Filetype
Instant messaging has become widely used in many instances. The concept of synchronous communication changed the terms of communication in distance education. This paper aims to achieve a deeper understanding of the current status of communication in distance education, additionally, to explore the usability of IM features in the e-learning process. Five interviews and a questionnaire investigatio
"Software as a Service" (SaaS) concept emerged in the late twentieth century as a new software delivered model and is outstanding in terms of swift software delivery. Some analysts predict that the unique of some characteristics in SaaS motivate software providers to offer many types of software as a service. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system has been delivered by providers a
The purpose of this thesis is to evaluate volatility forecasts by testing the predictive power of implied volatility vis-à-vis model based forecasts. Furthermore we test if implied volatility contains any additional information beyond that captured by the model based forecasts. A number of time series models are fitted to historical data. The fitted models are then used to forecast volatility. The
Uppsatsens syfte är att jämföra Moody’s kreditbetyg och KMV-modellen under perioden 2006- 2009. Detta för att analysera kreditbetygens ökade inflytande vid beräkning av bankers kapitalkrav inom BIS II samt utvärdera om det skulle vara möjligt att använda KMV-modellen s resultat för att beräkna dessa kapitalkrav istället. Studien baseras på Moody’s kreditbetyg samt den strukturella KMV-modellen vil
Europeiska Centralbanken (ECB 2003) använder sig av en modell med två stöttepelare för prognostisering av inflation. Den första stöttepelaren ska hantera reala aspekter, utbud och efterfrågan, som på kort sikt påverkar inflationen och den långsiktiga monetära hantera penningmängden och de faktorer som påverkar den på lång sikt. Detta kan knytas an till monetära teorier som bygger på Friedman (1963
This study tests the Balassa-Samuelson (BS) hypothesis for 10 OECD countries between 1975 and 2007 using the recent data sets and econometric methods. The study employs the Johansen cointegration approach in country-specific analysis. To investigate the existence of cointegration in panel series Pedroni, Kao and Johansen-Fisher tests of panel cointegration are used. The country-specific and panel
Uppsatsens syfte är att undersöka hur ombalanseringsstrategier med aktieindexobligationer har utfallit historiskt i jämförelse med beslut att inte ombalansera. En back testing-metod appliceras på det svenska aktieindexet OMXS30. En ombalanseringsstrategi testas på en fiktiv aktieindexobligation på 56 historiska tidsperioder med olika gränsvärden för ombalansering. Dataunderlaget analyseras därefte
The aim of this thesis is to examine the long-run relationship between regional house prices, how the house price model behaves in the short run and if aggregated national house price models may be misleading. To investigate whether house prices are related in the long run we use cointegration tests to look for common trends. The short-run behaviour of the model is estimated by an error correction
Den klassiska debatten kring hushållsnära tjänster behandlar frågan om hur beskattningen bör se ut. Denna uppsats vill istället behandla ämnet på samma sätt som barnomsorgen har gjorts de senaste decennierna, det vill säga som en statligt finansierad reform för att öka alla inkomstgruppers arbetsutbud. Avsikten är att testa de ekonomiska effekterna av ett extra barnbidrag, öronmärkt för hushållsnä
I uppsatsen diskuteras de individekonomiska, samhällsekonomiska och till viss del även de offentligekonomiska incitamenten och kostnaderna av den ökade andelen utländska studenter på avancerad nivå I Sverige. Uppsatsen belyser även till viss del den nationella strategin för internationalisering av den högre utbildningen. Uppsatsen kommer fram till att det kan vara kostnadseffektivt för de utländsk
Syftet med uppsatsen ligger i att genomföra en kundsegmentering med hjälp av klusteranalys på bas av kundpreferenser från en conjointanalys. Datamaterialet rör konsumentpreferenser med de två attributen öppning, med fem nivåer, och förpackning, om fyra nivåer. Klustermetoderna som används är K-mean, K-median och Fuzzy klustering. Segmenteringen baseras på att använda sig av standardiserade och ick
The international guest worker programmes as well as labour migration have had substantial impact on the economic development of many parts of the world including Europe, the United States, Canada, the Gulf States, Japan, as well as increasingly many other parts of the world. The severe shortages of labour due to low fertility and population ageing in the developed world have in the recent decades
Mean-Risk portfolio optimization method proposes an efficient frontier that consists of portfolios not dominated by any portfolio. Consequently, this method reduces the choice set by excluding inefficient portfolios. Different risk measures offer different efficient frontiers, which can be interpreted as different optimal choice sets. The question is whether these different risk measures lead to s
In the light of the current financial crisis, risk management and prediction of market losses seem to play a crucial role in finance. This thesis compares one day out-of-sample predictive performance of standard methods and conditional autoregressive VaR (CAViaR) by Engle & Manganelli (2004) for VaR (Value-at-risk) prediction of market losses. Comparison is made on US, Hong Kong, and Russian i
This paper investigates the profitability of the zero-cost strategies (Winner-Loser) on the Eurozone market for the time period 1999-2009. We find that the Winner portfolio outperforms the Loser portfolio by, on average, 0,8% per month when we combine formation and holding periods of 3, 6, 9 and 12 months. As the sum of these two periods gets closer to 24 months, the excess returns tend to dissipa
The purpose of this thesis is to test the implications of the permanent income – life cycle hypothesis. According to Hall (1978), if the permanent income-life cycle hypothesis is valid, consumption should follow a random walk and no variable other than once-lagged consumption should help explaining current consumption. Two different tests are conducted. Firstly, consumption is regressed upon its o
In recent years the concept of social capital has become particularly popular in epidemiologic literature for its hypothesized effects on health inequalities observable at national levels. This project evolves around the theory of social capital, particularly the interaction of its bonding, bridging and vertical forms and dimensions for health outcomes. It also incorporates a competing viewpoint a
Studien undersöker sambandet mellan ekonomisk tillväxt och utländska direktinvesteringar (FDI) i utvecklingsländer, samt om bättre inhemska finansiella marknader och/eller en högre nivå på humankapitalet påverkar utfallet. Detta studeras genom; (1) En justerad tillväxtmodell där FDI:s påverkan på kapitalackumulationen och teknologiöverföringen inkluderas. (2) En paneldatastudie som baseras på ett
Leveraged buyout transaction is the most familiar PE investment technique in financial market. It is controversial for high debt financing since some companies go to bankruptcy for it, and some companies achieve another boom. Debt financing is cheaper than equity financing, and tax shield would also be attractive for choice of high debt capital structure. Potential LBO companies should be mature,
Financial services sector is fundamental to economic growth and development in all advanced economies. Financial services such as banking, savings and investment, insurance, and debt and equity financing constitute a nation’s economic engine by fulfilling three core functions in the economy. Firstly, these services provide financial intermediation functions between savers/investors that are lookin
