Wednesday, October 30, 2019

MEA and PTE Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

MEA and PTE - Research Paper Example Ford is also one of the largest automobile producers of automobile in the international market. Social: The social issues faced by Ford and the automobile industry are mainly related to the cultural values and codes reflected by the organization. Goerzen & Beamish (2008) noted that the growing population and the demand for better transportation system has increased the scope of business for automobile firms. However, the increased cost of living and the rising fuel prices are major worries for the consumers in context of purchasing automobiles. Technological: Technology is one of the driving forces of the business firms in the existing scenario. The growth and development of technological aspects has allowed the organizations to expand their market space over internet and also enhance their operational performance with the help of robotics (Morris, Schindehutte & Allen, 2011). However, the opportunity cost of the firms is increasing and the technicality in the operations is also reducing the control of the management on the production functions of the company. Economical: The economical condition of the international market place was largely shaken with the recent global financial crisis of 2007-08. Amidst these economical instabilities, Ford was already facing financial crisis as their profits were falling (Hellriegel & Slocum, 2011). Apart from these, other economical complexities include currency fluctuation, taxation, government policies, etc are also major economic hurdles for the company in the international market. Environmental: The environmental concerns for the automobile organizations are growing rapidly. With the increased demand for vehicles, companies such as Ford have also increased their production process resulting in increased energy usage and creation of industrial waste which is hampering the natural environment. Moreover, the amplified amount of

Sunday, October 27, 2019

An Analysis Of A Mergers Profitability

An Analysis Of A Mergers Profitability Abstract Introduction In the last few years we have observed a revived surge in the number of mergers. They are more often observed in countries with better accounting standards. Companies undergo mergers for a number of reasons. The primary reason is the proper allocation of resources and thus, increasing cost efficiency. A small amount of research has been done in the past years analyzing the short and long term effects of mergers in creating value for the companies. It has been seen that most mergers result in failures but not much research has been done in analyzing the reasons behind it. My research would be based on few of the biggest mergers that have taken place in the last few years. Firstly, my analysis of a mergers profitability would be based on standard event study methodology. It would take into account the return to shareholders. Secondly, it would also aim to provide evidence regarding the signalling theory and the synergistic and the agency views. This would be based on an in-depth analys is of various determinants such as the excess returns around the announcement of the merger bid and around the termination of the merger and the significant differences in the responses of firms attempting focusing versus diversifying mergers respectively. Lastly, this would be followed by a thorough analysis of the valuation effects of mergers. There have been varied views but no one conclusion has been reached. I would thus, like to investigate deeper into it 2. Literature Review and Hypotheses Analysis revealed My research concentrates on the effects of a focusing and diversifying merger on the abnormal returns around the announcement period of the merger. The study by Delong (1999) can be seen as an extension to my research. He based his research on evaluating the stock pricing behaviour of the bidder and the target in bank mergers. He further studied the abnormal returns according to the nature of the merger i.e. focusing or diversifying. In my analysis, I take into account only activity focused mergers, whereas Delong (1999) considers mergers which focus on both activity and geography. His results show an enhancement in value of a focusing firm of about 2 % to 3 % as compared to a diversifying firm irrespective of the time period. On investigating further, he found that the relative market size of the target to the bidder and the pre-merger performance of the targets show an apparent relationship with the cumulative abnormal returns so calculated. Wong and Cheung (2009) analyse the changes in the stock prices of the bidding and target firms in Hong Kong, China, Taiwan, Singapore, South Korea and Japan, following a merger or an acquisition announcement. It can be seen from their analysis that such an announcement yields positive results for the bidding firms but does not prove to be very beneficial for the target firms. Their hypotheses considered the consequences of the mode of payment, the type of acquisition and the type of the target firm on the stock pricing. Out of them only the second variable seems to have a direct effect on the post announcement returns of the bidding firm. Huang and Walkling (1987) conducted similar research by extracting a sample of acquisitions from the Wall Street Journal which consisted of all initial front-page acquisition announcements. But this, took into account slightly different variables as compared to the other analyses discussed above. They determined the effect of tender offers vs. mergers; cash offers vs stock offers and resisted offers vs. unresisted offers. Their analysis revealed higher abnormal returns for tender offers which were quite insignificant once the effect of the extent of resistance and the payment type were isolated from it. The deals which faced resistance during a merger or tender offer showed higher abnormal returns irrespective to the mode of payment. All the results obtained above were either insignificant or marginally significant, but the effects of the third variable i.e. the form of payment showed some concrete results. The cumulative abnormal returns obtained from cash offers were radically high er than those obtained from stock offer. This research carried out by Huang and Walkling gave quite a holistic overview of the effect of the announcement of an acquisition, as it took into consideration, variables which are affected by both the bidding and target firms decisions. All the literature discussed earlier in this paper, has illustrated some positive effects of an acquisition for both the bidders and the target firms. But, the analysis conducted by Bruner (2001) showed a little variation to the above. It suggested that only the target shareholders draw upon the benefits of the acquisition. No such profitable return is observed for the bidding firms. But, the combined returns of the bidder and the target yield positive results. The approach followed by Bruner differs significantly from most of the research discussed earlier. He measures the performance of a merger and acquisition based on the investors required returns. After observing the abnormal returns of the acquirer around the announcement date of the merger as per my research, the most obvious next step would be to analyse the long term effects of the merger. Various studies have been done in order to rightfully determine the outcome .The study by Asquith (1983) showed drastic negative returns after about three years of the merger. One of the best analyses that I found was by Agrawal, Jaffe and Mandelkar (1992) in their paper ‘The Post-Merger Performance of Acquiring Firms: A Re-examination of an Anomaly. Their results are based on a thorough analysis of a number of mergers that took place from 1955 to 1987. They explored the effect of the size of the firm and its beta risk, and found a loss of 10 % in the total wealth of the acquiring firm, five years after the merger was completed. An attempt was also made to find the additional NPV which is not captured by the announcement returns analysis. But, it was seen that the modification of t he market was similar for both the announcement and post merger analyses. Cole et al (2006) Investigate a number of unsuccessful mergers in order to determine if they create or destroy value for acquirers by using mainly two approaches. Their signalling approaches show that the value of the bidding firm is reduced by a large margin in the market, which is a form of a punishment for considering the acquisition of a low NPV project. They also find that horizontal mergers yield negative CAR. Hypothesis 1: The average abnormal returns (AAR) yield positive results for all sub-periods in the event Hypothesis 2: The Cumulative average abnormal returns (CAAR) yield positive results for all sub-periods in the event. Hypothesis 3: The type of acquisition, kind of acquisition, the mode of payment and the type of target firms affects the value of the cumulative abnormal returns (CAR) around the announcement day t=0 in the event. Take into account focusing and diversifying 3. Methodology We begin by classifying the effective sample into two categories – Focusing and Diversifying. The classification approach has been adopted by Mann and Sicherman (1991).This can be done by comparing the two-digit SIC Codes of the acquirer and the target firm respectively. If both the firms involved in a deal have the same two-digit SIC Code, it can be classified as a focusing acquisition, whereas, if both firms have different codes, it is classified as a diversifying acquisition. Now we progress towards analysing the cumulative value created by a focusing and diversifying acquisition around the announcement date, using a standard event-study methodology described by MacKinlay (1997), Huang and Walkling (1987) and Wong and Cheung (2009). The Market Return Model is used in this case, to calculate the abnormal returns of the sample using a linear relationship between stock returns and market return. Rit = ÃŽ ±i + ÃŽ ²iRmt + ÃŽ µit (1) E (ÃŽ µit = 0) var (ÃŽ µit) = ÏÆ'ÃŽ µt2 Where: Rit : Return on security i on day t Rmt : Return on market portfolio on day t ÃŽ µit : Zero mean disturbance term ÃŽ ±i, : expected value of the difference between Ri and ÃŽ ²iRmt ÃŽ ²i : covariance between Rit and Rmt divided by the variance of Rmt ÏÆ'ÃŽ µt2 : variance of the error term We use the market model instead of the constant mean return model as it gives us a more accurate judgement of the effect of the event. This is true as it does not take into account the variation of the market return , thus, giving us more accurate abnormal returns. ( if any words remain add how to calculate rit and rmt) In order to calculate the abnormal returns, we use the market model parameter estimates. ^ ^ ARit = Rit – (ÃŽ ±i + ÃŽ ²iRmt) (2) Where: ARit : the abnormal return for security i on day t ^ ^ ÃŽ ±i and ÃŽ ²i : estimates of ÃŽ ±i and ÃŽ ²i In order to calculate the abnormal returns we use a maximum of 351 daily observations (Huang and Walkling, 1987). We start collecting data from t -300 to t +50 days, with t = 0 being the announcement date of the acquisition. These 351 days include non-trading days as well. In other words, we actually gather data from t -214 to t +36, taking only trading days into account. We use different time periods of an event for a complete comparative analysis of abnormal returns in each sub period which is described as below: Event period : day t -10 → day t +30 (41 days) Pre-announcement period : day t -10 → day t -2 ( 9 days) Announcement period : day t -1 → day t 0 ( 2 days) Post Announcement Period : day t +1 → day t +30 (30 days) diagram To analyse the effect of the event , we now calculate the average abnormal return (AAR) for all the securities for a time period t. AAR is the sum of all abnormal returns of firms on day t divided by N( the number of firms): (3) The t statistic, à Ã¢â‚¬ ¢, is calculated by dividing AARt by the standard deviation of the average abnormal returns. This is final step of the model, which helps in determining the significance of the AARt in the event period. (4) While calculating the standard error, an estimator is used to calculate the variance of the abnormal returns in the absence of but in this case we use the sample variance measure of that we derive from the market model regression. The estimator is as follows: In order to establish a more holistic viewpoint, the cumulative average abnormal returns (CAAR) are calculated: Where T1 to T2 is the duration of the event in which the AARt is collected. According to our hypotheses we have to calculate one more variable, the cumulative average abnormal return (CAAR) over a certain period. In order to find out the significance of CAAR we calculate its t statistic as follows: Where var(CAAR) is the variance of the cumulative average abnormal returns. We could use a variety of formulas to calculate the standard deviation and t statistic such as those described in Campbell, Lo and MacKinlay (1997) and Brown and Warner (1985). But we calculate using the method adopted by Kothari and Warner (1985): Where: : Variance of the average abnormal return for one period. L : Longer the L, the higher is the variance of CAAR To test the third hypothesis, another variable is taken into consideration the Cumulative abnormal returns (CAR). We now develop a regression model using dummy variables to test the effect of the type of acquisition, kind of acquisition, the type of the target firm and the mode of payment on the CAR of the acquirers. The control variables are the relative market size of the market value of the target to acquirer (RMV) and the market size of the acquiring firm (M) (Wong and Cheung, 2009). Where: : Cumulative abnormal return from day d1 → day d2 D1 : 1 if the type is acquisition D1 : 0 otherwise i.e. merger D2 : 1 if it is focusing D2 : 0 otherwise i.e. diversifying D3 : 1 if target firm is private D3 : 0 otherwise i.e. public D4 : 1 if mode of payment is cash D4 : 0 otherwise i.e. stock M : Market Value of the acquiring firm=Number of outstanding share *closing price on the announcement date The tests of hypotheses 1, 2 and 3 can be described as the following tests: H1 : H0 : AARt = 0 H1: AARt ≠  0 H2 : H0 : CAARt = 0 H1: CAARt ≠  0 H3 : H3i :ÃŽ ²1 = 0 (Acquisitions vs. Mergers) H3ii :ÃŽ ²2 = 0 (Focusing vs. Diversifying) H3iii :ÃŽ ²3 = 0 (Public vs. Private target firms) H3iv :ÃŽ ²4 = 0 (Cash offer vs. Share offer) 4. Data Description The number of mergers and acquisitions carried out in India has been quite extensive. Hence, certain criterion has been used to select a suitable sample. The deals carried out with Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, UBS, Deustche Bank and Citi as their financial advisors should be included. These banks have been chosen as they deal with high valued mergers which are perfect for highlighting the true effects of a focusing or diversifying merger. All deals should have been completed from January, 2003 to March, 2010. The sample consists of only 178 completed transactions. All the acquirer firms must be publicly listed in the Bombay Stock Exchange. The SIC Codes for the target and acquirer should be available in the CRSP Database. This helps in dividing the sample into focusing and diversifying mergers. Because of these restrictions, the sample reduces to 70 firms, three of which have some information missing regarding the stock returns etc and hence our effective sample is 67. It has been further classified into 44 focusing and 23 diversifying deals. Using only publicly listed firms enables us to extract information about these deals such as – announcement dates, termination dates, stock returns, market returns etc. from the Thomson One database, company websites and the Bombay Stock Exchange. The Bombay Stock Exchange Sensitivity Index or the BSE Sensex (30) has been used to gather the market returns of the firms.

Friday, October 25, 2019

The rule of law :: essays research papers

other house are for the benefit of Australia rather than the government, and include no instances of discrimination. The judiciary also exercises the power to control legislation if it is deemed not in accordance with the ‘rule of law’. This was proven in the landmark case of Chu Keng Lim vs Minister for Immigration. Parliament had amended the migration act to provide for the compulsory detention of certain designated persons who could not be released from custody by an order of the court. The high court rejected this legislation stating that it was â€Å" beyond the legislative power of parliament to invest the executive with an arbitrary to detain citizens in custody not withstanding that the power was conferred in terms which sought to divorce such detention in custody from both punishment and criminal guilt. Putting to one side exceptional circumstances the involuntary detention of a citizen in custody by the state is penal or punitive in character and exists only as an incident of the exclusively judicial function of adjudging and punishing criminal guilt. Every citizen is â€Å" ruled by the law and the law alone† and may with us be punished for a breach of law but he can be punished for nothing else.† The judiciary also applies a system of precedent which allows for consistency in decisions but still provides for individual circumstances. This insures that there is no discrimination between people. Although all current conventions comply with the ‘rule of law’, the constitution does not guarantee it and provides for things such as the arbitrary exercise of power by the Governor General. However in Emy Hughes publication Australian Politics it states that â€Å" the court reasoned that that since the constitution could be presumed to authorise a system of

Thursday, October 24, 2019

Lifecycle of a Plastic Product Essay

Our life has been full with the uses of plastic in our daily life, in food and beverages to the appliances surrounding our daily life. Plastic was made from simple chains of molecules that are linked together called as Polymers. Thus, make many types of plastics are named starting with ‘Poly’ such Polyethylene, polystyrene and polypropylene. Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) – More commonly known as rubbish or garbage such as packaging products, grass clippings, furniture, clothing, bottles, food scraps, newspapers, household appliances, paint, these daily items we use then throw away, and battery. It comes from our homes, schools, hospitals, and businesses [2]. Each year, a report on the EPA Advanced Certificate Management Amendment: Facts and Figures 2013, formerly known as Municipal Solid Waste in the United States: Facts and Figures. It contains information on municipal solid waste generation, recycling, and disposal. MSW trace after 30 years, source limit reports (waste prevention) MSW and MSW tipping landfill fees for historical information, generation and demolition Additional information on the information, which has been extended to include outside the scope. The new name emphasizes the importance of sustainable content management (CM). CM refers to the use and recycling of materials in a more productive and durable manner throughout their entire lifecycle. SMM practices to conserve resources reduce waste, slow climate change, the materials we use to reduce their impact on the environment. In 2013, nearly 254 million tons of garbage, recycled and converted to US fertilizer products of 87 million tons, equivalent to 34.3 percent recycling rate was generated. On average, we recycled and 40: 40 pounds per person per day. Even from that, plastic is a very crucial part of our everyday lives, as it been used and basically can be found everywhere. Some examples of usage of plastics are in electronics and surgical instrument as plastic is lightweight, cheap and easy to build. Other than that, plastic is very useful when dealing with durability along with times, it is because plastics don’t easily be damaged by surrounding, unlike iron that can rust over time if in contact with water. Plastic also has a great impact on our today telecommunication, as the world evolves with the technology, a higher demand for internet is needed and fiber optics cable for faster communication with others is needed. The main substances used to produce fiber optic is plastic, in vehicles plastic parts is also one of the major parts needed as it used because it optimizes the power usage and makes them more efficient. The parts that used plastic in a vehicle are including seats, polycarbonate windows and interior panel. Basically, plastic has its own advantages and disadvantages that made it impossible to be ban completely as its usage in every part of daily lives. Even though, it has an important role as one of the vital resources in domestic and also industrial, because of plastics characteristics that are durable, water-resistant, lightweight and cheaper. The usage of plastic needs to supervise and handled appropriately for disposal. Not properly disposing of plastic could lead to plastic pollution due to the basic property of plastic that made it so durable and take thousands of years to decomposed [1]. The overuse of plastic and plastic pollution could give a number of effects on the environment and ecosystem. The effect to the environment is the landfills of plastic wastage due to overuse of plastic because of it cheaper and easier to be obtained. Other than that, an open burning with plastic will release dangerous chemical gasses to the air and could lead to impotence, cancer, asthma and etc. other than that, an authorized disposal of plastics to the sea or river could harm the animals live inside it. From a research, the turtles mostly die because of the plastics that they consume because turtles were mistaken plastics as jellyfish. Besides that, another effect to the animals is the entanglement of plastics to the body of turtles, dolphin and etc. that could affect the animal’s growth. There are several of ways that human can contribute to ensuring a smart usage of plastic to avoid plastic pollution. The easier ways to contribute is by shop friendly when shopping at the market to buy the needs for home, by having oneself shopping bag the usage of plastics can be reduced. Secondly, is to bring your own food container and drink bottle to reduce the usage of plastics from the packaging of your food and plastic bottle that cannot be reusable. Nonetheless, recycling is one of the vital ways that can help in reducing the usage of plastics because by recycling the plastics can be disposed of appropriately.

Wednesday, October 23, 2019

The Memoirs of Lady Hyegyong

The memoirs of Lady Hyegyong Lady Hyegyong * Wife of the crown prince Sado (1735-1762) * Daughter-in-law of King Yongjo (1724-1776) * Mother of King Chongjo (1776-1800) * The crown princess and mother and grandmother of the kings in the late eighteenth century Korea * Choson women (women in Choson Korea 1392-1910) – three lords: father, husband, and son * Patrilocal marriage * Woman writer The Memoirs * Hanjongnok: Record Written in Silence * A series of autobiographical narratives by Lady Hyegyong * 4 memoirs: 1795, 1801, 1802, 1805 The first 3 memoirs: story of her earlier life and her marriage into the royal family, and championing (in some cases â€Å"defending† her natal family. ) These memoirs are more personal, and overall three hangs a shadow: the fate of her husband, Crown Prince Sado, who was executed in 1762. His reputation after his death threatens the position of her offspring. **The fourth memoir: story of her husband Sado, the most important piece The mem oir of 1795 * Genre: Family injunction The first memoir was written for the benefit of her nephew, in conformity with the tradition of a family elder writing an injunction for the instruction of the younger members of the family, exhorting them to follow in the footsteps of honorable family elders. It contains a most poignant and endearing account of how the author, an innocent child of nine, was suddenly wrenched from her loving home and put in a strange and awesome court. It is also gives an intimate view of the princess's natal home, which was that of an exemplary Korean scholar. Defend the integrity of her natal family, reclaim the honorable family tradition * The unspoken subjects of the first memoir: â€Å"With his exceptional talent and superior scholarship, Prince Sado would surely have achieved greatness. Of its own record, however, illness seeped into his remarkable nature and†¦began to manifest itself in strange symptoms. † 1. Her husband’s insanity 2. Her husband’s execution in the rice chest â€Å"â€Å"On the thirteenth day, Heaven and Earth clashed and the sun and moon turned black.When this calamity happened, how could I desire to live even one second longer! † 3. The loss of her son * Silence The memoir of 1805: breaking the silence * Chronicle the death of her husband at the hands of her father-in-law * Audience: her grandson King Sunjo * Reason: false versions has proliferated. She felt the need to inform her grandson, the new king, the exact truth of the incident â€Å"feeling that my descriptions might cast a blemish on their virtue. But I cannot withhold the truth. † * Genre: writing a history * Seed of Trouble Absence of love and guidance from the father 1. Model child in infancy 2. Live in a separate palace from his parents * Influence of servants * Sado’s interest in the occult and martial games As a heir to the throne, Shado was put under immense pressure to achieve and learn conformity by the stifling educational rituals of the royal family – while, simultaneously, he was neglected by his coldly formal father, Yongjo, to such an extent that even an inside observer like Lady Hyegyong, steeped in the customs of the time, cannot hide her shock in the retelling.â€Å"Let the ruler be a ruler, the subject a subject, the father a father, the son a son. † * Father-son relationship is at the core of tragedy * â€Å"some unknown forces seem to have been driving father and son apart. †¦ What can I attribute this to but Heaven? Oh! Cruelty! † * The coldness between them is beyond her comprehension * Father’s faults? * Favoritism * Not paying attention to his son * Humiliating his son in public * Using Sado to wash away inauspicious events * Sado’s insanity * Clothing Phobia For him to get dressed, I had to have ten, twenty, or even thirty sets of clothes laid out. He would then burn some, supposedly on behalf of some ghost or other. Ev en after this, if he managed to get into a suit of clothes without incident, one had to count it as great luck. If, however, those serving him were to make the slightest error, he would not be able to put his clothes on, no matter how hard he tried. In the process, people were hurt, even killed. † —-Paralyzing terror of being able to live up to the expectations of propriety A serial killer â€Å"When anger grips me, I cannot contain myself. Only after I kill something–a person, perhaps an animal, even a chicken–can I calm down. † â€Å"Why is that so? † â€Å"Because I am deeply hurt. † â€Å"Why are you so hurt? † â€Å"I am sad that your Majesty does not love me and terrified when you criticize me. All this turns to anger. † —- Sado’s madness became such a threat to the royal family that he had to be eliminated * Mother’s choice * Lady Sonhui urged the King to eliminate Sado -â€Å"Sundering her ma ternal love and crushing her parental attachment for the sake of great principle, Lady Sonhui had brought herself to inform his Majesty . † – The duty over private emotion * Father’s side * Political concerns 1. His own problem with legitimacy 2. Factional conflicts 3. Constant threat of rebellion 4. High hopes for his heir * The execution * â€Å"In the royal audience chamber, meanwhile, father and son faced each other. In between them there stood a wooden rice chest (measuring 4ft x 4ft x 4ft, we are told). It was opened, and Yongjo ordered his son to climb inside.Undoubtedly aware of what this meant, Sado did as his father told him. It was then sealed up. Eight days later, he died, still inside it. † * Rationalizing the brutal execution —-Concerns over bodily dismemberment —-Not to give the appearance of criminal execution * Lady Hyegyong’s two traumas On her husband’s execution: * Inevitable and justified * Public duty > private feelings On the king’s decree of making her son an adopted son of the late prince: * Unnecessary and mind-baffling * Private feelings > public duty