-Border Trade (ICBT) in developing countries to empower them and promote inclusive economic development. The research explored the barriers that hindered women's economic empowerment in ICBT, such as limited access to resources, financial capital, and productive assets, as well as gender-based discrimination and social norms. The study also identified opportunities to enhance women's participation in cross-border trade, including learning opportunities and best practices. Through a literature review and empirical analysis, the study provided valuable …

Case Study Analysis: Exploring Johnson & Johnson's 1982 Tylenol Contamination Crisis And Ongoing Talcum Powder Crisis Through The Six Principles Of Crisis And Emergency Risk Communication, Caroline Tibbs

Honors Theses

In 2002, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) developed a new field of communication, called Crisis and Emergency Risk Communication (CERC). With the creation of this new field, the CDC developed a streamlined CERC guidebook in order to provide a standard for the crisis communication strategies and responses of specifically healthcare organizations, but any organization can benefit from utilizing the CERC framework. The CDC also identified six key principles of CERC, which are as follows: response time (“be first”), accuracy (“be right”), credibility (“be credible”), having empathy (“express empathy”), promotion of actions (“promote actions”), and respectfulness (“show respect”). …

A Hierarchical Decision Model For Evaluating The Strategy Readiness Of Quantitative Machine Learning/Data Science-Driven Investment Strategies, Mohammadsaleh Saadatmand

Dissertations and Theses

Big data and computational technologies are increasingly important worldwide in asset and investment management. Many investment management firms are adopting these data science methods and technologies to improve performance across all investment processes. Researchers actively use these methods to develop more effective systematic investment strategies and produce more reliable outcomes less vulnerable to human decision-making biases. However, the success of such a strategy depends heavily on the scientific rigor applied throughout the process. "Best practices involve understanding how to make better decisions in the research design process. A good question is whether we can make better decisions in developing quantitative …

Building A Business: A Close-Knit Relationship Between Marketing & Entrepreneurship, Gabrielle O. Ysteboe

Honors Capstones

This project explores how best to build a knit blanket business with respect to several parameters including market research to determine price point, where to sell the product, with options including Etsy, brick and mortar, larger retail stores, personal website, craft fairs, and pop-up retail locations, and determining the target market and demographics, which will shape the marketing strategy to be used. It shows the ties between the 4 P's of marketing and entrepreneurship. Through surveys and primary research, data was found that allowed for one option for business placement to come out on top. It also allowed for the …

Effect Of Stakeholder Capitalism After The 2019 Business Roundtable Pledge, Maximiliano Villarreal-Castro

Honors Theses

There has been a shift towards a new model of corporate operation, one which prioritizes not only the company shareholders but anyone affected by its operations, i.e., stakeholders. Although many believe this is a path towards a more equitable future, others fear it could cause agency issues. As a result, companies that focus on ESG/Stakeholder Capitalism may experience the adverse effects of slow growth, costing shareholders, employers, and employees in the long term.

To determine if there was an impact from 'The Shift' to an ESG model by the major corporations, this study compared internal (accounting) and external (market) data. …

Refueling The Accounting Pipeline, Crystal Y. Wong

Honors Capstones

Recently, the number of college students majoring in accounting has significantly decreased, creating an accounting pipeline issue and resulting in fewer new accountants entering the industry. This presents a talent shortage while the demand for accountants remains high. The objective of this research study is to identify the potential methods that can be implemented to attract more students to major in accountancy and to contribute insights that may be useful in solving the accounting pipeline issue. Using an anonymous survey distributed to current students in Northern Illinois University’s (NIU) College of Business, I gathered data about factors that influence students’ …

Beyond Amateurism: Examining The Potential Labor Expenses Of Ncaa Student-Athlete Employment, Alayna K. Falak

Honors Thesis

In light of recent administrative developments urging the classification of student-athletes as employees, litigation challenging the current status of student-athletes, and the Supreme Court’s willingness to tackle National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) issues, many questions surrounding the future of college sports under an employment model have emerged. The authors analyzed key litigation, recent developments from administrative agencies, and academic literature. Then publicly available data was used from the NCAA, the United States Department of Labor (DOL), and other sources to construct two estimates of what it would cost the NCAA member institutions to treat their Division I athletes as employees. …

A Financial Valuation Of Comcast (Cmcsa), Lucas Marcinkowski

Honors Thesis

The current valuation of the global entertainment and media industry revenue is $2.32 trillion. When investing in the entertainment and media industry, individuals think of the fame and glamorous side of the entertainment industry. However, the industry is fiercely competitive and continuously evolving. Through examining the historical financial statement of the publicly traded media and technology conglomerate Comcast, as well as its competitors, I forecasted the future financial valuation of Comcast utilizing the Discounted Free Cash Flow and Public Comparable Firm Multiples models. This analysis examines the effects of the pandemic and other economic conditions on the entertainment and media …

Mental Health Among Collegiate Athletes, Stella Elise Fairbanks

Honors Thesis

Mental health has become increasingly more linked with athletics, especially collegiate athletics. There has been an increase in public acknowledgment of the presence of mental health in sports, specifically, more athletes are speaking about their mental health struggles as well as more research is being conducted in order to gain a greater understanding of the relationship between mental health and athletics. This literature review discusses athletes’ personal experiences of their mental health struggles, the presence of stigma associated with mental health and athletics, and the results of the recent NCAA, National Collegiate Athletic Association, research. This thesis aims to uncover …

Understanding The Accounting Of Agilysys' Current Business Model And Other Economic Activities, Brick Gore

Honors Theses

Agilysys operates out of the hospitality software industry and has seen a recent incline in volume due to the convenience and advancements of technology. They point of sale systems make it simple to conduct transactions; therefore, while the hospitality companies were negatively impacted during Covid-19, they were still able to sustain. Agilysys is posed a threat from operational risks, such as global climate change and rising interest rates as their products are many times located in luxurious environments; however, their current business model allows them to reduce this risk. From an auditor’s perspective, there are riskier accounts, and without a …

A Spatial Decision Support System For Rent Estimation Of Retail Spaces In Manhattan Using Geographically Weighted Regression And Spatial Regression, Andie M. Migden Miller

Theses and Dissertations

This report outlines an automated, three-phase Spatial Decision Support System that creates models to estimate rent of retail spaces across Manhattan. First, enrich data with predictors. Second, optimize spatially aware neighborhood-level models by combining GWR, spatial regression, and non-spatial regression. Finally, visualize results in an Esri-based WebApp.

The Oncology Etf: How Retail Traders Can Utilize Custom Growth Etf’S, Samuel Sprute

Honors Thesis

Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs) are potent investment vehicles to generate returns from systematic gains in any market. However, they have historically been products created and distributed by large financial institutions. Due to various drawbacks of institutionally available ETFs, many retail traders have begun to create their own custom ETFs. These custom ETFs operate as mini-portfolios and have significant potential to generate alpha, or positive risk-adjusted return, when positioned specifically in growth markets.

In this work I aim to show the potential for custom ETFs in retail trading. In achieving this goal, I have broken this work into two sections. The …

Women's Evening Wear Clothing Line, Monique Greene

Theses

Unavailable.

The Emergence Of Approachable Luxury In The Grocery Industry, Joseph Curcio

Honors Theses

This thesis examines various trends in the grocery industry that have led to the new age grocer. These trends are centered around the emergence of approachable luxury products on grocery shelves and new grocery stores centered around an approachable luxury approach. Due to the subjective nature of the term “luxury,” it is hard to define, but multiple academic definitions from the Journal of Business Research are analyzed.

The timeline of the luxury grocery is outlined – beginning with traditional Iberian shops to the emergence of the new curated grocer to the revitalization of big box stores. The thesis includes psychological …

From Cypherpunks To Congress: A Historical Analysis Of The Development, Uses, And Regulatory Landscape Of Cryptocurrencies, Andrew Moore

Honors Theses

As cryptocurrencies have begun to proliferate through the economy policymakers are asking questions of where they came from, how do they work, what they are used for and how should we regulate the market. Through a historical analysis, it can be seen that Bitcoin represented a legitimate innovation in money and provided significant improvements to earlier attempts at private commodity currency. Additionally, many of the criticisms lobbied against Bitcoin appear to be overstated, most notably the claim that it is a good tool for criminals. However, there has been a notable split in the market. The emerging crypto industry bears …

Income Taxation Of Corporations In The United States, Thomas Koshewa

Undergraduate Theses

Taxes affect everyone. Public infrastructure, education, healthcare, social security, public safety, and national defense are just some of the services provided for U.S. Citizens and residents through tax revenue. As taxes pay for these services, it is often a topic of discussion in the media. Though there are varying opinions about taxes and our tax system, there is one quote from Benjamin Franklin that everyone can agree upon: “Our new Constitution is now established, everything seems to promise it will be durable; but, in this world, nothing is certain except death and taxes.”

While Franklin’s statement about death and taxes …

Essays On Judgment And Decision Making, Chengyao Sun

Olin Business School Graduate Student Theses and Dissertations

In this dissertation, I describe two programs of research to demonstrate how logically irrelevant factors can influence everyday judgment and decisions. Chapter 1 looks at a common human behavior: prediction. In collaboration with Robyn LeBoeuf, we investigate a particular factor that may bias people’s predictions against their own judgment: the absolute likelihood of the most likely outcome. Previous research usually assumes that, when making a prediction from a set of possible outcomes, people select as their prediction the outcome that seems most likely to them. However, we find a disconnect between what people predict and what they believe to be …

Examining The Career Path Of Certified Public Accountants In Audit And Tax Services: Perceptions Of Accounting Graduates' Competencies, Steven Mulhollen

Dissertations

Accounting professionals claim there is a deficiency of individuals with the appropriate competencies to enter the accounting workforce (Pasewark, 2021; Richardson, 2020; Sandifer, 2018; Thomson, 2017). Also, recent trends indicate a need to increase the number of qualified accounting professionals who can pass the Certified Public Accounting Exam (CPA Exam) and enter the public accounting workforce (American Institute of Certified Public Accountants [AICPA], 2021a; Dawkins, 2023). This quantitative, causal-comparative study expands existing studies by analyzing the impact of CPA's chosen career path of audit or tax on their perception of the required and attained accounting competencies. This study contributes to …

Analysis Of Toyota And The Automobile Industry, Dylan Saltzman

Honors Theses

Toyota is an automobile company that has dominated the market for many recent years. The cars that we have today are a lot different than the ones we had two hundred years ago. Innovations in car technology were possible by entrepreneur’s who wanted to make a difference in the world. Now, there are so many different options of cars to buy. This paper will outline the three main different types of fuel sources for cars, the pros and cons of each, and determine which consumers want the most. It will then go into what Toyota and its competitors have done, …

Impact Of Leadership In Project Management, Ian Wegh

Information Systems Undergraduate Honors Theses

Today’s business environment demands effective project management for enterprises to meet their goals and continue to be innovative. Inherently, this also means that project managers must have strong leadership skills. Project management provides a framework of techniques that provides a symbiotic relationship between both the framework and the leader. The idea behind project management is to complete objectives efficiently within a certain time period given a restricted number of resources. This means project management is a process of principles, tools, and methodologies used to effectively manage a team through the System Development Life Cycle. The System Development Life Cycle (SDLC) …

Financial Self-Efficacy Among Puerto Rican Women In The United States: An Ethnographic Action-Based Research Study, Melinda Jimenez Perez

Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this ethnographic action research study was to better understand the financial self-efficacy of Puerto Rican women in the United States. There is a gap in the literature in identifying the relationship between middle-class Puerto Rican women and financial literacy. In a pilot study, four major findings emerged from the survey about Puerto Rican women and their relationship with finances: (a) as children, mothers taught them to save, and as adults, they rely on the male figures in their families; (b) the traditional education systems did not provide financial education; (c) the childhood culture of poverty and scarcity …

Entrepreneurship Education: Understanding The Lived Entrepreneurial Experiences Of Community College Students In South Texas, Hussain Y. Sama

Theses & Dissertations

Entrepreneurship education (EE) is a hot topic and has gained the attention and interest of scholars in the United States and globally. Despite the growth of EE, scholars have been marginalizing the impact of EE at the community college level and there is a dearth of studies in this area (Liguori et al. 2019; Mars & Ginter 2012). Therefore, I conducted this study to bridge this indicated gap and contribute to the EE literature through exploring the entrepreneurial learning and practical experiences of community college student entrepreneurs.

The purpose of this qualitative narrative inquiry was to better understand the lived …

Decoding Generation Z: A Perceptions Content Analysis, Olivia Larson

Agricultural Education, Communications and Technology Undergraduate Honors Theses

This thesis explores the multifaceted nature of Generation Z through a content analysis, aiming to identify the range of characteristics and preferences within this cohort. By delving beyond prevalent stereotypes, this study addresses the gap in understanding regarding Generation Z's learning styles, communication preferences, work ethics, and personal values. Through examination, this research provides insights crucial for marketers and educators seeking to engage and educate Generation Z effectively.

E-Commerce Internship At Coretrex, Noah Mrok

Information Systems Undergraduate Honors Theses

E-commerce is changing the digital world as we know it, and it is an important part of our daily lives as it influences our behaviors as consumers. In this paper, I will describe the complicated nature of e-commerce through the lens of my personal experience at CoreTrex, an e-commerce agency based in Rogers, Arkansas. E-commerce has transformed how businesses connect with consumers and how consumers connect back with businesses. From its early stages as smaller online marketplaces to its current state as a much more complex virtual ecosystem, e-commerce has undergone many changes due to technological advancements and changing consumer …

Developing And Modernizing Small Businesses In Dangriga, Belize, Abby Teague

Management Undergraduate Honors Theses

This thesis evaluates the effectiveness of the Small Business Development project located in Dangriga, Belize, and includes research on the challenges of entrepreneurship in developing countries. The project consisted of research and the implementation of marketing workshops to teach businesses how to manage their online and social media presence through the Belize Tourism Industry Association (BTIA) Dangriga. The impact of the project was significantly important because many Belizeans struggle to survive and succeed within their businesses. Belize contains multiple microenterprises that cannot meet their potential because of a lack of knowledge and communication. Overall, the project aims to give BTIA …