Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Market Enforcement'

Submitted by Stefania Grezzana Merenstein (stegrez@hotmail.com) on 2016-06-01T19:29:20Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Stefania Grezzana - Tese_vBiblio.pdf: 2120928 bytes, checksum: 746cbcd0ea0f6d71185c9ae0b5f8dc1c (MD5)<br>Rejected by Letícia Monteiro de Souza (leticia.dsouza@fgv.br), reason: Prezada Stefania, Favor alterar seu trabalho de acordo com as normas ABNT: 1: Contra-capa: O texto padrão de introdução deve ser em português. 2: Folha de assinatura: O texto deve, também, ser em português. 3: Agradecimentos e Acknoledgments: Favor fazer uma sessão de Agradecimentos em português e posicionar antes da folha de Acknoledgments. 4: Os títulos das sessões devem estar em caixa alta, negritado e centralizado. 5: A contagem de página deve apenas aparecer da Introdução a diante, e a mesma deve estar localizado ao lado direito da folha. Atenciosamente, Letícia Monteiro 3799-3631 on 2016-06-01T19:36:24Z (GMT)<br>Submitted by Stefania Grezzana Merenstein (stegrez@hotmail.com) on 2016-06-02T11:45:34Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Stefania Grezzana - Tese_vBiblio.pdf: 2125635 bytes, checksum: 80fe18aa661329f13965b2322ec441b2 (MD5)<br>Approved for entry into archive by Suzinei Teles Garcia Garcia (suzinei.garcia@fgv.br) on 2016-06-02T12:18:44Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Stefania Grezzana - Tese_vBiblio.pdf: 2125635 bytes, checksum: 80fe18aa661329f13965b2322ec441b2 (MD5)<br>Made available in DSpace on 2016-06-02T12:28:35Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Stefania Grezzana - Tese_vBiblio.pdf: 2125635 bytes, checksum: 80fe18aa661329f13965b2322ec441b2 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-05-13<br>This dissertation is a conjunction of three essays on the Industrial Organization field, this empirical work is applied to the Brazilian retail gasoline market. The first essay investigates the existence of spillover effects from cartel activity. The second essay relates the well-known economic puzzle of asymmetric cost pass through to prices with the existence of horizontal coordination - cartels - in the relevant market. Finally, the third essay investigates the effectiveness of antitrust interventions inside the offenders and the consequences of its disclosure in related markets.<br>Esta tese é uma conjunção de três ensaios sobre no campo de organização industrial, o trabalho empírico é aplicado ao mercado brasileiro de revenda de combustíveis, especificamente gasolina. O primeiro ensaio investiga a existência de efeitos indiretos, repercussões para outros mercados, resultantes da atividade do cartel. O segundo ensaio relaciona o conhecido tema da literatura de repasse assimétrico de custos aos preços com a existência de coordenação horizontal - cartéis - nos mercados em questão. Finalmente, o terceiro ensaio investiga a eficácia das intervenções de defesa da concorrência dentre os infractores e as consequências da sua divulgação em mercados relacionados.

<p> This dissertation is an exploration of the role of informality in the housing market in southeast Los Angeles County. While informality has long been the subject of scholarship in cases from the Global South, and increasingly in the United States, examinations of <i>housing</i> informality in the US thus far have largely been situated in rural and peri-urban areas. This work seeks to interrogate informality in housing processes unfolding within the very heart of northern North America's leading industrial metropolis. </p><p> After a brief preface, the dissertation's second chapter reviews literature on various aspects of informality and on <i>Accessory Dwelling Units, </i> or additions or conversions of living quarters on residential properties. Chapter 3 introduces the work's methodological pillars, and describes the four major, mixed methods relied upon. These are a survey of code enforcement officers; interviews and direct observation; and analyses of rental and property sales markets. Two other, minor, methods employed are an analysis of building footprints and the analysis of secondary data. </p><p> Chapter 4 introduces the single case used in the dissertation. This is a group of 14 communities, with a total population of 700,000, that are collectively referred to via the neologism <i>City of Gateway.</i> Next follows a historical overview of the area. Following a discussion of the 1965 Watts riots as a historical watershed, trends in the City of Gateway's economy and population that have driven a dramatic <i>informalization</i> of the housing stock since that time are examined. </p><p> Chapter 5 describes the physical expression of the informal housing market in the City of Gateway, in seven extralegal modes that involve either the <i> conversion</i> of existing space or the <i>addition</i> of new space, and the tactics used to effect them. Chapter 5 closes with a quantification and discussion of the consequences of the characteristic urban form produced by the informal housing market, <i>horizontal density,</i> which is the addition of density by more intensively covering lots with buildings rather than building upwards. </p><p> Chapter 6 describes the "nuts and bolts" of the informal housing market. It presents evidence that extralegal rentals are, on balance, generally (though not always) cheaper for their occupants than formal market alternatives. It examines <i>presale ordinances</i> that some cities have passed to try to disrupt the informal housing market by intervening in the sale of residential property. It discusses the important role of appraisers in providing or denying mortgage credit to current or would-be homeowners with extralegal space. An analysis of property sales transactions provides evidence that extralegal space does not appear to be capitalized in property values. Finally, the chapter discusses barriers imposed by the current US mortgage system to financing the construction of rentable space on residential properties. </p><p> Chapter 7 is an examination of the role played by <i>code enforcement </i> in shaping the informal housing market in the City of Gateway. Specifically, it examines how code enforcement departments allocate their time and effort given that there are far more potential enforcement actions than their capacity allows. The chapter presents arguments that code enforcement reshapes the informal housing market while failing to suppress it; that it is applied unevenly; and that it paradoxically helps maintain the informal order of the informal housing market. </p><p> Chapter 8 begins by arguing that issues related to informal housing, when they are discussed at all in the local political sphere, tend to be filtered through the reductive frame of <i>law and order.</i> The chapter presents reasons for this state of affairs, both ones specific to the City of Gateway and others that are more general and potentially applicable to other places in the US. Chapter 8 closes with a summary of high-profile local debates in which informal housing's influence is considerable but rarely acknowledged: fair share housing, water and sewer utility capacity, parking, and school crowding. </p><p> The conclusion, Chapter 9, begins by assessing the positive and negative attributes of the informal housing system. A normative judgment is made that the former outweigh the latter, although the drawbacks are considerable and in need of urgent attention. A multiscalar palette of policy interventions intended to usefully and justly intervene in the informal housing system is put forth. Many of these are within the ambit of local government, but action in other spheres&mdash;in state and even federal government, and within the housing NGO sector&mdash;is needed. Next, lessons for advocates, policymakers, and researchers drawn from the broader implications of this dissertation are presented. After that follows a speculative discussion about the role of culture in comparison with economic necessity in driving the informal housing market in the City of Gateway. Next, informed speculation about the future of the City of Gateway's housing market is presented. The dissertation closes with a discussion of these trends' implications for the City of Gateway's continued existence as that increasingly rare of type of place, a working class enclave in the heart of a vast global metropolis.</p>

Pochi studi hanno analizzato I prezzi delle droghe in Europa nonostante I risultati forniti da questo tipo di analisi in altri paesi. In America, l’analisi sui prezzi delle droghe costituisce la base dell’attuale conoscenza su domanda e offerta del mercato delle droga e dell’effetto delle forze di polizia. Questa tesi analizza il prezzo delle droghe illecite (eroina e cocaina) in Europa. In particolare questo studio ha due obiettivi 1) identificare quali fattori influenzano i prezzi delle droghe; 2) identificare quali fattori hanno portato al declino dei prezzi delle droghe negli ultimi venti anni. In linea con la precedente letteratura, questo studio ha impiegato un’analisi della variazione geografica e temporale dei prezzi, un “Risk and price model” ed una analisi panel. I risultati mostrano che le forze di polizia e il livello di violenza hanno un effetto marginale sul prezzo delle droghe e non sono capaci di spiegare il loro declino negli anni. La globalizzazione sembra la principale spiegazione. La globalizzazione ha tagliato i costi nel traffico di droga, riducendo le inefficienze causate dalla sua illegalità (per esempio nel trasporto). Di conseguenza la globalizzazione può essere considerata la componente principale nello spiegare il declino dei prezzi delle droghe in Europa.<br>There are few studies on drug prices in Europe, despite the insight this type of analysis has provided in other countries. In the USA, the examination of drug prices has improved the knowledge of the demand and supply in drug markets and the impact of law enforcement. The dissertation aims to analyze the prices of illicit drugs (heroin and cocaine) in Europe. The study has two objectives: (1) identifying which factors affect drug prices; (2) analyzing which factors drove the price decline in the last twenty years. In line with the previous literature, the methods include the analysis of the trends of prices over time and across countries, a risk and price model, and a panel regression. The results show that law enforcement and violence have marginal impact on drug prices and they are unable to explain the decline over time. In fact, globalization is the key explanatory factor. Globalization has likely cut the costs of the drug trade, reducing the inefficiencies caused by illegality (e.g. transportation). As a result, it may be regarded as the most important factor in the price decline in European drug markets.

The thesis examines the effectiveness of acquis communautaire on anti-discrimination with a focus on the Roma minority in the EU accession state - Hungary. Therefore, it critically evaluates the European Union’s (EU) competence in terms of monitoring and enforcement of relevant legislation, such as the Race Equality Directive 2000/43/EC (RED), which is central to the research question. The thesis argues that the EU needs to demonstrate a firmer grip on this issue along with a consistent application of its legislation including the RED under the acquis communautaire in order to have a visible impact on the ground. The scenario is compounded by the implementation and enforcement mechanisms of Hungary despite having an elaborate legal and policy framework for minority protection. The doubt on the ‘political will’ of both the EU and Hungary emerged repeatedly throughout the thesis, which signifies the relative weight of the topic. An empirical study conducted through expert interviews in Hungary supplemented the existing data and enabled to identify the ‘causal factors’ behind the implementation and enforcement issues of policy and legislation under the auspices of the RED. The thesis concludes that legislation will prove to be impracticable; unless and until societal dialogue can be established, especially between the minority and the majority at a local level. Thus, there is scope for making recommendations in line with the identified ‘causal factors’ from interdisciplinary perspectives in the context of the competences of both the EU and Hungary.

Illegal drug use is perceived as immoral, criminogenic, and an unhealthy practice for decades under the discourse sustaining drug prohibition. Those who apply prohibition laws on the front lines are narcotic police officers, particularly the ones who work in narcotic squads. Based on the specific context in which these individuals work in, perceptions and meanings on drug prohibition and illegal drug use will emerge. This project will explore drug enforcement officer’s perceptions on Canadian drug legislation and illegal drug use through the mobilization of Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s interpretation of phenomenology and social problems theory.

The present study examines the status of the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) in Japan, with due regard to the status of treaties in general as sources of rights and obligations in the country. Further, the study aims to ascertain whether the said Convention has been properly implemented and enforced, and to demonstrate obstacles causing deficiencies and shortcomings in regards to combating discrimination against women in the labour market. In theory, treaties enjoy a high status in Japan, however, human rights treaties are rarely directly applied by the courts. Although certain legislative reforms have been undertaken to bring domestic law into harmony with the CEDAW, the Convention has had a limited impact. The domestic legislation fails to prohibit all forms of discrimination against women and the prohibitions, as well as the statistical targets for female representation, lack the backing of an effective enforcement mechanism. Additionally, the Japanese judiciary has been reluctant to accept arguments based on the CEDAW and, so far, no litigants have prevailed explicitly on the grounds of the Convention. The vague wording of the CEDAW makes the provisions easy to circumvent, which stresses the importance of bridging discrepancies between the treaty rules and domestic law. Finally, the Government of Japan needs a more comprehensive approach in addressing the issue of sex discrimination in the labour market, which includes working proactively to modify discriminatory practices and stereotypes.

Expensive and excessive regulations may affect the number of firms by discouraging them to access and remain into the market. Despite of such a fact, worldwide there are few legal mechanisms within competition law able to control regulatory activity. This document describes briefly the Peruvian mechanism of regulatory oversight through the Indecopi´s Elimination of Bureaucratic Barriers Commission, which has reached in less than 3 years the voluntary elimination of more than 1000 regulatory and  administrative burdens affecting, inter alia, the market of the deployment of infrastructure on public utilities. This has been the result of a strategy that not relies on sanctioning administrative procedures but in a coordinative-oriented approach with the regulatees aiming to reach the effective accomplishment of the law. In turn, the development of such a strategy make possible to show a new style of enforcement in Peru, which has been studied and undertaken in other countries around the world, namely “Responsive Regulation”.<br>Una regulación costosa y excesiva puede afectar negativamente la cantidad de ofertantes en el mercado, al desincentivar su acceso y/o permanencia en él. No obstante ello, en el mundo existen pocos mecanismos de defensa de la competencia que controlen este tipo de actividad. El presente artículo describe brevemente el mecanismo de control regulatorio empleado en el Perú a través de la Comisión de Eliminación de Barreras Burocráticas del Indecopi, la cual ha logrado en menos de 3 años la eliminación voluntaria de más de 1000 regulaciones y trabas administrativas que afectaban, entre otros, el mercado de infraestructura en servicios públicos, a través de una estrategia que prescinde del uso exclusivo de procedimientos sancionadores y privilegia la coordinación con los agentes regulados para lograr el cumplimiento efectivo de la ley. El desarrollo de esta estrategia, a su vez, permite demostrar la posibilidad de aplicar un nuevo estilo de «enforcement» en el Perú, que ha sido estudiado y adoptado en otros países del mundo, como es la «Regulación Responsiva».

The Thesis analyses the impact that humanly devised institutions, defined as “formal and informal constraints on political, economic, and social interactions”, have on international trade and the patterns comparative advantage. The key assumption of the Thesis is that although institutions impact on the whole economy they may influence some sectors more than others. Industry‘s dependence on institutions is a technological feature of production. Hence, for example, industries that require a large number of intermediate inputs for production will be more dependent on the quality of contract enforcement regulation for their growth. The Thesis analyses 4 different sub-components of institutional quality: contract enforcement, financial development, property rights and labour market institutions. The Thesis’ hypotheses regarding each of these sub-components are as follows: 1. Countries with more efficient contract enforcement regulations will specialize (have a comparative advantage) in more complex sectors that depend on contracts with suppliers/producers for their growth.2. Countries with more secure property rights will specialize in sectors that are more dependent on intangible assets for production.3. Countries with higher financial development will have a comparative advantage in sectors that are more dependent on external finance for their growth.4. Countries with more flexible labour markets will specialize in more volatile industries. In order to test these assumptions we construct three econometric models (Chapters 4-6). In Chapter 4 we assess how contract enforcement regulations, financial development, property rights and labour market institutions impact on trade volumes using a well-known gravity model. In Chapter 5 we test whether these sub-components have an impact on growth of value-added at industry level. Finally, in chapter 6 the impact on firms’ productivity is tested. The results show that contract enforcement regulations and financial development affect countries’ comparative advantage by affecting countries trade flows, value-added and productivity in a way consistent with the hypothesis. The results regarding the other two institutional sub-components are mixed but we do find some evidence the countries with more secure property rights export more and have higher value-added growth in sectors that are more dependent on intangible assets. These results are robust to different specifications. Using a novel set of instrumental variables we show that causality runs from institutions to trade, value-added and productivity rather than the reverse. We supplement the empirical evidence with a case-study of Lesotho’s textiles and garment industry and also find some evidence that this export-oriented industry emerged in Lesotho at least partly due to this country’s good institutions that are better than its African competitors. From a policy perspective our results imply that institutional and regulatory reform - especially in enforcement of contracts and financial sector regulations - may enhance the capacity of poor countries to move up to specialization into higher-valued products and to reap benefits from international integration.

O mercado de crédito brasileiro oferta uma quantidade reduzida de crédito a preços elevados, denotando sinais de um resultado não eficiente. Uma das explicações para esse fato é a existência de altos custos de transação no mercado, que acabam por restringir sua dimensão e elevar o custo total. Um estudo que identifique os custos de transação e seus componentes pode auxiliar na avaliação desse resultado, bem como pode contribuir para o entendimento dos aspectos necessários para o seu aprimoramento. O referencial teórico da Economia dos Custos de Transação fornece uma série de ferramentas analíticas que permitem essa avaliação, focando a existência de custos de transação não-nulos. O objetivo deste estudo é justamente analisar os determinantes dos custos de transação e seus efeitos no mercado de crédito brasileiro. Para tanto, é realizada uma revisão da literatura da Economia dos Custos de Transação, de forma a apresentar o instrumental analítico. Além disso, é feita uma caracterização dos mercados de crédito, apontando para as possíveis fontes de custos de transação. Logo após, analisa-se o mercado de crédito brasileiro sob a ótica Economia dos Custos de Transação e realiza-se um exercício econométrico para avaliar qual o impacto dos custos de transação sobre o a oferta de crédito pessoal no Brasil. Como resultado, destaca-se duas fontes principais de custos de transação. A primeira é a elevada assimetria informacional presente nas transações de crédito, que é fruto de sistemas de compartilhamento de informações pouco desenvolvidos. A segunda é a ineficiência do enforcement, por suas características de lentidão, custos elevados e imprevisibilidade. Essas duas fontes apresentam-se como os principais determinantes dos custos de transação que influenciam negativamente a oferta de crédito no Brasil, e, mais especificamente, o nível de concessões de crédito pessoal. Essa hipótese é ratificada pelos resultados do exercício econométrico realizado no estudo.<br>The Brazilian credit market supplies little volume of credit at elevated prices, which signals nonefficient market results. The existence of high transaction costs in the credit market is one of the issues that are raised to explain these results because they restrain the credit market dimensions and elevate its costs. Therefore their correct identification could help to evaluate the market results and could also to contribute for the comprehension of the aspects which are necessary for its improvement. The Economic of Transaction Costs offers a theoretical referential that allows for this evaluation to take place by focusing on the existence of non-null transaction costs. This study analyses the transaction-cost determinants of the Brazilian credit market. To do so, the Economics of Transaction Cost literature is briefly presented and it is followed by a credit market description. Subsequently the Brazilian credit market is analyzed and an econometric exercise is offered. As a result, two main sources of transaction costs are identified in the market. The first one is the asymmetric information that is current at credit transactions and has its roots at the underdeveloped information sharing systems. The second one is the inefficient enforcement which is said to be slow, costly and unpredictable. Therefore, those two sources are pointed to be the transaction-cost determinants that adversely impact the credit supply in Brazil and, more specifically, the personal credit market. This hypothesis is reaffirmed by the econometric results presented in the study.

The role of the Court of Justice of the European Union in the process of direct tax integration in the European Union (EU) has been widely discussed in the academic literature, while another important actor, the European Commission, has attracted much less attention. The Commission’s input is commonly perceived to be limited to the right of legislative initiative. This study questions such an oversimplified interpretation and draws a more nuanced picture of EU tax harmonisation by integrating an analysis of the complex regulatory approaches adopted by the Commission for the establishment and smooth functioning of the Internal Market. It is argued that the past decade brought a notable change in the Court-dominated pattern of direct tax integration. This change is apparent first in the evolution of enforcement strategies under Articles 258 and 260 TFEU; and second, in the increased reliance upon non-binding regulatory measures. Both developments have strengthened the role of the Commission, supplying it with more possibilities for influencing national direct tax systems, despite the reluctance of Member States to agree upon legislative harmonisation. Against this background, the procedural and substantive problems associated with these instruments require closer examination. The normative scope of this research covers the key procedural problems related to the infringement procedure and non-binding regulatory measures. The empirical component explores the Commission’s enforcement and coordination practices, drawing particular attention to two case studies: the tax treatment of losses in cross-border situations and exit taxation. Following the analysis of enforcement and coordination in the field of direct taxation, the study argues the need and proposes potential solutions for (i) the developing of a more comprehensive procedural framework for the infringement procedure and non-binding regulatory acts; (ii) the strengthening of accountability mechanisms; and (iii) the enhancing of the effectiveness of their application.

Bien que les recherches sur l'adoption obligatoire des IFRS ne montrent pas une amélioration claire de la qualité de l'information financière (augmentation de la transparence et/ou de la comparabilité des états financiers), elles mettent quasiment toutes en évidence des impacts bénéfiques pour ce qui concerne la liquidité, l'asymétrie d'information ou le coût du capital des entreprises qui les ont adoptées. Dans l'Union Européenne (UE), l'adoption obligatoire des IFRS a coïncidé avec l'adoption de la directive sur les abus de marché (MAD). Tandis que l'adoption obligatoire des IFRS a eu lieu en 2005, la date d'adoption de MAD varie entre 2004 et 2007 selon le pays de l'UE considéré. En outre, les IFRS et MAD ont le même objectif. Il s'agit d'accroître la transparence des entreprises cotées, soit par l'amélioration de la qualité de l'information financière (IFRS), soit en interdisant toute communication sélective afin que les investisseurs bénéficient tous de la même information au même moment (MAD). Notre première étude a pour objectif de dissocier les impacts respectifs de l'adoption de MAD et de l'adoption des IFRS sur la liquidité des titres afin de déterminer l'effet spécifique de chaque règlementation. Nos résultats suggèrent qu'une partie importante des effets traditionnellement attribués aux IFRS provient de l'adoption simultanée de la directive sur les abus de marché. Notre deuxième étude porte sur le rôle de l'environnement informationnel. Examiner comment l'environnement informationnel affecte les effets de MAD et des IFRS sur la liquidité des titres est crucial pour déterminer si toutes les entreprises bénéficient identiquement de ces règlementations. En utilisant la taille des entreprises et le suivi des analystes financiers comme mesures de l'environnement informationnel des entreprises, nous montrons que les petites entreprises et les entreprises peu suivies par les analystes sont celles qui bénéficient le plus de l'introduction des IFRS. En revanche, les grandes entreprises et les entreprises fortement suivies par les analystes sont celles qui bénéficient le plus de l'adoption de MAD. Notre troisième étude traite de l'efficacité des modalités d'application de ces réglementations (enforcement). Nous montrons que les effets des IFRS et de MAD sur la liquidité des titres des entreprises soumises à ces réglementations dépendent fortement des modalités visant à garantir leur bonne application. En la matière, il est toutefois essentiel de bien dissocier les effets imputables à l'une de ces réglementations de ceux imputables à l'autre. Au total, nous mettons en garde les chercheurs à ne pas attribuer abusivement d'éventuels effets observés à une règlementation, notamment à l'adoption des IFRS, sans impérativement tenir compte de l'adoption concomitante d'autres réglementations, notamment MAD pour ce qui concerne l'Union Européenne<br>While prior research on mandatory IFRS adoption fails to provide evidence of improvement in the quality of financial reporting (increased transparency and/or comparability), it provides almost unanimous evidence of beneficial capital-market impacts. Within the European Union (EU), mandatory IFRS adoption coincides with the adoption of the Market Abuse Directive (MAD). While the mandatory adoption of IFRS took place in 2005, MAD was passed between 2004 and 2007 depending on the EU country under consideration. Furthermore, both IFRS and MAD aim towards increased transparency, either by improving the quality of financial reporting (IFRS) or by prohibiting selective disclosures to enhance common information available to all market participants (MAD). Our first essay aims to disentangle the respective market impacts of MAD adoption and IFRS adoption in order to determine the specific effect of each regulation. Our evidence suggests that a significant part of the capital market effects usually attributed to IFRS comes, at least to some extent, from the contemporaneous adoption of the Market Abuse Directive. Our second essay focuses on the role of information environment. Investigating how information environment affects the market impacts of both MAD adoption and IFRS adoption is crucial to determine whether all firms benefit identically from these regulations. Using firm size and analyst following as proxies capturing firms' information environment, we provide evidence showing that small firms and firms with weak analyst following are those that benefit the most from the introduction of the IFRS mandate. In contrast, large firms and firms with high analyst coverage benefit the most from MAD adoption. Our third essay analyzes the role of enforcement. We find that the effectiveness of both IFRS and MAD is hampered by different enforcement levels across firms and countries. Moreover, the observed capital-market outcomes on one regulation differ if the effects of both regulations are not clearly dissociated. Thus, we caution researchers not to attribute capital-market outcomes primarily or solely to one regulation without taking into account the concomitant adoption of the other one

Magister Legum - LLM (Public Law and Jurisprudence)<br>Zimbabwe is a Southern African country which has witnessed frequent bank collapses in the last two decades. This has eroded consumer and business confidence in the banking sector due to the irreparable financial prejudice suffered by most sectoral consumers. The side effect of this lack of trust in the sector has been the hoarding and preference of cash in most, if not all transactions, as opposed to the use of plastic money. Between April 2015 and March 2016, it is estimated that between US$3 billion and US$7.4 billion was circulating outside the banking system in the informal sector thus exposing the depth of mistrust crippling the banking sector. Together with other factors beyond the scope of this study, it is submitted that this lack of trust and confidence in the sector has contributed to the current cash shortage which, according to Latham and Cohen, has left .a black hole in the financial system that's crushing the rest of the economy'.

This thesis is a collection of essays about the instrumental use of commitment decisions to facilitate the completion of the European internal electricity market. European policy can shape markets in many ways, two most evident being regulation and competition enforcement. The interplay between these two instruments attracts a lot of scholarly attention. One of the major concerns in the competition vs. regulation debate is the instrumental use of competition rules. It has been observed that competition enforcement is triggered not only as a response to an anticompetitive harm occurring in the market, but that it sometimes becomes a powerful tool in the European Commission’s hands to pursue regulatory goals. This thesis looks for examples of such instrumentalisation in the context of electricity markets and finds that the Commission is very pragmatic in using all the possible instruments it has at hand to push forward its project of creating the internal electricity market. This includes regulation, competition enforcement and all sorts of political pressure. To the extent that commitment decisions accelerate sector-specific regulation and overcome political deadlocks, they contribute to the Commission’s energy policy goals. However, instrumentalisation of competition rules comes at a certain cost to competition policy, energy policy and, most importantly, to electricity markets themselves. Markets might be negatively affected either indirectly, by application of sector-specific regulation or competition policy building on previous commitment decisions, or directly, through the implementation of inadequate commitments in individual cases. Concluding, commitment decisions generally contributed to achieving the policy objectives of the internal electricity market, but their use for that purpose does not come without cost. Given that this cost is ultimately borne by the internal electricity market, the Commission should take a more balanced approach to the instrumental use of commitment decisions so that it does not do more harm than good.

Financial authorities have traditionally relied on fines, suspensions, and bars to discipline misconduct in financial markets and, in that way, protect public investors and promote financial development. In theory, these sanctions should be sufficiently high to internalize the social cost of wrongdoing and deter future misbehavior. In practice, however, public firms are often criticized for being under-punished. This concern has motivated a line of research, especially in the United States, to examine whether enforcement actions initiated by public authorities generate negative indirect effects for the firms accused of misbehavior and, therefore, whether those effects supplement the regulatory sanction. In general, the answer to this question is positive under certain circumstances. Whether or not firms also suffer collateral effects in emerging financial markets, however, is a question that has received little attention in the literature. The purpose of this work is therefore to make a first step to fill this gap. Addressing this gap is important because emerging markets are smaller, less liquid, and more concentrated than the United States' financial market, which might neutralize the side financial effects of enforcement that prior studies have documented. As a result, the policy recommendations proposed in the prior literature are not necessarily applicable to emerging economies. This work focuses on three specific types of collateral effects: the effect of enforcement on (1) the defendant's stock price, (2) the defendant's operating performance, and (3) the cost of external financing. In terms of types of violations and sample countries, this work focuses on enforcement actions triggered by securities regulation violations in the five countries that form the MSCI-EC-LATAM index (Morgan Stanley Capital International Emerging Markets Index - Latin America). The results indicate that the stock price and operating performance of firms whose insiders were sanctioned for insider trading decline significantly after the imposition of the sanction. These results have various implications for the regulation of official penalties as a tool to promote financial development.

La littérature académique récente n'aborde que très peu la question du comportement, des transactions et des gains sous-jacents aux manquements d'initiés. A partir des décisions rendues par la Commission des sanctions de l'Autorité des marchés financiers entre 2001 et 2011, nous recensons les opérations d'initiés intervenues entre 1999 et 2008 sur des actions cotées en France, ayant abouti à une mise en cause des personnes concernées et éventuellement à une sanction administrative. Les informations collectées, qui concernent à la fois le statut professionnel des initiés, mais également le nombre et le montant de leurs transactions, le type d'information privilégiée utilisée, les profits obtenus, et le cas échéant les sanctions imposées, nous permettent de caractériser de manière empirique le profil type de l'initié et son comportement. Les déterminants des profits, de la probabilité de sanction et du montant de l'amende financière sont également testés économétriquement. Nous nous intéressons ensuite aux stratégies de camouflage, qui, bien qu'elles existent, semblent peu efficaces. Les déterminants de la taille des transactions illégales sont également mis en évidence au moyen d'une estimation économétrique. Enfin, dans la perspective d'une juste adéquation entre la sanction financière et la gravité du manquement commis, nous proposons une évaluation des méthodes de calcul des profits réalisés par les initiés utilisées par les régulateurs de marché en France, aux États-Unis et en Italie. Quoique beaucoup plus complexe, la méthode utilisée par la SEC fournit des résultats identiques à ceux obtenus à l'aide de l'outil de calcul de l'AMF. Ce dernier est donc à privilégier pour évaluer les profits indus car il s'avère utilisable en toutes circonstances, statistiquement tout aussi robuste et plus simple dans sa mise en œuvre<br>The recent academic literature deals only very rarely with issues related to illegal insider trading behavior, deals and profits. From the decisions of the Enforcement Committee of the French financial market authority (AMF) between 2001 and 2011, we built a database that identifies insider trading operations and their instigators between 1999 and 2008, involving shares listed in France, and leading to the indictment and possibly the sanction of the concerned persons. The collected information, which refers to the professional status of insiders, but also the number and the amount of trades, the type of inside information used, the profits realized, and if any, the sanctions imposed, allows us to empirically characterize the insiders typical profile and behavior. The determinants of profits, of sanction probability and of the amount of financial penalty are also tested econometrically. We then turn to concealment strategies, which, although they exist, seem inefficient. The determinants of the size of illegal trades are also evidenced through an econometric estimation. Finally, from the perspective of a fair balance between the financial penalty and the seriousness of the breach, we propose an evaluation of insider trading profits calculation methods used by market regulators in France, the United States and Italy. Though much more complex, the method used by the SEC provides identical results to those obtained using the AMF calculation tool. The latter should thus be preferred because it seems usable in all circumstances, statistically as robust and simpler in its implementation

Submitted by Jamile Barbosa da Cruz (jamile.cruz@ucsal.br) on 2017-01-17T17:42:02Z No. of bitstreams: 1 DISSERTACAO - ROSENIURA.pdf: 3933810 bytes, checksum: a134a77541d4864afa9297dffa08461f (MD5)<br>Approved for entry into archive by Rosemary Magalhães (rosemary.magalhaes@ucsal.br) on 2017-01-18T16:39:57Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 DISSERTACAO - ROSENIURA.pdf: 3933810 bytes, checksum: a134a77541d4864afa9297dffa08461f (MD5)<br>Made available in DSpace on 2017-01-18T16:39:57Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 DISSERTACAO - ROSENIURA.pdf: 3933810 bytes, checksum: a134a77541d4864afa9297dffa08461f (MD5) Previous issue date: 2013-08-15<br>A precarização do trabalho tem sido apontada como um dos principais efeitos da reestruturação do processo produtivo. A Reforma neoliberal do Estado orientou-se pelo primado da sujeição ao comando da lógica de ajuste fiscal, da privatização e da desregulamentação. Transplantou-se a racionalidade da gestão empresarial para o setor público, adotando-se o denominado modelo gerencial. Neste contexto, o estudo tem como objetivo geral analisar o processo de fiscalização do trabalho no setor de Saúde e o modo pelo qual as ações fiscais têm sido desenvolvidas. Devido à grandeza do fenômeno, a pesquisa requereu examinar o processo de implantação da Reforma Administrativa e seus efeitos sobre ação do fiscal do trabalho a partir dos dados históricos disponíveis, bem como investigar a evolução do modus operandi, a amplitude e perfil da intervenção da auditoria-fiscal do trabalho no serviço de Saúde e levantar dados e evidências do grau de alcance desta intervenção fiscal. O percurso metodológico abrangeu a classificação e delimitação das categorias profissionais do Setor Saúde e a seleção de fontes, variáveis e indicadores das características do mercado de trabalho em Saúde e do perfil e alcance da fiscalização do trabalho. Quanto à contextualização do setor de Saúde, as fontes utilizadas foram o Cadastro Nacional de Estabelecimentos de Saúde do Ministério da Saúde (CNES/MS), o Cadastro Central de Empresas (CEMPRE/IBGE), a Pesquisa Nacional por Amostra de Domicílios (PNAD/IBGE) e a Pesquisa de Assistência Médico-Sanitária (AMS/IBGE) e para a análise dos aspectos fiscais foram colhidos e sistematizados os dados do Sistema Federal de Inspeção do Trabalho (SFIT). A pesquisa confirma a hipótese principal, verificando-se que ocorreu um estreitamento do foco fiscal com forte caráter arrecadatório em detrimento de dimensões como jornada e segurança e saúde, apresentando grau mais acentuado no Serviço de Saúde. Foi evidenciado ainda que a Reforma Administrativa tornou a auditoria-fiscal do trabalho flexível e menos punitiva, gerando perda de credibilidade institucional, estimulando sensação de impunidade e posturas de resistências pelas empresas em razão da reduzida probabilidade de flagrar infrações e o baixo custo das multas trabalhistas. O estudo também traz evidências de que a ruptura com do sistema de avaliação de desempenho vinculado à remuneração dos fiscais do trabalho parece ter iniciado um processo de reversão dos efeitos do modelo gerencial, apontando a necessidade de novas pesquisas para investigar a evolução da transição do modelo gerencial para uma nova política de administração da fiscalização do trabalho e respostas a questões concernentes à construção e adequação de indicadores de monitoramento e avaliação da eficácia fiscal que possam contribuir para construção e captação de um novo modo de atuar da inspeção trabalhista com vistas a promover o cumprimento da lei e a desprecarização do mercado do trabalho.<br>The precariousness of work has been identified as one of the main effects of restructuring the production process. The neoliberal state reform was guided by the rule of subjection to command logic fiscal adjustment, privatization and deregulation. The managerial public administration model transplanted the rationality of business for the public sector. In this context, the study aims at analyzing the process of labor inspection in Healthcare sector and the way interventive actions have been developed. Because to the magnitude of the phenomenon, the research required to examine the process of implementation of administrative reform and its effect on the action of the Labour Inspection. from the available historical data and, to investigate the evolution of the modus operandi, the amplitude and profile of the intervention of the work fiscal in the Service of Health and to collect data and evidence as to the reach of this fiscal intervention. The methodological approach included the classification and definition of the professional categories of the Health Sector and the selection of sources, variables and indicators of the characteristics of the labor market Health and profile and scope of labor inspection. For the contextualization of Health sector, the sources used were the National Register of Health Care of the Ministry of Health (CNES / MS), the Central Register of Enterprises (CEMPRE / IBGE), the National Household Sample Survey (PNAD / IBGE) and the Survey of Medical-Sanitary (AMS / IBGE) and the analysis of the fiscal aspects were collected and systematized data of the Federal Labour Inspection System (SFIT). The research confirms the main hypothesis, verifying that there was a narrowing of focus tax revenue collection with strong character rather than dimensions such as working hours, safety and health, presenting greater degree in Health Service. It was evidenced that the Administrative Reform has turned out flexible and less punitive the Labour Inspecton, causing loss of institutional credibility, stimulating feeling of impunity and postures of resistance by companies because the reduced probability of catching violations and the low cost of labor fines. The study also provides evidence that the break with the performance measurement systems linked to the remuneration of labor inspectors appears to started a process of reversing the effects of managerial public administration model, pointing out the need for further research to investigate the evolution of the transition model management to a new administration policy of the Labour Inspecion and answers to questions concerning the construction and adaptation of indicators for monitoring and evaluating the inspection effectiveness may contribute to the construction and funding of a new way of acting Labour Inspection in order to promote the law enforcement and the reversion of the precariousness of the labor market.

The present study aims to contribute to the analysis on the capacity of contract enforcement institutions in early modern Spain to protect private property rights, thus encouraging the development of markets. In order to do this I focus on the role played by the aforementioned institutions within the notarial credit market of the city of Malaga in the second half of the eighteenth century. Chapter 1 studies the legal advantages that notarized contracts offered in the Crown of Castile, as well as those financial segments that benefited from them the most. Chapter 2 measures the degree of flexibility enjoyed by the notarial credit market in introducing legal adaptations in the absence of changes to Castilian statutory law. Finally, chapter 3 assesses whether the public mortgage registries, created in 1768, contributed to the better functioning of the notarial credit market.<br>El presente trabajo pretende contribuir al análisis sobre la capacidad de las instituciones contractuales españolas durante el Antiguo Régimen para proteger los derechos de propiedad privados, incentivando así el desarrollo de los mercados. Para ello, me centro en el papel desempeñado por dichas instituciones dentro del mercado notarial de crédito de la ciudad de Málaga en la segunda mitad del siglo XVIII. El capítulo 1 estudia las ventajas legales de los contratos notarizados en la Corona de Castilla, así como aquellos segmentos financieros que más se beneficiaron de ellas. El capítulo 2 analiza el grado de flexibilidad del mercado notarial de crédito para introducir adaptaciones legales en ausencia de modificaciones en la ley escrita castellana. Finalmente, el capítulo 3 evalúa si los oficios de hipotecas, creados en 1768, contribuyeron a un mejor funcionamiento del mercado notarial de crédito.

The aim of my thesis is to investigate the relationship between legal protections of minority shareholders – ‘on the books’ and ‘in action’ – and the development of equity markets. In this regard, there is a general consensus that Russian legal measures adopted to protect minority shareholders are strong. The failure of the judiciary to enforce these measures is the principal focus of the academic criticism and has been frequently cited to explain the underdevelopment of the Russian equity market. Notably, the criticism of the judiciary persists despite the market’s marked improvements over the last decade. And yet there has been little empirical analysis of enforcement of the minority shareholder protections by Russian judiciary. This thesis examines private enforcement of corporate law in Russia focusing on the lawsuits to impugn transactions with corporate insiders and the outcomes of those suits. Drawing on a dataset of 170 cases decided by the Federal Arbitrazh Court for the Moscow region in 1999 – 2006, the thesis finds that a large proportion of claimants are unsuccessful. Relying primarily on the law and economics literature and theoretical accounts of the relationship between the law and market development, the thesis develops an analytical framework (for convenience termed judicial bias hypothesis) against which it evaluates case outcomes. The evaluation suggests that in a substantial fraction of the cases the outcomes were justified by legislation or by efficiency, casting doubt over the criticisms of Russian judiciary. While cautious in drawing causal links between the enforcement and markets, the thesis suggests that marginalising legal institutions’ role in Russia might be premature. Their role in fostering the market might be greater than anticipated particularly in incentivising disclosure if not in deterring overreaching.

L’oggetto del presente lavoro è rappresentato dall'esame del rapporto tra l'attuale regolamentazione delle agenzie di rating e le regole di responsabilità civile cui le stesse agenzie possono essere assoggettate, anche alla luce del trattamento normativo riservato alle agenzie di rating dalla legislazione e dalla giurisprudenza statunitensi e delle teorie sviluppate dalla dottrina sul tema della responsabilità da informazione inesatta al mercato. L’attuale regolamentazione introdotta dall'Unione Europea svolge un ruolo determinante sia sotto il profilo dell'individuazione del fondamento della responsabilità, sia sotto quello della ricostruzione degli obblighi, della diligenza e della causalità materiale e giuridica. La disciplina comunitaria, anche alla luce della giurisprudenza statunitense, consente di prospettare uno scenario in cui i rater sono soggetti a regole di responsabilità differenziate in ragione del diverso status riconosciuto dalla normativa rilevante. La nuova regolamentazione comunitaria è chiamata a svolgere il duplice ruolo di fondare una sorta di private action da inadempimento in capo a qualunque investitore nei confronti di un’agenzia registrata e di contribuire a definire il perimetro degli obblighi esigibili da parte dell’agenzia, rafforzando la posizione del terzo investitore danneggiato dal rating inesatto e fornendo un efficace supporto agli strumenti di tutela di tipo pubblicistico.<br>The present work is focused on the examination of the relationship between the current regulation of credit rating agencies and the rules of civil liability to which agencies may be subject to, in light of the regulatory treatment of the U.S. credit rating agencies, both according legislation and case law, and the legal theories developed on the case of liability for incorrect information to the market. The regulation introduced by the European Union plays a major role to find out the basis of liability, the duties of diligence and the legal and material causality nexus. EU regulation, in light of U.S. case law, can envisage a scenario in which the raters are subject to different rules of liability on the basis of the different status recognized by the relevant legislation. The new EU regulation is called to play a dual role: to establish, although not explicitly, a sort of private action for negligence on the part of investors against a registered agency, and to help in defining the scope of the obligations of the credit rating agency, strengthening the position of the third investor damaged by inaccurate ratings and providing an useful support to the public enforcement remedies.

Understanding how health care markets function is important not only because competition has a direct influence on the price and utilization of health care services, but also because the proper functioning, or lack thereof, of health care markets has a very real impact on patients who depend on health care markets and providers for their personal well-being. In this dissertation, I examine the role of government policies and regulation in health care markets, with a focus on the response of health care providers. In Chapter 1, I analyze the impact of Medicare payment rules on hospital ownership of physician practices. Since the mid-2000’s, there has been a rapid increase in hospital ownership of physician practices, however, there is little empirical research which addresses the causes of this recent wave of integration. Medicare’s “provider-based” billing policy allows hospital-owned physician practices to charge higher reimbursement rates for services provided compared to a freestanding, independent physician practice, without altering how or where services are provided. This “site-based” differential creates a premium for physicians to integrate with hospitals, and the size of this differential varies with the types of health care services provided. I find that Medicare payment rules have contributed to hospital ownership of physician practices and that the response varies across physician specialties. A 10 percent increase in the relative reimbursement rate paid to integrated physicians leads to a 1.9 percentage point increase in the probability of hospital ownership for Medical Care specialties, including cardiology, neurology, and dermatology, which explains about one-third of observed integration of these specialties from 2005 through 2015. Magnitudes for Surgical Care specialties are similar, but more sensitive across specifications. There is no significant response for Primary Care physicians. In combination with other empirical literature which finds that integration between physicians and hospitals typically results in higher prices with no impact on costs or quality of care, I cautiously interpret this responsiveness as evidence that Medicare’s provider-based billing policy overcompensates integrated physician practices and leads to an inefficiently high level of vertical integration between physician and hospitals. In Chapter 2, I analyze the effect of anti-fraud enforcement activity on Medicaid spending, with a particular focus on the False Claims Act. The False Claims Act (FCA) is a federal statute which protects the government from making undeserved payments to contractors and suppliers. Individual states have chosen to enact their own versions of the federal FCA, and these statutes have increasingly been used to target health care fraud. FCA statutes commonly include substantial monetary penalties such as “per-violation” monetary fines and tripled damages, as well as a “whistleblower” provision which allows private plaintiffs to initiate a lawsuit and collect a portion of recoveries as a reward. Using variation in statelevel FCA legislation, I find state FCAs reduce Medicaid prescription drug spending by 21 percent, while other spending categories - which are less lucrative for FCA lawsuits - are unresponsive. Within the prescription drug category, drugs prone to off-label use show larger declines in response to the whistleblower laws, consistent with FCA lawsuits being used to prosecute pharmaceutical manufacturers for off-label marketing and promotion. Spending and prescription volume for drugs prone to off-label use fall by up to 14 percent. This effect could be driven by pharmaceutical manufacturers’ changes in physician detailing for drugs prone to off-label use and/or physicians’ changes in prescribing behavior.

Die vorliegende kumulative Doktorarbeit umfasst drei Arbeiten aus dem Bereich der empirischen Rechnungslegungsforschung. Die erste Arbeit untersucht die Rolle persönlicher Eigenschaften von Rechnungslegungsstandardsetzern bei der Entwicklung der Internationalen Rechnungslegungsstandards IFRS. Sie dokumentiert, dass in den IFRS insgesamt ein Rückgang der Bedeutung von Prinzipien gegenüber Regeln sowie ein Anstieg der Bedeutung des beizulegenden Zeitwerts im Zeitablauf zu verzeichnen sind. Zwischen Änderungen von IFRS-Eigenschaften sowie beruflichen und kulturellen Eigenschaften von Mitgliedern des International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) wird ein Zusammenhang festgestellt. Die zweite Arbeit widmet sich Ursachen und Folgen fehlerhafter Finanzberichterstattung im Rahmen des deutschen Systems der Durchsetzung von Rechnungslegungsregeln. Sie findet systematische Unterschiede in der Unternehmensführung von Unternehmen, bei denen fehlerhafte Finanzberichte festgestellt werden, gegenüber einer Kontrollgruppe. Weitere Ergebnisse lassen die Vermutung zu, dass die Aufdeckung fehlerhafter Finanzberichte Verbesserungen in der unternehmensspezifischen Aufsicht über den Rechnungslegungsprozess auslösen könnte. Die dritte Arbeit nutzt umfangreiche Befragungsergebnisse deutscher Privatanleger zur Untersuchung der Ursachen ihres Unternehmensüberwachungsverhaltens. Demnach üben Anleger, die ein geringeres Vertrauen in andere Anspruchsgruppen eines Unternehmens haben, zugleich eine geringere Unternehmensüberwachung aus. Darüber hinaus dokumentiert die Arbeit, dass Vertrauen und Unternehmensüberwachung in einem Zusammenhang mit dem Ausmaß der Teilnahme am Aktienmarkt und dem Bildungshintergrund der Anleger stehen.<br>This cumulative doctoral thesis consists of three papers within the field of empirical financial accounting research. The first paper examines the role of personal characteristics of accounting standard setters in the development of the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). It documents that the full set of IFRS exhibited a decrease in the importance of principles relative to rules and an increase in its fair value orientation over time. Changes in IFRS properties are found to be associated with the professional and cultural background of International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) members. The second paper investigates determinants and consequences of erroneous financial reporting under the German financial reporting enforcement regime. The corporate governance of firms detected with erroneous financial reporting is found to differ systematically from that of control firms. Further results suggest that error detection might trigger improvements in firm-level accounting oversight. The third paper uses large-scale survey evidence from German individual investors to explore the determinants of their monitoring behavior. Investors who are less trusting in their fellow stakeholders are found to engage in less monitoring. Furthermore, trust and monitoring are documented to be associated with the stock market exposure and the educational background of investors.

Doutoramento em Gestão<br>The doctoral thesis is composed by three self-contained empirical papers that can be read independently, plus an introduction and a conclusive chapter. The first empirical paper, which is entitled “Corporate Taxation and Financial Reporting Quality”, examines whether the relation between tax enforcement and firms’ financial reporting quality varies with firms’ level of tax avoidance in Europe. Incentives for tax avoidance are dissimilar across firms and jurisdictions, as the latter levy firms with different corporate taxation and employ different enforcement mechanisms. Thus, the simple view that higher tax enforcement increases the quality of financial reporting may also change with institutional characteristics. We predict and confirm that in Europe, overall tax enforcement is positively associated with financial reporting quality, although there is a greater incidence for firms engaged in more tax avoidance. We find a lower sensitivity to tax enforcement for firms engaged in less tax avoidance, which is consistent with the tendency for these firms to already report higher quality financial information. Furthermore, it is unclear whether our findings are sensitive to variations in other tax system characteristics and in institutional characteristics. In contrast to other studies, we show that the association between tax enforcement and financial reporting quality is sensitive to firms’ level of tax avoidance, rather than accounting for other differences at country level. The second empirical paper – “Disclosure of Income Taxes and Firm Value: a Cross Country Comparison of IFRS Adopters”, examines whether disclosure of income taxes is associated with firms’ value. We focus on all IAS 12 disclosure requirements in a sample of IFRS adopters in Europe, rather than in the US. The disclosure of income taxes is measured by an index based on hand-collected data from annual reports, which made it possible to distinguish between mandatory and voluntary disclosure of income taxes. Results suggest no direct relation between mandatory disclosure of income taxes and firms’ value. However, when the level of tax avoidance is taken into consideration the association is significant. Tax avoidance strategies are viewed with scepticism by investors, although disclosure of income taxes mitigates this negative effect, especially for tax aggressive firms, and for “poorly”-governed firms, which is measured by lower institutional ownership. Findings suggest that disclosure of income taxes might play a role in shaping the relation between tax avoidance strategies and firms’ value, rather than the quality of corporate governance. The third empirical paper is entitled as “Crossing the Border: Regional Tax Differences and Firm Creation”. Does the introduction of reduced corporate income tax rates at regional level increases firm creation? Instead of focussing on existing corporate income tax rate differentials, we take advantage of a quasi-natural experiment to study the introduction of reduced corporate income tax rates at regional level. Results suggest that the creation of firms increased with the introduction of reduced corporate income tax rates for specific regions. However, further variations in the corporate income tax rate differential between regions appear to be ineffective in fostering the creation of firms. Indeed, the effect on firm creation is robust regarding border competition, whereby neighbouring municipalities compete for corporate income tax rates. Job creation appears to be positively affected, these new firms are typically small, and the likelihood of their survival appears to be enhanced by the tax change. The findings also highlight the influence of agglomerations in order to take advantage of the tax change. Taken altogether, the findings contrast with the previous literature, which is focussed on existing tax rate differentials, as we demonstrate that what really triggers the creation of new firms is when a tax rate differential between regions is created.<br>A tese de doutoramento é composta por três artigos empíricos autónomos que podem ser lidos de forma independente, a que se acrescenta um capítulo introdutório e um capítulo conclusivo. O primeiro artigo empírico, intitulado de “Corporate Taxation and Financial Reporting Quality”, analisa se a relação entre o nível de fiscalização da administração fiscal e a qualidade do relato financeiro das empresas varia de acordo com o nível de planeamento fiscal das empresas na Europa. Os incentivos ao planeamento fiscal não são iguais entre empresas e jurisdições, uma vez que estas últimas fazem incidir nas empresas diferentes tributações empresariais e os mecanismos de fiscalização das administrações fiscais variam igualmente entre jurisdições. Nesse sentido, a visão clássica de que uma maior fiscalização da administração fiscal tem efeitos positivos na qualidade do relato financeiro das empresas pode variar de acordo com as características institucionais dos respetivos países. Neste artigo, é previsto e confirmado que na Europa uma maior fiscalização da administração fiscal exerce um efeito positivo na qualidade do relato financeiro das empresas, no entanto esse efeito é mais acentuado para as empresas com maior nível de planeamento fiscal. Verificou-se uma menor sensibilidade para as empresas envolvidas em um menor nível de planeamento fiscal, situação que é consistente com o facto de essas empresas já exibirem um relato financeiro de melhor qualidade. Adicionalmente, os resultados parecem não ser sensíveis a variações em outras características fiscais e em características institucionais. Em contraste com outros estudos, é evidenciado que a associação entre a fiscalização das administrações fiscais e a qualidade do relato financeiro das empresas é sensível ao nível de planeamento fiscal das empresas, ao contrário de estudos existentes que sugerem a existência de efeitos diferentes de acordo com características específicas dos próprios países. O segundo artigo empírico – “Disclosure of Income Taxes and Firm Value: a Cross Country Comparison of IFRS Adopters”, analisa se a divulgação de informação sobre impostos sobre o rendimento relaciona-se com o valor das empresas. O foco recai sobre os requisitos de divulgação da IAS 12, sendo a amostra composta por empresas Europeias que adotaram as IFRS, em vez de empresas cotadas nos EUA que têm sido alvo de mais investigação. A divulgação de informação sobre impostos sobre o rendimento é medida através de um índice construído através de recolha de informação diretamente dos relatórios e contas das empresas, permitindo dessa forma distinguir a divulgação de informação com caráter obrigatório da divulgação de informação voluntária, ambas sobre impostos sobre o rendimento. Os resultados sugerem que não existe relação direta entre a divulgação de informação sobre impostos sobre o rendimento de caráter obrigatório e o valor das empresas. No entanto, quando é considerado o efeito moderador das estratégias de planeamento fiscal, a relação acima descrita é significativa. As estratégias de planeamento fiscal são vistas pelos investidores com ceticismo, todavia a divulgação de informação sobre impostos sobre o rendimento mitiga esse efeito negativo, sobretudo para as empresas com práticas mais agressivas de planeamento fiscal, bem como para as empresas com menor qualidade do corporate governance, medido por uma menor presença de investidores institucionais na estrutura acionista das empresas. Os resultados sugerem que a divulgação de informação sobre impostos sobre o rendimento pode desempenhar um papel importante na definição da relação existente entre as estratégias de planeamento fiscal e o valor das empresas, ao invés da qualidade do corporate governance. O terceiro artigo empírico é denominado de “Crossing the Border: Regional Tax Differences and Firm Creation”. Será que a introdução de taxas de imposto sobre o rendimento empresarial reduzidas ao nível regional aumenta a criação de empresas? Em vez do foco recair sobre diferenciais de taxas de imposto já existentes entre regiões, este estudo toma partido de uma aproximação a uma experiência natural para analisar o momento da introdução de taxas de imposto sobre o rendimento empresarial mais reduzidas para algumas regiões. Os resultados sugerem que a criação de empresas aumenta com a introdução de taxas de imposto reduzidas sobre o rendimento empresarial. Contudo, variações posteriores no diferencial de taxas de imposto entre regiões parecem não ser eficazes para fomentar a criação de empresas. Além do mais, o efeito na criação de empresas parece ser influenciado por competições fiscais regionais, nas quais municípios vizinhos podem competir ao nível das taxas de imposto sobre o rendimento empresarial. A criação de emprego parece ser positivamente afetada com a alteração fiscal, as novas empresas são tipicamente de pequena dimensão e a probabilidade de sobrevivência parece melhorar como consequência da alteração fiscal. Os resultados também salientam a importância dos aglomerados para que as empresas aproveitem a alteração fiscal. Em geral, os resultados contrastam com a literatura que foca-se em diferenciais de taxas já existentes entre regiões, uma vez que neste estudo é demonstrado que o período mais relevante para despoletar a criação de novas empresas é o período da criação de um diferencial de taxas entre regiões.

This thesis draws on David Harvey’s concept of “accumulation by dispossession” and an international political economy (IPE) approach centred on the institutional arrangements and power structures that privilege certain actors and values, in order to critique current capitalist practices of primitive accumulation by the global corporate extractive industry. The thesis examines how accumulation by dispossession by the global extractive industry is facilitated by the “free entry” or “free mining” principle. It does so by focusing on Canada as a leader in the global extractive industry and the spread of this country’s mining laws to other countries – in other words, the transnationalisation of norms in the global extractive industry – so as to maintain a consistent and familiar operating environment for Canadian extractive companies. The transnationalisation of norms is further promoted by key international institutions such as the World Bank, which is also the world’s largest development lender and also plays a key role in shaping the regulations that govern natural resource extraction. The thesis briefly investigates some Canadian examples of resource extraction projects, in order to demonstrate the weaknesses of Canadian mining laws, particularly the lack of protection of landowners’ rights under the free entry system and the subsequent need for “free, prior and informed consent” (FPIC). The thesis also considers some of the challenges to the adoption and implementation of the right to FPIC. These challenges include embedded institutional structures like the free entry mining system, international political economy (IPE) as shaped by international institutions and powerful corporations, as well as concerns regarding ‘local’ power structures or the legitimacy of representatives of communities affected by extractive projects. The thesis concludes that in order for Canada to be truly recognized as a leader in the global extractive industry, it must establish legal norms domestically to ensure that Canadian mining companies and residents can be held accountable when there is evidence of environmental and/or human rights violations associated with the activities of Canadian mining companies abroad. The thesis also concludes that Canada needs to address underlying structural issues such as the free entry mining system and implement FPIC, in order to curb “accumulation by dispossession” by the extractive industry, both domestically and abroad.

This dissertation consists of two theoretical papers on market-based environmental policy. The first paper exploits the correlation between the environmental performance of firms and their economic performance to show that financial markets can be used to help enforce environmental policy and to design more efficient regulations. The results indicate that when markets punish firms for not complying with environmental standards, environmental regulators can exploit this by setting stricter standards. In fact, it is possible for the regulator to use market-driven enforcement to reduce a firm’s emissions and monitoring of the firm simultaneously. The second paper provides a theoretical analysis of the nature of an optimal emissions tax when firms’ emissions are not perfectly observable. The purpose is to examine how the optimal tax is affected by enforcement costs and the market structure. We obtain the result that market imperfections and enforcement costs push the optimal tax lower than the marginal damage when the number of firms in the market is exogenous. However, when the number of firms is determined endogenously enforcement costs generate two countervailing effects on the optimal tax. The overall effect of enforcement costs on the optimal tax depends on the strength of direct relative to indirect effects when there is free entry and exit.

This dissertation consists of two different research efforts. In the first one I describe the institutional framework, policy instruments, and the enforcement process that characterize industrial water pollution regulation in Montevideo, Uruguay, aiming to identify and weigh institutional and political economy constraints that may help to explain the present instrument choice of command and control instruments as opposed to more cost-effective economic instruments. The identification of these constraints allows one to evaluate the possibilities that the country has of moving toward incentive-based instruments for the control of industrial water pollution. The second part of my dissertation is a formal econometric analysis that aims to first empirically examine the determinants of the allocation of inspections of industrial plants by the municipal and national governments in Montevideo and then to empirically testing the effect of these inspections, fines and other intermediate enforcement actions on the reported levels of emissions of Biological Oxygen Demand (BOD 5) and the compliance status of industrial plants with regard to BOD 5 standards.

This study emanates from the worldwide issue of climate change, as well as the need for all nations to make an effort to reduce their carbon emissions and move towards greener economies. It delves into South Africa's current command-and-control environmental enforcement regime and highlights the pitfalls that allow major air polluters to avoid sanction of any form in many instances. This poor environmental enforcement and compliance effectively means that South Africa is unlikely to be capable of meeting targets set under international agreements. The study confirms that environmental enforcement is inadequately addressed in South Africa. This is attributable to the inherent shortcomings of command-and-control approaches, including that they are inflexible and offer few incentives for firms to modify behaviour to reduce emissions. Poor enforcement of environmental legislation results in negative externalities caused by air pollution being borne by people who did not create such pollution. The study therefore advocates the use of market-based mechanisms as an alternative to traditional command-and-control approaches to environmental enforcement. In light of the South African government's recent publication of the Draft Carbon Tax Bill, carbon taxes as a subset of market-based environmental enforcement mechanisms have the potential to better enforce the polluter pays principle. Mexico, arguably the most forward-thinking developing nation in terms of climate change mitigation, has taken numerous steps towards meeting international commitments, including the implementation of a carbon tax. While South Africa's proposed carbon tax does differ from Mexico's in some respects, the basic premise remains the same and some comparisons can be made in this regard, with accompanying lessons to be learned. Such lessons include that it is imperative that the carbon tax must be set at a high enough rate to meet international commitments whilst at the same time avoiding adverse economic effects, maintaining social welfare and stabilising economic output levels. The proposed carbon tax, while unable to achieve this on its own, is a good place to start and should be utilised in conjunction with the Draft Climate Change Bill to effectively and efficaciously bring about the required change. The proposed carbon tax undoubtedly has the potential to better hold major air polluters responsible for their CO2 and other GHG emissions.<br>Private Law<br>LL. M.

The Agreement on Trade – Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights has almost universal application due to the large number of signatories from the World Trade Organization member states. 149 countries signed the TRIPS by 1994. Therefore, the TRIPS Agreement has also become a valuable tool for the protection of special intellectual property rights under the term geographical indications. GIs have current relevance in the world market to consumers who are healthy and quality conscious. The legal protection of GIs is due to their economic value to many countries where the producers are in rural areas. This is because most GIs are based on traditional methods of production which have earned goodwill. The TRIPS came in to prevent fee riding of such rights by producers who do not conform to the standards and rules of production. The TRIPS Agreement requires member states to harmonise their legal systems to provide legal means of protecting GIs to the standard stipulated therein. Malawi joined the WTO on 31 May 1995 which means that the obligation above mentioned is applicable from then on. Therefore, this study is an investigation of whether Malawi has complied with the obligations in article 1.1 of the TRIPS especially in so far as geographical indications rights are concerned.<br>Dissertation (LLM)--University of Pretoria, 2013.<br>Centre for Human Rights<br>unrestricted

The primary argument and area of interest within this explorative study lies within the domain of copyright law enforcement of the creative industries and argues the deleterious impact that the infringement of copyright has on national and individual balance sheets and the opportunity to re-engineer the copyright dividend. Globally, creative industries are estimated to account for more than 7% of the world’s gross domestic product and are predicted to grow, on average, 10% per year. Digitization and the internet have seen to it that copyright, through inter alia the unlimted reproduction capacity of copyrights, brought by digitization and the internet, has seen its importance in the intellectual property bouquet soar. This study endevours to establish the beginning of a discourse on copyright in which the very survival of the creative industries, galvanized, for more than a century by technology and changes in technology and the security of its consumers, depends on the adopting of improved, farsighted, equitable, inclusive and stricter measures in order to protect such from both internal and external threats. From a global perspective most copyright owners and nations with few exceptions rich in copyrights, compounded by the presence of unsubstantial collaboration, suffer losses because the protection of their respective intellectual property rights such as copyright, trademarks and patents are not adequately aligned with what may be referred as the technology conversation. It is imperative that the collaborative copyright alliances develop a strategic agenda that is relevant to the technology conversation in order to re-engineer the copyright dividend where new copyright enforcement mechanisms will be deployed. In as much as this study placed greater emphasis on online infringement, physical piracy is still pervasive and it intensely contributed to the explorative conversation. Piracy effectively relieves copyright authors and the State of the royalty flows that arise from legal and transparent use of copyright. It is these royalty flows that give rise to term “copyright dividend” literally meaning the income arising from the underlying copyright assets. Seeing what is stolen by piracy as the “theft”, whether direct or indirect, of copyright dividends, the challenge to address, avert and amend such outcomes is akin to re-engineering the copyright dividend and this meant the examining of the copyright law structures influencing and regulating the trade in copyrights. In this study the focus was initially on understanding the copyright law regimes and the real challenges that influenced their respective implementations that generated a copyright dividend. Understanding exactly how well such were actually working rested on exploring the lived experiences and perceptions of ten copyright experts across the world from two primary copyright law regimes. Such an exploration was necessary as such provided the requisite insight into inter alia the legal framework wherein both the illegal market and the legal market for copyright operated, to the threats faced the copyright dividend. Five research questions were used in this study. Such served as the discussion points used in the interviews with the ten research participants.These five research questions emerged from the problematization within current , literature and supported by the research data. The obtained data were grouped in relation to the five research questions and filtered to identify commonalities amongst the ten participants. The obtained data were grouped in relation to the five research questions and filtered through a lamination process,which emerged to identify commonalities amongst the ten participants.The global copyright law system and stakeholdership presently lack the necessary strategies, capacities, will and common thought to effectively address infringement. This is the major impediment of technological advancement and thus reengineering the copyright dividend was critical. To a demonstratable extend it is independent of the progress of governments and other relevant parties affected by infringement. The data also showed that infringement is an eroding threat to intellectual property and that critical knowledge is an urgent necessity to re-install the copyright value in its global ecosystem, which is essentially achieved by diverting the copyright dividends stolen by the illegal copyright market and re-engineering the copyright dividend. The outcome is that copyright law enforcement promotes the returns of dividends and fair trade to the rightful owners in an accountable and sustainable manner, as was and is intended by the global copyright law regimes.<br>PhD (Business Administration), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

The purpose of this study was to explore and gain insight into the current purpose of contracting and, in the main, the future of contracting in emerging markets. The study aimed to explore the nature of contracting in emerging markets in order to understand what the future of contracting will be in emerging markets. The study was a qualitative study and a sample of ten participants was interviewed. Findings of the study indicated that the emerging market environment is risky due to unfamiliar local nuances; and local laws are preferred over international law. Technology and innovation are not a strong focus in emerging markets but relationship frameworks allow for some degree of flexibility and innovation. Relationships and their importance were the biggest finding of this research prompting an exploration of the Confucian concept of guanxi highlighting relational networks within social settings. The research further identified that contract professionals need to firstly be both competent and globally literate. Relationships and links between skills, knowledge and the operating environment are intertwined in determining the future of contracting. The research concluded by making recommendations to Chief Executive Officers of multinationals, lawyers, contract professionals and consultants in emerging market firms in light of the findings of this research. The research highlights the legal and both internal and external contextual considerations of contracting and also suggests variables for further research that are crucial for a deeper understanding of contracting in emerging markets.<br>Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2014.<br>zkgibs2015<br>Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS)<br>MBA<br>Unrestricted