This book introduces concepts of business incubation and suggests a learning process. This process begins with prior knowledge at the opportunity identification phase, progresses through the acquisition of new skills and knowledge necessary to develop an opportunity and concludes with a transformation phase where new knowledge is acted upon. The book draws on extensive qualitative data and documentary evidence from a range of stakeholders associated with a University Business Incubator known as Innospace. The process of opportunity development within the business incubator is explored by combining experiential and social learning theories as heuristic tools. Presented implications for policy-makers and incubator managers are that attention and scarce resources should be focused on providing relevant information and encouraging an atmosphere of learning and mutual support. Recruitment practices should be revised to include a more holistic appreciation of potential incubatees contribution to the Business Incubation learning community as well as an assessment of their business plans. For policy makers the book suggests that successful business incubators do not necessarily require a large financial investment in state-of-the-art premises and technology. Appropriate management training together with carefully selected incubatees can create an effective learning community where opportunities are developed and transformed into enterprises and individuals into entrepreneurs.

This book covers several new areas in the growing field of analytics with some innovative applications in different business contexts, and consists of selected presentations at the 6th IIMA International Conference on Advanced Data Analysis, Business Analytics and Intelligence. The book is conceptually divided in seven parts. The first part gives expository briefs on some topics of current academic and practitioner interests, such as data streams, binary prediction and reliability shock models. In the second part, the contributions look at artificial intelligence applications with chapters related to explainable AI, personalized search and recommendation, and customer retention management. The third part deals with credit risk analytics, with chapters on optimization of credit limits and mitigation of agricultural lending risks. In its fourth part, the book explores analytics and data mining in the retail context. In the fifth part, the book presents some applications of analytics to operations management. This part has chapters related to improvement of furnace operations, forecasting food indices and analytics for improving student learning outcomes. The sixth part has contributions related to adaptive designs in clinical trials, stochastic comparisons of systems with heterogeneous components and stacking of models. The seventh and final part contains chapters related to finance and economics topics, such as role of infrastructure and taxation on economic growth of countries and connectedness of markets with heterogenous agents, The different themes ensure that the book would be of great value to practitioners, post-graduate students, research scholars and faculty teaching advanced business analytics courses.

Leopardology TM - the art of Positive Predatory Thinking. Critical business strategy, gleaned from the hunt of the African leopard. Critical business thinking and strategy, gleaned from the hunting habits and techniques of the African leopard, perhaps the most successful predator on earth! Using the hunting habits and techniques of Africa's most successful predator, Leopardology TM draws metaphors of personal and business success that will simply leave you spellbound! Having the "lion's share" of market territories and clients, to which corporations have been accustomed, is no longer the case. Competitor predators are continually on the prowl for your market share and profit. On the plains of the African savannah, deficiencies of vision, strategy, trust and change-management are often the indicators that lead alert predators to easy prey. Not unlike the world of commerce, in the bushlands of Africa, if one is not hunting to survive, one will simply survive to be hunted!

Junk bonds burst into the nation's headlines as the fastest growing and most controversial financial instruments of the 1980s. Branded with an unflattering nickname, these high yield securities were tarnished in the public eye by waves of negative publicity. Critics cast the financiers and entrepreneurs who pioneered their use as symbols of a decade of greed and financial excess. By the end of the 1980s, the heyday of junk bonds had seemingly come to a close with the conviction of junk bond pioneer Michael Milken and the bankruptcy of Drexel Burnham Lambert, the brokerage that dominated the high yield market. But the controversy surrounding junk bonds continues.
Now, in Junk Bonds, business professor Glenn Yago turns the tables on conventional wisdom about this new financial technology. He offers the first systematic examination of the facts about high yield securities. His analysis provides hard evidence that demystifies junk bonds and explodes many of the popular myths that surround them.
Junk Bonds sheds light on the role of high yield financing in what Yago calls the democratization of capital. Before the advent of junk bonds, only companies with an "investment grade" rating--five percent of the 23,000 American companies with sales over $35 million--had access to long term capital. In effect, the author argues, 95 percent of American companies were denied the means to finance growth and business development. Yago shows how junk bonds changed all that, breathing life into thousands of American companies that had been shunned by the capital markets. His research demonstrates that these "junk" companies outperformed many Fortune 500 firms in job creation, product development, sales, and business innovation.
The real contribution of junk bonds, according to Yago, was to improve the productivity and competitiveness of American business by restructuring companies in the wake of the corporate conglomerations of the 1960s and 1970s. His findings show that divestitures by companies financed with high yield bonds were not necessarily destructive. Many sold-off units flourished as independent enterprises at a time when numerous "investment grade" companies stagnated or closed plants or fired workers. This restructuring of corporate America has enabled businesses to compete in a changing international environment, benefiting managers, workers, stockholders, and investors alike.
Junk Bonds provides readers with a scholarly analysis that shears away the hype and hysteria that often accompany rapid change. And at a time when Wall Street is under greater scrutiny than at any time since the Depression, this provocative study provides a timely and thoughtful contribution to the debate surrounding junk bonds.

This book combines theory and practice to analyze risk measurement from different points of view. The limitations of a model depend on the framework on which it has been built as well as specific assumptions, and risk managers need to be aware of these when assessing risks. The authors investigate the impact of these limitations, propose an alternative way of thinking that challenges traditional assumptions, and also provide novel solutions. Starting with the traditional Value at Risk (VaR) model and its limitations, the book discusses concepts like the expected shortfall, the spectral measure, the use of the spectrum, and the distortion risk measures from both a univariate and a multivariate perspective.

This practical guide in Eviews is aimed at practitioners and students in business, economics, econometrics, and finance. It uses a step-by-step approach to equip readers with a toolkit that enables them to make the most of this widely used econometric analysis software. Statistical and econometrics concepts are explained visually with examples, problems, and solutions. Developed by economists, the Eviews statistical software package is used most commonly for time-series oriented econometric analysis. It allows users to quickly develop statistical relations from data and then use those relations to forecast future values of the data. The package provides convenient ways to enter or upload data series, create new series from existing ones, display and print series, carry out statistical analyses of relationships among series, and manipulate results and output. This highly hands-on resource includes more than 200 illustrative graphs and tables and tutorials throughout. Abdulkader Aljandali is Senior Lecturer at Coventry University in London. He is currently leading the Stochastic Finance Module taught as part of the Global Financial Trading MSc. His previously published work includes Exchange Rate Volatility in Emerging Markers, Quantitative Analysis, Multivariate Methods & Forecasting with IBM SPSS Statistics and Multivariate Methods and Forecasting with IBM (R) SPSS (R) Statistics. Dr Aljandali is an established member of the British Accounting and Finance Association and the Higher Education Academy. Motasam Tatahi is a specialist in the areas of Macroeconomics, Financial Economics, and Financial Econometrics at the European Business School, Regent's University London, where he serves as Principal Lecturer and Dissertation Coordinator for the MSc in Global Banking and Finance at The European Business School-London.

The way in which leverage and its expected dynamics impact on firm valuation is very different from what is assumed by the traditional static capital structure framework. Recent work that allows the firm to restructure its debt over time proves to be able to explain much of the observed cross-sectional and time-series variation in leverage, while static capital structure predictions do not. The purpose of this book is to re-characterize the firm's valuation process within a dynamical capital structure environment, by drawing on a vast body of recent and more traditional theoretical insights and empirical findings on firm evaluation, also including asset pricing literature, offering a new setting in which practitioners and researchers are provided with new tools to anticipate changes in capital structure and setting prices for firm's debt and equity accordingly.

Sustainable finance has been one of the emerging areas of finance in the last decade. With its emphasis on environmental, social, and governance as focal points in decision-making processes, it can help to improve social well-being while also supporting sustainable recovery. Furthermore, when practiced appropriately, it has the potential to avoid financial crises. Focusing on sustainable finance, responsible banking, responsible insurance, and responsible public finance can thus drive economic resiliency and must be examined from a pre-, post-, and during-crisis period in order to effectively avoid such circumstances in the future. Global Aspects of Sustainable Finance in Times of Crises discusses theory and concepts, focuses on practices and strategies, addresses the recent challenges and trends, and presents future prospects regarding sustainable finance. It provides a comprehensive look at sustainable finance in a variety of contexts and fields and discusses contemporary issues in light of crises such as the climate crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic. Covering a wide range of topics such as climate finance, green finance, and microfinance, it is ideal for corporate managers, portfolio managers, investors, finance professionals, accountants, government officials, financial analysts, researchers, practitioners, academicians, students, and policymakers.

This book provides insights into current issues in corporate governance by examining twelve cases from the 2010s and 2020s where corporate governance was seen to be an issue. The cases are designed to introduce the reader to 'real life' episodes with corporate governance implications, shedding light on why corporate scandals continue to occuer, to what extent these are a corporate governance failure, and in which ways corporate governance - and the behaviour of those involved in ensuring good governance and an ethical culture in their business - may be improved in the future. This book will be of interest to businesspeople, students of business, and lawyers and motivate discussion on the reasons why corporate governance failed, or was seen to be inadequate.

This monograph is devoted to a modern theory of capital cost and capital structure created by this book's authors, called the Brusov-Filatova-Orekhova (BFO) theory, and its application to the real economy. BFO theory promises to replace the traditional theory of capital cost and capital structure by Nobel laureates Modigliani and Miller. This new theory in particular, presents a possible explanation to the causes of the recent global financial crisis. The authors of the book describe the general theory of capital cost and capital structure that can be applied to corporations of arbitrary age (or with arbitrary lifetime) and investment projects with arbitrary duration. The authors illustrate their theory with examples from corporate practice and develop investment models that can be applied by companies in their financial operations. This updated second edition includes new chapters devoted to the application of the BFO theory in ratings, banking and other areas. The authors also provide a new approach to rating methodology highlighting the need for including financial flow discounting, the incorporation of rating parameters (in particular, financial ratios) into the modern theory of capital structure - BFO theory. This book aims to change our understanding of corporate finance, investments, taxation and rating procedures. The authors emphasize that the most used principles of financial management should be changed in accordance to BFO theory.

The risk of counterparty default in banking, insurance, institutional, and pension-fund portfolios is an area of ongoing and increasing importance for finance practitioners. It is, unfortunately, a topic with a high degree of technical complexity. Addressing this challenge, this book provides a comprehensive and attainable mathematical and statistical discussion of a broad range of existing default-risk models. Model description and derivation, however, is only part of the story. Through use of exhaustive practical examples and extensive code illustrations in the Python programming language, this work also explicitly shows the reader how these models are implemented. Bringing these complex approaches to life by combining the technical details with actual real-life Python code reduces the burden of model complexity and enhances accessibility to this decidedly specialized field of study. The entire work is also liberally supplemented with model-diagnostic, calibration, and parameter-estimation techniques to assist the quantitative analyst in day-to-day implementation as well as in mitigating model risk. Written by an active and experienced practitioner, it is an invaluable learning resource and reference text for financial-risk practitioners and an excellent source for advanced undergraduate and graduate students seeking to acquire knowledge of the key elements of this discipline.

This book explores the relationship between and the compatibility of lean management (LM) and value-based management (VBM) approaches at the systems level. It then develops a model to improve LM and VBM professional practice by fostering a shared understanding of the value creation process within a lean system, and in doing so helps to remove existing barriers. The results promote future fruitful alliances between a company's operational and financial communities, enhancing the benefits to the enterprise and its stakeholders. The book is of primary interest to LM and VBM professionals and researchers.

Mergers & acquisitions are an essential instrument of strategic corporate management for companies of all sizes. The success of an M&A project highly depends on an optimal transaction preparation, fast execution and the experience of all parties involved. Due to numerous endogenous and exogenous influences, no two M&A transactions are alike at the detailed level. This book is designed as a practical M&A guide for students and professionals alike. In addition to dealing with important basics of mergers & acquisitions, the focus is on a structured and in-depth examination of the individual process steps of a typical company sale. At various points in this book, specific differences between a company sale of medium-sized companies (mid-caps) and large companies (large-caps) are discussed in detail.

"It has been said that in theory, theory translates into practice, but in practice it never does. This breakthrough book defies this conventional wisdom in a unique way. It is a must read for anyone interested in structuring derivatives products." — Dr Peter Carr, Principal, Banc of America Securities

"Harry Kat has done a masterful job explaining the world of exotic options and the role that these options play in building structured securities. Dr Kat conveys the essence of these products from the perspective of a very experienced financial engineer but in a fashion that the less experienced reader can easily follow and understand. In this, Dr Kat has shown himself to be a marvellous teacher. I'm confident that this book will prove to be one of the classics to be read by future generations of financial engineers." — John F. Marshall, Principal, Marshall, Tucker & Associates, and Founding Executive Director, International Association of Financial Engineers

"This is a refreshingly new and different book about putting together structured equity products. It is not a book about deriving formulas but a book about applying formulas. The emphasis on hedging costs and alternative ways of reducing those costs by modifying the structure will be appreciated both by those who actually manufacture and sell these products and those who buy them." — Don Chance, First Union Professor, Virginia Tech

"This book is about applications, about solving real business problems with derivatives.... Contrary to many other books in the field, the approach is managerial rather than abstractly mathematical, aimed at practitioners instead of applied mathematicians. Professor Kat's book contains all the mathematics required. However, the mathematical aspects play a purely supportive role, not the starring role. Bravo!"
— Anthony F. Herbst, University of Texas at El Paso, Founding Editor, The Journal of Financial Engineering

"It is certainly a unique book, much more useful that most new books on derivatives. In a nutshell, this book is very creatively done and a great resource for professionals."
— Mark Rubinstein, Paul Stephens Professor of Applied Investment Analysis, University of California at Berkeley

This book is a valuable companion for everyone who is interested in the historical context of the co-evolution of financial markets and information technologies in the last 30 years. The contributors analyze system architectures and solution technologies in banking and finance by focusing on the particularities of certain practices and risks.

This book explores research that contributes to the current literature on the Oil and Gas Sector by analysing the multiple discourses that experts use to examine social investment. This book explains how these discourses influence social investment practices and host communities in the O&G sector. This book serves as a starting point from which companies, social investment experts, communities, host country governments, and international banks can build more participatory and community-centred social investment programmes to promote positive futures. The book suggests an alternative approach to O&G social investment, where social investment represents one of the main tools of social engagement, rather than its substitute; and where care instead of profit, becomes the driver of O&G social investment.

This book introduces to basic and advanced methods for credit risk management. It covers classical debt instruments and modern financial markets products. The author describes not only standard rating and scoring methods like Classification Trees or Logistic Regression, but also less known models that are subject of ongoing research, like e.g. Support Vector Machines, Neural Networks, or Fuzzy Inference Systems. The book also illustrates financial and commodity markets and analyzes the principles of advanced credit risk modeling techniques and credit derivatives pricing methods. Particular attention is given to the challenges of counterparty risk management, Credit Valuation Adjustment (CVA) and the related regulatory Basel III requirements. As a conclusion, the book provides the reader with all the essential aspects of classical and modern credit risk management and modeling.

An essential guide to valuation techniques and financial analysis

With the collapse of the economy and financial systems, many institutions are reevaluating what they are willing to spend money on. Project valuation is key to both cost effectiveness measures and shareholder value.

The purpose of this book is to provide a comprehensive examination of critical capital budgeting topics. Coverage extends from discussing basic concepts, principles, and techniques to their application to increasingly complex, real-world situations. Throughout, the book emphasizes how financially sound capital budgeting facilitates the process of value creation and discusses why various theories make sense and how firms can use them to solve problems and create wealth.Offers a strategic focus on the application of various techniques and approaches related to a firm's overall strategyProvides coverage of international topics based on the premise that managers should view business from a global perspectiveEmphasizes the importance of using real options

Comprised of contributed chapters from both experienced professionals and academics, "Capital Budgeting Valuation" offers a variety of perspectives and a rich interplay of ideas related to this important financial discipline.

In this special issue of Research in Finance, editors Rita Biswas and Michael Michaelides compile eleven papers, five of which were selected from the II International Conference on Economics and Finance (ICEF-II) in Bengaluru, India. This volume focuses on a gamut of topics ranging from monetary policy to corporate governance in emerging economies. More specifically, it presents papers on the role of board characteristics and sub-committees on firm performance, the impact of US quantitative easing on countries like India and China, public-private partnerships in infrastructure projects in India, and multinational banking evolution in Nigeria and India. In order to advance the field of international economics and finance, it is necessary to question conventional practice and research approach. Incorporating analysis of classical theories of international finance and economics, the papers in this volume present new innovative theories that seek to do just that. They are essential reading for researchers interested in development economics and emerging finance.

The book examines the market reaction to mergers and acquisitions (M&A) announcements over a period from 2003 to 2015. Mergers and acquisitions continue to be amongst the preferred competitive options available to the companies seeking to grow fast in the rapidly changing global business scenario. M&A as a growth strategy has received attention from developed as well as emerging economies. It has been extensively used by managers as an expansion strategy and also serves as an important instrument for increasing corporate efficiency. Recently, M&A has grown at a rapid pace, creating a need for research to analyze what drives this phenomenon and how it affects firms and markets. As such, this book evaluates the impact of M&A on short-term abnormal returns as well long-term financial performance. It also assesses the management view concerning the motives for undertaking M&A. In addition, the book investigates the corporate governance practices of the acquiring firms and their impact on the short- term as well as long- term performance of those firms.

This book provides a critical analysis of the current state of knowledge on the relationship between family firms and a wide range of accounting choices, including earnings management, accounting conservatism, and financial and non-financial disclosure. In examining the choices made in family firms, the authors explore and elucidate the relevance of agency, socioemotional wealth, stewardship, and resource-based theories. Readers will also find close consideration of the impacts of a country's culture and societal values on accounting choices. In particular, further evidence is provided on the impact of different cultures on accounting conservatism in family businesses. Finally, avenues for future accounting research on family firms are discussed, highlighting theoretical and empirical challenges. In addition to offering a revealing analysis of the influence of ownership types and cultures on accounting choices within family firms, the book identifies significant practical implications for the management of family firms and policy implications for regulators and standard setters.

Finally! A comprehensive volume on the management of corporate acquisitions that summarizes contemporary research, and that moves what we know about acquisition management a step further. The book encompasses innovative works from several countries, related to a variety of issues; managerial motives, the role of acquisitions in competitive strategy, as well as organizational and political processes. Unlike several other works on acquisitions, this book emphasizes the most critical issue faced by managers today; how to manage successfully already acquired companies and operations. Both researchers, managers and students of strategy and organization will find this book an important supplement.

This book presents the best papers from the 2nd International Conference on Mathematical Research for Blockchain Economy (MARBLE) 2020, held in Vilamoura, Portugal. While most blockchain conferences and forums are dedicated to business applications, product development or Initial Coin Offering (ICO) launches, this conference focused on the mathematics behind blockchain to bridge the gap between practice and theory. Blockchain Technology has been considered as the most fundamental and revolutionising invention since the Internet. Every year, thousands of blockchain projects are launched and circulated in the market, and there is a tremendous wealth of blockchain applications, from finance to healthcare, education, media, logistics and more. However, due to theoretical and technical barriers, most of these applications are impractical for use in a real-world business context. The papers in this book reveal the challenges and limitations, such as scalability, latency, privacy and security, and showcase solutions and developments to overcome them.

The book offers new ways to think about retirement security in a volatile financial environment. Myriad retirement risks confront employees, retirees, employers, and governments. This book illustrates how stakeholders can reinvent pensions that perform well in a competitive global setting.