Including financial services in preferential trade agreements : lessons of international experience for China

The objective of this paper is to address the main considerations for China of including financial services in its preferential trade agreements. The paper briefly reviews China's financial liberalization process and the state of its domestic financial system, discusses the main considerations of including financial services in China's preferential trade agreements, compares and contrasts the different'architectural'approaches that have been used by countries to include financial services in such agreements, and identifies good practices in preparing for financial services negotiations. Particular emphasis is placed on lessons from Latin American preferential trade agreements, given their more frequent and extensive coverage of financial services compared with other regions.Emerging Markets,Banks&Banking Reform,Trade Law,Trade and Services,

THE RISK CONNECTION OF AN ORGANIZATION WITH INTERNAL AUDIT. SPECIFIC CORPORATE GOVERNANCE PRACTICES

There is risk in everything we do. A risk-free situation is one where we know exactly what will happen and there is no variation doubt, which is otherwise impossible. But not all risks have only a negative connotation, some of them can even create opportunities. A good risk management means to keep an unwanted risk in certain permissible limits and exploit its „opportune” side. Corporate governance represents an innovative method of supervision on firms’ activity. Executive boards now exert more and more influence, the investors become more and more pretentious, and the managers have become more aware of the key problems their business have to confront (every day). All these are tendencies that result from the higher importance laid on corporate governance in the business world. Given the reasons, this theme awoke in us a great attention, considering the present tendencies of organizing the management of companies. They consist in finding those ways that would prevent investors and the taxation from being manipulated.risk appetite, risk management, SOX model, corporate governance, the Cadbury Report

Y2K Interruption: Can the Doomsday Scenario Be Averted?

The management philosophy until recent years has been to replace the workers with computers, which are available 24 hours a day, need no benefits, no insurance and never complain. But as the year 2000 approached, along with it came the fear of the millennium bug, generally known as Y2K, and the computers threatened to strike!!!! Y2K, though an abbreviation of year 2000, generally refers to the computer glitches which are associated with the year 2000. Computer companies, in order to save memory and money, adopted a voluntary standard in the beginning of the computer era that all computers automatically convert any year designated by two numbers such as 99 into 1999 by adding the digits 19. This saved enormous amount of memory, and thus money, because large databases containing birth dates or other dates only needed to contain the last two digits such as 65 or 86. But it also created a built in flaw that could make the computers inoperable from January 2000. The problem is that most of these old computers are programmed to convert 00 (for the year 2000) into 1900 and not 2000. The trouble could therefore, arise when the systems had to deal with dates outside the 1900s. In 2000, for example a programme that calculates the age of a person born in 1965 will subtract 65 from 00 and get -65. The problem is most acute in mainframe systems, but that does not mean PCs, UNIX and other computing environments are trouble free. Any computer system that relies on date calculations must be tested because the Y2K or the millennium bug arises because of a potential for “date discontinuity” which occurs when the time expressed by a system, or any of its components, does not move in consonance with real time. Though attention has been focused on the potential problems linked with change from 1999 to 2000, date discontinuity may occur at other times in and around this period.

Compensatory Time vs. Cash Wages: Amending the Fair Labor Standards Act?

In the 108th Congress, two work hours flexibility bills have been introduced: S. 317 by Senator Gregg and H.R. 1119 by Representative Biggert. Both bills deal with a compensatory time off option (comp time) — though the Gregg proposal is somewhat broader, projecting other changes in the overtime provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) as well. This report is limited to consideration of the issue of comp time

Compensatory Time vs. Cash Wages: Amending the Fair Labor Standards Act?

CRS_February_2005_Compensatory_Time_vs_Cash_Wages.pdf: 489 downloads, before Oct. 1, 2020

A Review of the Agriculture Literature in Malaysian and Indonesian Accounting Journals

This article discusses the scope related to Malaysian and Indonesian accounting research in agricultural literature. This discussion was based on two well-known Malaysian accounting journals and many were referred from 2008 to 2016, recognized as Accounting Overview Malaysia (MAR) and Asian Business and Accounting Journal (AJBA), and three Indonesian accounting journals namely Economic & Financial Studies (SEZ) , Gadjah Mada International Business Journal (GamaIJB) and Indonesian Accounting and Finance Journal (JAKI). In MAR and AJBA, Corporate Governance, Auditing, Financial Accounting Reporting, and Management Accounting are the most widely published topics. In SEZ, Economy, Finance, Public Sector Accounting and Taxation; GamaIJ, Management / Managerial Accounting and Finance; and JAKI, Management / Managerial Accounting, Financial Accounting, and Reporting Audit are the most widely published topics. This article proposes peculiarities, non-company and non-professional attributes as opportunity-researched variable fields for future agricultural studies. This article concludes with a reminder of the direction that leads to Malaysian and Indonesian accounting research, including the ontological difference between agricultural studies and accounting minutes while the latter seeks to fulfill generalizations, company attributes and stereotyped-research-variable professionals. It was concluded there is no difference in the average number of journals published in Malaysia and Indonesia with the test.   Keywords: Accounting, agriculture, opportunity, stereotype, Malaysia and Indonesi

COMPANY ATTRIBUTES AND THE TIMELINESS OF FINANCIAL REPORTING IN NIGERIA

Abstract This study examines the impact of company attributes on the timeliness of financial reports in Nigeria based on a sample of 61 companies’ annual reports for the years 1999-2008. The data were analyzed and results estimated using Ordinary Least Square (OLS) Regression which was complimented with the panel data estimation technique. The findings reveal that the age of company is the major company attribute that influences the overall quality of timeliness of financial reports in Nigeria. It was also observed that there is a significant difference in the timeliness of financial reporting among industrial sectors in Nigeria. The banking sector is found to be more timely in financial reporting. Though the results suggest that regulations are not enough to ensure that the quality of financial reports are timely in Nigeria, reporting lag may however be reduced by the existence and strict enforcement of rules and regulations of regulatory bodies. Key words: Audit Firm, Age, Companies Attributes, Company Size, Financial Reports, Financial Year, Information, legal Requirements, Nigeria, Nigeria Accounting Standards Boards Act, Profitability, Timeliness, Stakeholders

Applying Goldratt’s Framework to the Banking System

This paper describes the major elements of the Goldratt’s framework – the Theory of Constraints (TOC) – in the banking sector, and examines the factors involved in the decision to adopt the TOC by companies in this sector. Through a deep literature review, analyzing similar cases that apply the Goldratt’s framework in services and in manufacturing and the severalviews of its components, we aim at formulating a framework specifically for the banking system.The study uses a qualitative methodology supported by the information extracted from reality as it is framed in a multicase study model. As part of the quantitative approach, we test several research hypotheses raised from the review of existing studies in the area.The main factors that influence the decision to adopt the TOC are the nature and the characteristics of the banking service, the attitude towards change, the leadership and the commitment of the entire institution.By using the Goldratt’s approach outlined in this article, through the location of the constraints and develop practical measurement to facilitate the banking process improvements, banks can improve resource utilization, revenues and employee satisfaction

Developing Sound Banks in Transitional Economies: Structural Reforms in Ukraine

This paper explores the methods that the Ukrainian government (supported by international technical assistance providers) is developing to minimize the probability of a damaging, systemic banking crisis. The contention is that with highly lucrative existing sources of income for banks receding (and profits under increasing pressure), banks will more aggressively expand their balance sheets - but not necessarily in a healthy manner - as well as engage more in riskier off-balance sheet activities, such as foreign exchange trading. Thus, in the coming period, the fragility of the Ukrainian banking system could increase, leaving the system at greater risk. The first two sections briefly review banking under the Communist system, and in the first period of the transitional governments. Then follows an in-depth discussion of Ukraine which explores at some length some of the elements needed for a more comprehensive strategy. An appendix deals with the question of banking sector strategy in more general terms.Economic Transition, Structural Reforms, Banking Sector, Ukraine