Financial structure and the transmission of monetary shocks: preliminary evidence for the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland

The paper analyses the financial structure of the private sector in the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland and assesses its implications for the monetary transmission mechanism. The financial accounts of these countries provide a picture of a private sector which is predictably financially less mature than the EU average: the corporate sector relies significantly on non-market financial liabilities (such as trade credits and non-traded shares) and bears a substantial exchange rate risk; the household sector is less sophisticated both in terms of financial assets, whose composition is tilted towards bank deposits, and liabilities, the volume of which is still negligible. VAR system estimates conducted separately on each acceding country suggest that, despite the inferior financial development of these countries, the co-movement of macroeconomic variables conditional on a monetary policy shock is similar across countries and not dissimilar to what is found in the more advanced economies.Financial structure, identified VAR, monetary policy shock, price puzzle.

Oil supply news in a VAR: Information from financial markets

This paper analyzes the macroeconomic effects on the U.S. economy of news about oil supply by estimating a VAR. Information contained in daily quotations of oil futures contracts is exploited to estimate the dynamic path of oil prices following a shock. Hence, differently from the VAR literature on oil shocks we do not need to rely on recursive identification. Impulse response functions suggest that oil supply disruptions have stagflationary effects on the U.S. economy. Historical decomposition shows that oil shocks contributed significantly to the US recessions of the last thirty years, but not all exogenous increases in oil prices induced a recession. Finally, the contribution of oil shocks to inflation fluctuations seems to have declined over time.vector autoregression, oil shock, futures, news

Gradient expansion technique for inhomogeneous, magnetized quark matter

A quark-magnetic Ginzburg-Landau (qHGL) gradient expansion of the free energy of two-flavor inhomogeneous quark matter in a magnetic field $H$ is derived analytically. It can be applied away from the Lifshitz point, generalizing standard Ginzburg-Landau techniques. The thermodynamic potential is written as a sum of the thermal contribution, the non-thermal lowest Landau level contribution, and the non-thermal qHGL functional, which handles any arbitrary position-dependent periodic modulation of the chiral condensate as an input. The qHGL approximation has two main practical features: (1) it is fast to compute; (2) it applies to non-plane-wave modulations such as solitons even when the amplitude of the condensate and its gradients are large (unlike standard Ginzburg-Landau techniques). It agrees with the output of numerical techniques based on standard regularization schemes and reduces to known results at zero temperature ($T = 0$) in benchmark studies. It is found that the region of the $\mu$-$T$ plane (where $\mu$ is the chemical potential) occupied by the inhomogeneous phase expands, as $H$ increases and $T$ decreases.Comment: 16 pages, 5 figures. Accepted for publication in EPJ

Physical activity and cancer prevention: a review of current evidence and biological mechanisms

Objective. The main aim of this paper is to review the evidence available from the date of PubMed?s inception to May 2011 for a link between cancer and physical activity (PA) in both animal models and humans. Methods. We decided to select studies that comply with the scheme proposed by the American College of Sports Medicine/ American Heart Association (ACSM/AHA) that distinguish occupational physical activity (OPA) and leisure-time physical activity (LT-PA), further classified in three levels of intensity (low, moderate and heavy) based on the Metabolic Equivalent of Task (MET) index. Results. Considering animal models, there was strong evidence for an inverse association between voluntary wheel exercise and the risk of colon and breast cancer. Regarding human studies, we identified the following main results: 1) colorectum: LT-PA provided an overall colon risk reduction of 13-14%; 2) breast: significant reduction in the frequency of post-menopausal (PMP) cancers in women that practiced heavy and moderate LT-PA; 3) prostate: heavy OPA and LT-PA seemed to reduce the risk of advanced prostate cancers; 4) endometrium: strong protective effect of heavy/moderate LT-PA among overweight/ obese women; 5) lung: inverse relationship between heavy LT-PA and lung cancer in former or current smokers across all histologies. Conclusion. Increased LT-PA is associated with cancer prevention in several organs, but strong biases, such as body mass index (BMI), gender and age, make it difficult to assess which aspects of PA contribute most strongly to the reduced risk. Furthermore, we found few studies that indicated a protective role for OPA in cancer prevention when compared with LT-PA

Screening of endocrine organ-specific humoral autoimmunity in 47,XXY Klinefelter's syndrome reveals a significant increase in diabetes-specific immunoreactivity in comparison with healthy control men.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the frequency of humoral endocrine organ-specific autoimmunity in 47,XXY Klinefelter’s syndrome (KS) by investigating the autoantibody profile specific to type 1 diabetes (T1DM), Addison’s disease (AD), Hashimoto thyroiditis (HT), and autoimmune chronic atrophic gastritis (AG). Sixty-one adult Caucasian 47,XXY KS patients were tested for autoantibodies specific to T1DM (Insulin Abs, GAD Abs, IA-2 Abs, Znt8 Abs), HT (TPO Abs), AD (21-OH Abs), and AG (APC Abs). Thirty-five of these patients were not undergoing testosterone replacement therapy TRT (Group 1) and the remaining 26 patients started TRT before the beginning of the study (Group 2). KS autoantibody frequencies were compared to those found in 122 control men. Six of 61 KS patients (9.8 %) were positive for at least one endocrine autoantibody, compared to 6.5 % of controls. Interestingly, KS endocrine immunoreactivity was directed primarily against diabetes-specific autoantigens (8.2 %), with a significantly higher frequency than in controls (p = 0.016). Two KS patients (3.3 %) were TPO Ab positive, whereas no patients were positive for AD- and AG-related autoantigens. The autoantibody endocrine profile of untreated and treated KS patients was not significantly different. Our findings demonstrate for the first time that endocrine humoral immunoreactivity is not rare in KS patients and that it is more frequently directed against type 1 diabetes-related autoantigens, thus suggesting the importance of screening for organ-specific autoimmunity in clinical practice. Follow-up studies are needed to establish if autoantibody-positive KS patients will develop clinical T1D

Endocrine and metabolic evaluation of classic Klinefelter syndrome and high-grade aneuploidies of sexual chromosomes with male phenotype: are they different clinical conditions?

Klinefelter syndrome (KS) is the most common sex chromosome aneuploidy in males. As well as classic KS, less frequent higher-grade aneuploidies (HGAs) are also possible. While KS and HGAs both involve testicular dysgenesis with hypergonadotropic hypogonadism, they differ in many clinical features. The aim of this study was to investigate the endocrinal and metabolic differences between KS and HGAs.Objective: Klinefelter syndrome (KS) is the most common sex chromosome aneuploidy in males. As well as classic KS, less frequent higher-grade aneuploidies (HGAs) are also possible. While KS and HGAs both involve testicular dysgenesis with hypergonadotropic hypogonadism, they differ in many clinical features. The aim of this study was to investigate the endocrinal and metabolic differences between KS and HGAs. Design: Cross-sectional, case-control study. Methods: 88 patients with KS, 24 with an HGA and 60 healthy controls. Given the known age-related differences all subjects were divided by age into subgroups 1, 2 and 3. Pituitary, thyroid, gonadal and adrenal functions were investigated in all subjects. Metabolic aspects were only evaluated in subjects in subgroups 2 and 3. Results: FT4 and FT3 levels were significantly higher in HGA than in KS patients in subgroups 1 and 2; in subgroup 3, FT4 was significantly higher in controls than in patients. Thyroglobulin was significantly higher in HGA patients in subgroup 1 than in KS patients and controls. Hypergonadotropic hypogonadism was confirmed in both KS and HGA patients, but was more precocious in the latter, as demonstrated by the earlier increase in gonadotropins and the decrease in testosterone, DHEA-S and inhibin B. Prolactin was significantly higher in HGA patients, starting from subgroup 2. Total and LDL cholesterol were significantly higher in HGA patients than in KS patients and controls, while HDL cholesterol was higher in controls than in patients. Conclusions: KS and HGAs should be considered as two distinct conditions

Los Principios y los Fines de la Empresa: Más Allá de la Ganancia, la Realización del Bien Común

The company, as a group of people operating at a social and economic level within a territory, plays a fundamental role in the development of society and is constantly influenced by various values and ethical principles. One approach that addresses this relationship is the perspective of the Catholic Church through its Social Doctrine. This doctrine promotes principles, virtues, and ethical values that touch on the moral aspect, but also have a broad Aristotelian perspective for the ultimate promotion of integral human development through the overall well-being of individuals. These principles are fundamentally based on the inherent dignity of every human being, created in the image and likeness of God. Hence, the company cannot be considered solely as an entity oriented towards economic profit, but rather as an agent of human development and promoter of the common good. Among the virtues are the cardinal virtues (Prudence, Fortitude, Justice, and Temperance) that form the individual and connect them with God to follow a righteous path. The ethical values promoted by the Church in relation to the company include solidarity, subsidiarity, social responsibility, and respect for human dignity. Solidarity implies recognizing interdependence and the need for collaboration among all actors in society, including companies. Subsidiarity, on the other hand, establishes that decisions should be made at the level closest to those affected, avoiding excessive concentration of power.La empresa, cual conjunto de personas que obran a nivel social y económico en un territorio, juega un papel fundamental en el desarrollo de la sociedad y se encuentra constantemente influenciada por diversos valores y principios éticos. Uno de los enfoques que aborda esta relación es la perspectiva de la Iglesia Católica a través de la Doctrina Social. En esta, se promueven, principios, virtudes y valores éticos que tocan el aspecto moral, pero que tienen en si una perspectiva Aristotélica amplia para la promoción última del desarrollo humano integral a través el bienestar integral de las personas. Estos principios encuentran su fundamento básicamente en la dignidad inherente de cada ser humano, creado a imagen y semejanza de Dios y es por eso que la empresa no puede ser considerada únicamente como una entidad orientada a la obtención de beneficios económicos, sino que debe ser un agente de desarrollo humano y promotor del bien común. Entre las virtudes se encuentran las virtudes cardinales (Prudencia, Fortaleza, Justicia y Templanza) que sí, forman la persona y la conectan con Dios para seguir un camino recto. Entre los valores éticos promovidos por la Iglesia en relación a la empresa se encuentran la solidaridad, la subsidiariedad, la responsabilidad social y el respeto a la dignidad humana. La solidaridad implica reconocer la interdependencia y la necesidad de colaboración entre todos los actores de la sociedad, incluyendo a las empresas. La subsidiariedad, por su parte, establece que las decisiones deben tomarse a nivel más cercano a los afectados, evitando la concentración excesiva de poder

El Fundraising: una reflexión sobre una disciplina en continuo ascenso

Donating is an ancient tradition, which initially had to do with Christian charity, the development of mutual aid societies in Italy, and corporate funds. In more recent times, it is the international NGOs and non-profit organizations that represent the culture of the gift. Culture that, however, has had and continues to have a fundamental role in civil society, since it has not always been recognized for what it deserves. The attempt to give a formal structure to the culture of the gift is Fundraising. This management practice that is used to support non-profit organizations, especially in the emergency caused by the global crisis caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, demonstrates that through generosity and transparent communication, it can really be changed. people's lives by creating a relationship that goes beyond fundraising. The Fundraising phenomenon has in itself a trail of extremely positive effects. In fact, this discipline, still little taught at a formal level and seen as an artisanal practice of administration and marketing, has numerous connections with other disciplines, using extremely innovative practices. Fundraising has gone from being an implicit tool to other activities in solidarity and non-profit organizations, to a secondary tool, sometimes ancillary to professional activity that moves millions of dollars in the United States of America and Italy alone.Donar es una tradición antigua, que tiene que ver inicialmente con la caridad cristiana, el desarrollo de las sociedades de ayuda mutua en Italia y las cajas de las corporaciones. En tiempos más cercanos, son las ONG internacionales y nacionales las encargadas en representar la cultura del dono, la cual ha tenido y sigue teniendo un rol fundamental en la sociedad civil, ya que no siempre ha sido reconocida como se merece. El tentativo de dar una estructura formal a la cultura del dono es el Fundraising, la cual es la práctica de administración que se utiliza para sostener organizaciones sin fin de lucro, demostrando especialmente en la emergencia por la crisis mundial causada desde la pandemia de Covid-19, como a través de la generosidad y con una comunicación transparente, se puede de verdad cambiar la vida de las personas creando una relación que va más allá de la recaudación de fondos. El fenómeno del Fundraising tiene en si una estela de efectos extremamente positivos. De hecho, esta disciplina, todavía poco enseñada a nivel formal y vista como una práctica artesanal de administración y marketing, tiene en sí, numerosas conexiones con otras disciplinas, a través el uso de prácticas extremamente innovadoras. El fundraising ha pasado desde el ser una herramienta implícita a otras actividades en las organizaciones solidarias y sin fin de lucro, a herramienta secundaria, a veces accesoria a actividad profesional que mueve millones de dólares solo en los Estados Unidos de América y Italia