Vertical Integration and Shared Facilities in Unregulated Industries

I this paper we consider a market situation in which initially there is an unintegrated monopoly upstream entry and vertical integration. The equilibrium entry mode -sharing the incumbent facility or building a new facility- is derived as well as the equilibrium market structure. Several policy prescriptions are set forth.Esencial facilities, shared facilities agreements, vertical integration, strategic substitutes

A Simple Test of Momentum in Foreign Exchange Markets

This study proposes a new method for testing for the presence of momentum in nominal exchange rates, using a probabilistic approach. We illustrate our methodology estimating a binary response model using information on local currency / US dollar exchange rates of eight emerging economies. After controlling for important variables affecting the behavior of exchange rates in the short-run, we show evidence of exchange rate inertia; in other words, we find that exchange rate momentum is a common feature in this group of emerging economies, and thus foreign exchange traders participating in these markets are able to make excess returns by following technical analysis strategies. We find that the presence of momentum is asymmetric, being stronger in moments of currency depreciation than of appreciation. This behavior may be associated with central bank intervention.Momentum, foreign exchange markets, hazard duration analysis, emerging economies. Classification JEL: G14, G15, C41.

The Competing Risks of Acquiring and Being Acquired: Evidence from Colombia´s Financial Sector

This paper studies the determinants of the probability of participating in a process of merging or acquisition for financial institutions in Colombia. We use survival analysis techniques and competing risks models to estimate the probability of participating in such processes as an acquiring or acquired firm. Using an especially rich database containing financial information of Colombian banks for the period 1990 - 2007, we find that both macroeconomic and microeconomic variables are important determinants of such probability. However, there are differential effects for the acquiring firm and the acquired firm. Particularly, while firm size and solvency result significant determinants of the probability of being an acquiring firm, efficiency is an important determinant of the probability of being acquired. Also, the concentration index, that plays no role for acquiring firms, plays an important role in the probability of being acquired.Survival analysis; competing risk models; Colombia

The Impact of Firm Heterogeneity in Aggregated Productivity: Firm Entry, Financial Selection, and Capital Misallocation

Aggregated productivity is the primary source of long-run economic growth. Therefore, understanding the nature of productivity accumulation is crucial to promoting welfare and development across nations. Recent literature has turned to the micro-foundation of aggregated productivity by studying the role of firms and entrepreneurs in shaping this process, which is the focus of my dissertation. This dissertation consists of three chapters, each of which investigates how heterogeneous firms\u27 decision making determines aggregated productivity. The first chapter studies the role of the financial system in selecting and developing the most promising business plans. In particular, more developed financial sectors are able to better allocate resources and foster cohorts of firms that are more productive. This chapter shows that considering firm heterogeneity is fundamental when studying the effects of financial development in long-run growth. In fact, the financial system determines not only the size of a new cohort of firms but also the productivity of the new entrants. The second chapter enriches the former model by studying the effects of financial crises in the long-run level of aggregated productivity. The main mechanism of the first chapter is embedded into a standard stochastic small open economy model, commonly used to study international financial crises. The model suggests that during crises, smaller cohorts of firms arise, but the average contribution of those cohorts to aggregated productivity should be higher than during normal times. This prediction is verified using firm level data from Chile spanning the period of crisis triggered by the Russian sovereign default of 1998. The calibrated model suggests that heterogeneity is crucial when assessing the long-run impact of financial crises in aggregated productivity. The third chapter focuses on the allocation of capital between heterogeneous firms. Firms in the United States have access to unequal tax benefits tied to physical capital and firms that lobby for taxation issues enjoy larger benefits than the rest. A heterogeneous firm dynamics model with endogenous lobbying decisions is developed and calibrated to firm level data. Although only a small fraction of firms lobby, the effect on aggregated productivity is sizeable

The decline in inequality in Latin America: How much, since when and why

Between 2000 and 2009, the Gini coefficient declined in 13 of 17 Latin American countries for which comparable data exist. The decline was statistically significant and robust to changes in the time interval, inequality measures and data sources. In depth country studies for Argentina, Brazil, Mexico and Peru suggest that there are two phenomena which underlie this trend: (i) a fall in the premium to skilled labor (as measured by returns to education); and (ii) higher and more progressive government transfers. The fall in the premium to skills results from a combination of supply and demand factors and, in Argentina—and to a lesser extent in Brazil--, from more active labor market policies as well.Income inequality, wage gap, government transfers, Latin America.

Forecasting Interest Rates: an application for Brazil

Understanding the links between long and short-term interest rates is crucial for monetary policy makers, since Central Banks decide and set short-term interest rates in order to affect indirectly long-term interest rates, which affects aggregate spending. This paper studies whether VAR/VEC models are useful in predicting long-term interest rates for Brazil. The empirical results suggest that these models are useful in building qualitative scenarios for the Term structure of interest rates, but do not provide good forecasts in terms of accuracy. Furthermore, models that assume that the future path of short-term interest rates (target interest rates) is known by forecasters do not perform better in terms of both directional and forecasting accuracy.

Análise gustativa em pacientes submetidos a secção do nervo corda do tímpano durante estapedotomia.

Trabalho de Conclusão de Curso - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro de Ciências da Saúde, Departamento de Clínica Médica, Curso de Medicina, Florianópolis, 199

Effect of fractionation on nutritional value of wheat distillers grains for rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss)

In this study, the nutritional value of wheat distillers grains and the effect of further processing of these products on their nutritional value for rainbow trout were investigated in five experiments. In experiments 1 and 2, wheat distillers grains with solubles (WDDGS) was fractionated using grinding, sieving and elutriation sequentially. Apparent digestibility coefficients (ADC) of dry matter (DM), gross energy (GE), acid ether extract (AEE), ash and amino acids (AA) did not differ between the original WDDGS and the WDDGS protein concentrate (P > 0.05). However, the ADC of crude protein (CP) was significantly higher for WDDGS protein concentrate (88.0 %) than the original WDDGS (84.9 %) (P 0.10). In experiment 5, a 56 d growth trial was performed to determine the effect feeding the aqueous fractionated WWDG to rainbow trout on growth performance. Rainbow trout (n=22/ tank; body weight 136 g and 3 tanks/ treatment) were fed diets containing 0, 75, 150, 225 and 300 g kg-1 of the processed WWDG from plant 2. There were no significant linear or quadratic relationships between inclusion rate and specific growth rate (SGR), average daily gain (ADG) or feed to gain ratios (feed:gain). However, there was a significant negative linear relationship between inclusion rate and average daily feed intake (ADFI) (P < 0.05). The results of these studies suggest that both dry and aqueous fractionation are suitable methods to produce protein concentrates from wheat distillers grains but that the aqueous fractionation process was more effective in improving nutrient composition and increasing digestibility

An efficient methodology to estimate probabilistic seismic damage curves

The incremental dynamic analysis (IDA) is a powerful methodology that can be easily extended for calculating probabilistic seismic damage curves. These curves are metadata to assess the seismic risk of structures. Although this methodology requires a relevant computational effort, it should be the reference to correctly estimate the seismic risk of structures. Nevertheless, it would be of high practical interest to have a simpler methodology, based for instance on the pushover analysis (PA), to obtain similar results to those based on IDA. In this article, PA is used to obtain probabilistic seismic damage curves from the stiffness degradation and the energy of the nonlinear part of the capacity curve. A fully probabilistic methodology is tackled by means of Monte Carlo simulations with the purpose of establishing that the results based on the simplified proposed approach are compatible with those obtained with the IDA. Comparisons between the results of both approaches are included for a low- to midrise reinforced concrete building. The proposed methodology significantly reduces the computational effort when calculating probabilistic seismic damage curves.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft