How do market imperfections affect working capital management?

This paper examines whether Working Capital Management (WCM) is sensitive to market imperfections such as asymmetric information, agency conflicts or financial distress. We find that firms have a target investment in working capital and that they take decisions in order to achieve this. In addition, the results appear to support the hypothesis that the working capital competes with investment in fixed assets for the funds of the firms when they have financial constraints. Finally, we also find that WCM depends on bargaining power and other financial factors such as the availability of internal finance, cost of financing and access to capital markets. Este artículo analiza si la gestión del capital circulante está afectada por las imperfecciones de mercado tales como la asimetría informativa, los conflictos de agencia o las dificultades financieras. Los resultados muestran que las empresas tienen un nivel de inversión en capital circulante objetivo y toman decisiones con el fin de alcanzarlo. Además, los resultados parecen apoyar la hipótesis de que el capital circulante compite con los activos fijos por los fondos de las empresas cuando éstas tienen restricciones financieras. Finalmente, la gestión del capital circulante depende del poder de negociación y otros factores financieros tales como la disponibilidad de financiación interna, el coste de financiación y el acceso a los mercados de capitales.ciclo de efectivo, gestión del capital circulante, imperfecciones de mercado, datos de panel net trade cycle, working capital management, market imperfections, panel data

Determinants of working capital management

This paper analyzes the determinants of working capital management (WCM) for a sample of Spanish firms during the period 1997-2004. We find that firms have a target investment in working capital and that they take decisions in order to achieve this. The results appear to support the hypothesis that the working capital competes with investment in fixed assets for the funds of the firms when they have financial constraints. Finally, we also find that WCM depends on bargaining power and other financial factors such as the availability of internal finance, cost of financing and financial constraints.Research Agency of the Spanish Government ECO2008-06179/ECO

A stochastic frontier analysis approach for estimating energy demand and efficiency in the transport sector of Latin America and the Caribbean

In this paper, a stochastic frontier analysis approach is applied to estimate energy demand functions in the transport sector. This approach allows us to obtain energy efficiency measures at country level that are a robust alternative to the energy intensity indicators commonly used for international comparisons. A transitive multilateral price index is constructed for aggregating the diverse energy components employed in the sector. Due to the likely unobserved heterogeneity among countries, the use of a random parameters model is proposed to accommodate these differences and to obtain different income and price elasticities per country. The estimated model is compared with alternative approaches of addressing this issue such as latent class, true fixed effects or true random effects models. This study is the first to use a random parameters stochastic frontier approach in the estimation of energy demand functions. The proposed procedure is applied to Latin America and the Caribbean, where the transport sector represents a large share of total energy consumption

What makes slow samples slow in the Sherrington-Kirkpatrick model

Using results of a Monte Carlo simulation of the Sherrington-Kirkpatrick model, we try to characterize the slow disorder samples, namely we analyze visually the correlation between the relaxation time for a given disorder sample $J$ with several observables of the system for the same disorder sample. For temperatures below $T_c$ but not too low, fast samples (small relaxation times) are clearly correlated with a small value of the largest eigenvalue of the coupling matrix, a large value of the site averaged local field probability distribution at the origin, or a small value of the squared overlap $$. Within our limited data, the correlation remains as the system size increases but becomes less clear as the temperature is decreased (the correlation with$$ is more robust) . There is a strong correlation between the values of the relaxation time for two distinct values of the temperature, but this correlation decreases as the system size is increased. This may indicate the onset of temperature chaos

Interconnection of port-Hamiltonian systems and composition of Dirac structures

Port-based network modeling of physical systems leads to a model class of nonlinear systems known as port-Hamiltonian systems. Port-Hamiltonian systems are defined with respect to a geometric structure on the state space, called a Dirac structure. Interconnection of port-Hamiltonian systems results in another port-Hamiltonian system with Dirac structure defined by the composition of the Dirac structures of the subsystems. In this paper the composition of Dirac structures is being studied, both in power variables and in wave variables (scattering) representation. This latter case is shown to correspond to the Redheffer star product of unitary mappings. An equational representation of the composed Dirac structure is derived. Furthermore, the regularity of the composition is being studied. Necessary and sufficient conditions are given for the achievability of a Dirac structure arising from the standard feedback interconnection of a plant port-Hamiltonian system and a controller port-Hamiltonian system, and an explicit description of the class of achievable Casimir functions is derived

La investigació formativa en l’assignatura optativa d’informática aplicada a la investigació educativa

Podeu consultar el document complet a: http://diposit.ub.edu/dspace/handle/2445/65797En la investigació formativa l’alumnat és protagonista actiu del seu propi procés, fent del professorat un acompanyant cap a l’aprenentatge autònom. L’alumnat adopta un rol actiu, prenent les seves pròpies decisions, integrant coneixements, i desenvolupant competències diverses. En aquesta innovació apostem per l’aprenentatge orientat a projectes (ABP) i l’avaluació amb portafolis digital, com estratègies per a la investigació formativa. La finalitat de l’estudi que presentem és l’anàlisi de la innovació en una assignatura del grau de Pedagogia, des de la perspectiva de l’alumnat participant; mitjançant el mètode per enquesta. Els principals resultats obtinguts evidencien la idoneïtat de la innovació docent implementada per tal de potenciar el desenvolupament d’habilitats de pensament d’ordre superior. L’ABP afavoreix l’adquisició i integració dels nous coneixements; destaquem especialment el desenvolupament de dues competències bàsiques com són el treball col·laboratiu i la capacitat de reflexió. Per al desenvolupament d’aquestes competències han resultat especialment útils, segons l’alumnat, les activitats d’aprenentatge autònom, les activitats col·laboratives, les del projecte d’investigació i el portafolis

Consideraciones acerca de los contenidos y metodologías en los cursos de Química en la Educación Secundaria en Bogotá (Colombia)

La formulación de un nuevo currículo para los cursos de química general, impartidos en la Universidad Nacional de Colombia, nos llevó a indagar acerca de la química que se enseña en la secundaria y a analizar los contenidos en su coherencia y relación con los cursos universitarios. Los resultados muestran una gran intención de los profesores por impartir una química relacionada con la vida, pero muy abundante en contenidos formales y muy relacionada con los cursos universitarios de química. Las preferencias entre diversos temas no se relacionan directamente y se prevé que se privilegia una enseñanza teórica y preparatoria para la química universitaria. Esto motiva a pensar en un currículo alejado de presiones, como exámenes de ingreso o de cursos universitarios