$$$$$$RESEARCH PAPERS$$$$$$

[bonddonraj]

Investment Managers' Market Timing Abilities

Market timing is vital in the investment decision-making process and to investment performance. Portfolio managers time investment decisions, based on their macro forecasting skills, to earn excess abnormal returns. Studying the market timing abilities of investment managers is important to understand how well they have done in achieving the desired return targets and how well risk has been controlled in the process. Studies hitherto have documented inconsistent evidence on the subject. However, their approach has not separated the aggressiveness of a fund manager from the quality of information s/he possesses. Superior investment performance is earned not only by the ability to forecast returns on individual assets but also by the ability to time investment decisions correctly in the volatile stock markets.

AUTHOR studied the market timing abilities of investment managers in the Indian capital market based on the performance outcome of 80 investment schemes from the public and the private sectors for the period 1998 to 2002. The study revisited the market-timing proposition inherited from earlier studies and extended the contour of timing performance to fund characteristics, measurement criteria and benchmark indices to investigate performance variability and persistence. The information inputs were examined through performance evaluation measures developed by Fama, Treynor and Mazuy, and Henriksson and Merton.

The results were unable to generate adequate statistical evidence in support of Indian managers' successful market timing performance, across measurement criteria, fund characteristics, and benchmark indices. Further, they revealed that successful timers failed to maintain their performance while laggard managers improved upon theirs, thus negating the survivorship bias. These results also point to the success of contrarian investment strategies instead of momentum strategies at the market place. The findings have wider significance for investment decision-making and the capital market theory.

 

[bonddonraj]

The Technology-Strategy== Market Imperfections

The Technology-Strategy== Market Imperfections


The purpose of strategy is to gain competitive advantage, that is to beat one's competitors and to show profits over and above the industry average. As a corollary, the purpose of strategy is to examine the ways in which market perfections can be converted into market imperfections.

THE paper starts with an understanding of Porter's Five Forces model and its application and validity under different market conditions. The central thesis that emerges is that to maintain the existing level of industry attractiveness, firms must play a pro - active role in terms of changing the intensity of the forces. What the consumer considers as utopian market conditions a large number of producers, undifferentiated products, the inability of individual producers or consumers to fix prices, the technology being constant returns to scale, and symmetric information flows a producer would consider the worst. The entire objective of the producer would be to introduce imperfections in the market that can be taken advantage of and the most effective way to introduce them is through the use of technology.

In a series of seven propositions, the paper looks at the intrinsic nexus between technology and strategy and how technology can support strategy by introducing distortions in the market. Imperfections in the market can be introduced by lowering the average cost curves and erecting entry barriers; segmenting the market through product differentiation, which can be done either physically or perceptually; allowing cost leadership to be translated into price leadership through the back-up of reserves and surpluses; using the Internet to generate asymmetric information flows; thwarting the cross elasticity of substitution in the case of homogenous goods through product differentiation; and introducing super normal profits not only in the short run, but also in the long run through rent seeking behaviour.

fair amount of research, both international and Indian, has gone into determining the factors affecting bank performance. However, the relationship between performance and stock returns has not received much attention. With more and more banks in India getting listed in the stock markets, shareholder value creation has assumed importance along with the traditional objectives. The challenge before banks is to create such value by differentiating themselves from the competition on the one hand, while working within the regulatory boundaries on the other.

Banks design business and operational strategy that determines their final performance. The market observes both these sets of variables through published information, makes an informed assessment and this gets captured in market returns. In this essay, AUTHOR makes an attempt to identify those items of published information that have an impact on stock performance. Variables such as income composition, NPA ratios and capital adequacy ratios have been used to define strategy, and panel data regression models have been run to test how such strategy variables impact profitability (the only facet of performance considered in the study) and are in turn captured in stock market returns. The study represents an extension of earlier research in that it includes new private banks and uses a more recent set of data to see how performance variables impact stock returns. It also looks at another factor that impacts performance namely, the strategy adopted by the bank, and its impact at the stock market level. The study concludes that the stock market assimilates most of the relevant information in arriving at the stock price figures while most of the 'manipulatable' and/or transitory phenomena and pure historical variables are duly discounted. While the stock market does not reward excessive risk-taking, it does not appreciate excessive conservatism either.

 

[bonddonraj]

Job Satisfaction among Teachers

Job Satisfaction among Teachers

Attracting and retaining high quality teachers is a primary necessity as well as a challenge for educational institutions. While intrinsic factors play a significant role in motivating individuals to enter the teaching profession, extrinsic conditions can influence their job satisfaction and desire to remain in teaching. In addition, demographic factors and teacher specific and school specific characteristics also affect job satisfaction.

This study is an evaluative and diagnostic attempt to discover empirically the nature of relationships between job satisfaction and different factors, as well as independent aspects of job satisfaction. The sample comprised 120 school teachers working in government and private schools in Jammu city. The questionnaire covered six aspects of the job: principal's behaviour, society and colleagues' behaviour, work itself, pay and rewards, growth opportunities and recognition, and students' behaviour and others. The analysis revealed that each of these aspects played a role in job satisfaction. The degree of job satisfaction secured by teachers is not high and the reason lies in insufficient pay. Secondary level teachers are more satisfied than primary level teachers. Contrary to expectation, private school teachers are more satisfied than government school teachers despite the poor pay package, due to the congenial atmosphere in the private schools. Female teachers are more satisfied due to the nature of the job and the socio-cultural value of the profession. The level of education inversely affects the pay satisfaction of the employees working at the same level. Satisfaction with teaching as a career, not merely as a job, is an important policy issue since it is associated with teacher effectiveness, which ultimately affects student achievement

 

[bonddonraj]

Shaping the Destiny of a Public Sector Enterprise

Shaping the Destiny of a Public Sector Enterprise


The company now known as Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) has been in India in some form for a very long time. Beginning with the consolidation of Asiatic Petroleum in India in 1907 under the name Shell, it was registered in London as the Burmah Shell Oil Company in 1928. With the inevitable nationalisation of oil majors in 1976, the company entered an era of constraint and collapsed to a meagre 15% in market share. After a period of inaction, BPCL embarked on an effort to resurrect itself, involving extensive representations with the government to increase its share of allocation of new business opportunities. J Ramachandran and Vani Venkatesh spoke to its Chairman and Managing Director, Ashok Sinha, to understand the journey from the days of steady decline to the current position of leadership in thought, action and innovation.

Acting with far reaching vision and foresight, BPCL has consistently nurtured its employees and picked the best entrepreneurs as its dealers. In an era of public sector dominance where customers were taken for granted, it was one of the first companies to think of the customer. Having first established a unique identity for itself among the Indian oil companies, it set out to build a brand based on three core values - caring, reliable and innovative, and the daring guarantee of 'Pure for Sure. It has several 'firsts' and 'biggests' in India to its credit - first to introduce premium fuel, first bottled gas, largest loyalty programme and largest convenience store network to name a few. Embedded in the company's DNA are the courage, conviction and pride that got BPCL to where they are today, and the appetite for innovation and change that will keep them ahead of the curve.

 

[sanaa]

nice topics..............gr8 infooo......thanks