IE University

About: IE University is a education organization based out in Segovia, Castilla y León, Spain. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Corporate governance & Context (language use). The organization has 527 authors who have published 1709 publications receiving 64682 citations.

Misinformation, Economic Threat, and Public Support for International Trade

Abstract: The recent surge in protectionist sentiment in countries around the world has rekindled the long-standing debate over the determinants of citizens' trade policy preferences. We examine the influence of two understudied but increasingly relevant factors --- misinformation and economic threat --- on support for international trade in the United States. We first show that more than 6--in--10 Americans endorse a salient misperception about Chinese currency manipulation despite extensive evidence to the contrary. Then, based on a preregistered survey experiment, we show that misinformation can be corrected, regardless of whether the threatening frame is present or not. In contrast to these results on factual beliefs, however, we find that trade policy preferences are considerably stable: neither anti-trade misinformation nor an economically threatening frame significantly reduces support for international trade. These findings suggest that political elites' strategy of ``playing the China card'' by using misleading and threatening rhetoric is not so effective in mobilizing opposition to trade.

The Antecedents and Consequences of Emerging Market Divestitures

Abstract: Divesting assets owned in emerging markets has substantive consequences for the multinational corporation. In this paper, we examine two dimensions surrounding the decision to divest a business in an emerging market: institutional effects impacting the timing of the divestiture, and the effects of the ownership structure on the stability of the venture. Also, we explore the consequences of divestment on the sale price of the assets. We use a proprietary database of all acquisitions in Argentina (> US$1 million) for the period 1990-2002 to test our hypotheses.Our evidence supports the existence of institutional and ownership effects on the propensity to divest, which in turn affect the divestiture price.

Evolution of Control of Cross-Listed Companies

Abstract: Some – such as La Porta et al. (1999) explain the dispersed control, which is the norm in common law countries, by the better protection of minority shareholders. Conversely, concentrated control, which prevails in civil law countries, is thought to be caused by low shareholder protection. This paper examines whether changes in the legal environment of a company, via cross-listing, affect its control structure. In particular, we investigate whether companies that cross-list on common law markets evolve towards dispersed control. Using a sample of 126 companies that have cross-listed on 18 stock markets during the period of 1990 to 2000, our analysis does not reveal that cross-listing on common law markets affects the subsequent control structure of the sample companies. We find that company characteristics such as initial control structure and risk are better determinants of the evolution of control. In addition, we find that firms that incorporate in countries with good quality of accounting are more likely to evolve towards a dispersed control structure. Our results suggest that the optimal ownership and control structure varies across companies.

A Few Good Companies: Rethinking Firms’ Responsibilities Toward Common Pool Resources

Abstract: While a significant body of literature has highlighted the moral obligations of companies regarding the sustainable use of common pool resources, business activities that contribute to the sustenance of common pool resources remain embryonic. Studies in this area have largely focused on environmental stimuli rather than on the complex motivational structures that drive or hinder businesses’ contributions to common pool resources. We explore the different motives and behaviors of businesses and their contributions to common pool resources, and propose four roles by which companies’ motives and behaviors toward common pool resources can be categorized—namely, free riders, followers, believers, and altruists. We shift the focus from moral reasoning to Platt’s (Am Psychol 28(8):641–651, 1973) notion of social trapping and his “ways out” as Platt’s “ways out” include propositions that address not only environmental stimuli but also companies’ motives. Both types of propositions are important for businesses to be able to respond rapidly to the scarcity of certain common pool resources and to use and maintain common pool resources in a sustainable way. Based on our categorization and Platt’s typology of social traps and “ways out,” we propose a theoretical framework by which companies and other stakeholders are provided with a differentiating perspective that allows for propositions addressing the complex nature of motivational structures and common pool resources. Our framework helps business leaders, institutions, and policy makers decide on actions that can contribute to the sustainability of common pool resources and that differ from actions that solely serve organizational self-interests.

Combining technical analysis and grammatical evolution in a trading system

Abstract: Trading Systems are beneficial for financial investments due to the complexity of nowadays markets. On one hand, finance markets are influenced by a great amount of factors of different sources such as government policies, natural disasters, international trade, political factors etc. On the other hand, traders, brokers or practitioners in general could be affected by human emotions, so their behaviour in the stock market becomes nonobjective. The high pressure induced by handling a large volume of money is the main reason of the so-called market psychology. Trading systems are able to avoid a great amount of these factors, allowing investors to abstract the complex flow of information and the emotions related to the investments. In this paper we compare two trading systems based on Evolutionary Computation. The first is a GA-based one and was already proposed and tested with data from 2006. The second one is a grammatical evolution approach which uses a new evaluation method. Experimental results show that the later outperforms the GA approach with a set of selected companies of the spanish market with 2012 data.