Essays in empirical asset pricing

This dissertation consists of three articles. In the first article, I provide a literature survey on the cross-section and time-series of expected returns. I review some of the most significant empirical anomalies in the literature. The second article utilizes an international context and revisits the findings which argue that the positive relation between book-to-market ratio and future equity returns is driven by historical changes in firm size in the US. After confirming these results in the US setting, I find that they do not hold in regions outside the US. In the international sample, book-to-market ratio has a significantly positive relation with future equity returns even after changes in firm size are controlled for in regression analyses. This positive relation is again visible when the orthogonal component of book-to-market ratio is used as a sorting variable in portfolio analyses. The third article examines the predictive power of average skewness, defined as the average of monthly skewness values across stocks, in an international setting. First, after confirming the validity of the US results for the sample period between 1990 and 2016, I find that the intertemporal relation between average skewness and future market returns becomes either insignificant or marginally significant when the sample period is extended. Second, when I repeat the analysis in 22 developed non-US markets, I find that average skewness has no robust predictive power. The inability of average skewness to forecast market returns does not depend on the method used to calculate average skewness or the regression specificatio

Space and Time Travelers Exploring Cultural Identity of the City

This chapter presents the architectural graduate students’ works on exploring cultural identity of a palimpsest city in Turkey, İznik (Nicaea). These evaluative works, which were prepared in the context of time and space, include the interpretations of transformation of urban spaces throughout time and its effects on the identity of the city. At the end of their study, the fresh architects were conscious about the role of culture in the process of urban development. They had experienced how to investigate the ways of benefiting from city culture in favor of city identity. Putting stress on the efficient role of cultural factors composing identity of a city throughout time, the example studies and their proposals indicated in this chapter show that achieving sufficient and healthy urban environments could be possible with identifying the importance of culture and benefits of culture-led development and using it in architectural and urban design

A novel B-spline collocation method for Hyperbolic Telegraph equation

The present study is concerned with the construction of a new high-order technique to establish approximate solutions of the Telegraph equation (TE). In this technique, a novel optimal B-spline collocation method based on quintic B-spline (QBS) basis functions is constructed to discretize the spatial domain and fourth-order implicit method is derived for time integration. Test problems are considered to verify the theoretical results and to demonstrate the applicability of the suggested technique. The error norm $L_{\infty }$ and the rate of spatial and temporal convergence are computed and compared with those of techniques available in the literature. The obtained results show the improvement and efficiency of the proposed scheme over the existing ones. Also, it is obviously observed that the experimental rate of convergence is almost compatible with the theoretical rate of convergence

Mobile Computation with Functions

The practice of computing has reached a stage where computers are seen as parts of a global computing platform. The possibility of exploiting resources on a global scale has given rise to a new paradigm -- the mobile computation paradigm -- for computation in large-scale distributed networks. Languages which enable the mobility of code over the network are becoming widely used for building distributed applications. This thesis explores distributed computation with languages which adopt functions as the main programming abstraction and support code mobility through the mobility of functions between remote sites. It aims to highlight the benefits of using languages of this family in dealing with the challenges of mobile computation. The possibility of exploiting existing static analysis techniques suggests that having functions at the core of a mobile code language is a particularly apt choice. A range of problems which have impact on the safety, security and performance of systems are discussed here. It is shown that types extended with effects and other annotations can capture a significant amount of information about the dynamic behaviour of mobile functions and offer solutions to the problems under investigation. The thesis presents a survey of the languages Concurrent ML, Facile and PLAN which remain loyal to the principles of the functional language ML and hence inherit its strengths in the context of concurrent and distributed computation. The languages which are defined in the subsequent chapters have their roots in these languages. Two chapters focus on using types to statically predict whether functions are used locally or may become mobile at runtime. Types are exploited for distributed calltracking to estimate which functions are invoked at which sites in the system. Compilers for mobile code languages would benefit from such estimates in dealing with the heterogeneity of the network nodes, in providing static profiling tools and in estimating the resource-consumption of programs. Two chapters are devoted to the use of types in controlling the flow of values in a system where users have different trust levels. The confinement of values within a specified mobility region is the subject of one of these. The other focuses on systems where values are classified with respect to their confidentiality level. The sources of undesirable flows of information are identified and a solution based on noninterference is proposed

Ashiq Pasha’s Sema treatise: Risalah fî beyân al-Semâ’

Garîb-nâme müellifi Âşık Paşa, bu ünlü eserinin yanı sıra, çeşitli şiir mecmuaları ve cönklerde rastlanan bazı gazel ve ilâhilerle hemen hepsi mesnevi tarzında olmak üzere küçük bazı risaleler de kaleme almıştır. Bunlar arasında mensur olanlar, kendisine ait olması tartışmalı bir eser olan Tasavvuf Risalesi ile Semâ’ Risalesi’dir. Semâ’ Risalesi, eser hakkında ilk bilgileri veren Bursalı Mehmed Tahir’den bu yana adı, nüshaları, Âşık Paşa’ya aidiyeti, hatta varlığı tartışılan bir risale olarak dikkat çekmektedir. Bu makalede, eser hakkında bugüne kadar yapılan çalışma ve tespitler değerlendirilecek, A. Sırrı Levend’in eserin Âşık Paşa’ya ait olamayacağı noktasındaki görüşü ele alınacak ve eser kısaca tanıtılacaktır. Makalenin sonunda eserin tespit edilebilen üç nüshasının tenkitli metni sunulacaktır.Apart from his well-known book Garîb-nâme, Ashiq Pasha wrote some ghazals that can be met in small poetry majmuahs and jonks (folk poetry collections). He also has some treatises almost all written in mathnawi form. Among his all works, the prose ones, namely Tasavvuf Treatise and Sema‘ Treatise are doubtful in belonging to him. Since Bursalı Mehmet Tahir, the first source has information on it, Sema Treatise‘s name, its copies, its belonging to Ashiq Pasha and even also its presence have been suspicious. In this article, literature and the discussions on Sema‘ Treatise will be criticized; the view of âgah Sırrı Levend on its belonging to Ashiq Pasha will be evaluated and the work will shortly be presented. Finally, three copies of the Treatise with critical editions will be given

The role of thought suppression in conversion disorder in relation to depression, symptom interpretation and sleep hygiene: a case-control study

Background: Thought suppression has been associated with a number of psychiatric disorders. However, the association with conversion disorder (CD) has not been investigated yet. Objective: To investigate the role of thought suppression in CD. Methods: Eighty consecutive outpatients with a diagnosis of CD and sixty age, sex and neighborhood-similar controls were evaluated using Beck Depression Inventory-I (BDI-I), White Bear Suppression Inventory (WBSI), Symptom Interpretation Questionnaire (SIQ) and Sleep Hygiene Index (SHI). Cases and controls were compared in regard to thought suppression scores considering their status of high depression scores via a logistic regression model. The reciprocal associations of thought suppression with other clinical dimensions in CD were assessed. Finally, structural equation modelling was applied to untangle the possible connections. Results: CD patients had significantly higher scores of thought suppression than the control group. However, the difference was below the significance level when CD patients without comorbid high depression scores were taken into account. Thought suppression was associated with the clinical severity of CD. According to the structural equation model, older age and somatic attributions to the common bodily sensations were the significant correlates of thought suppression among CD patients. Discussion: Thought suppression may be considered as a non-specific marker of clinical severity in CD

Energy management and energy accountingEnerji yönetimi ve enerji muhasebesi

That the energy, as an important production factor, is a non-replaced element is an undeniable fact while the businesses perform their basic functions. In macro scale the economies of the countries and in micro scale businesses must manage the energy well in order to obtain their goals. In that sense, energy management should be organized as an independent unit within the institutions; it should take precautions to reduce the energy costs and to increase the operation productivity of the businesses. In the modern understanding of business administration, energy management has the functions such as reducing the costs in a business, increasing the competitiveness, increasing the operating profits, increasing the operation productivity, wise use of energy and reducing environmental pollution. Energy accounting is an information system that follows, records and reports the energy consumption and energy costs regularly. Energy accounting has a significant contribution in achieving the expected success of energy management. Energy accounting has benefits in many fields such as reducing energy supply costs, reducing energy consumption costs and making budgets of the business in the context of energy management. Energy accounting motivates and activates all the units of the business in terms of reducing energy costs by performing the duties which are expected from it. Özetİşletmeler temel işlevlerini yerine getirirken, önemli bir üretim faktörü olarak enerjinin; ikame edilemeyecek bir unsur olduğu yadsınamaz bir gerçektir. Makro ölçekte ülke ekonomilerinin ve mikro ölçekte de işletmelerin amaçlarına ulaşabilmeleri için enerjiyi etkin bir şekilde yönetmeleri gerekir. Bu bağlamda, enerji yönetimi, kurumlarda bağımsız bir birim olarak örgütlenmeli; enerji maliyetlerini azaltacak ve işletme faaliyet verimliliğini arttıracak önlemleri almalıdır. Çağdaş işletmecilik anlayışında enerji yönetimi; bir işletmede maliyetlerin azaltılması, rekabet gücünün arttırılması, işletme karlılığının arttırılması, işletme verimliliğinin arttırılması, enerjinin akılcı kullanımı ve çevre kirliliğinin azaltılması gibi işlevlere sahiptir. Enerji muhasebesi, enerji tüketimini ve enerji maliyetlerini düzenli bir şekilde izleyen, kaydeden ve raporlayan bir bilgi sistemidir. Enerji yönetiminin kendisinden beklenen başarıyı sağlamasında; enerji muhasebesinin önemli bir katkısı vardır. Enerji muhasebesi, enerji yönetimi kapsamında işletmelere; enerji tedarik maliyetlerini azaltmada, enerji kullanım maliyetlerini azaltmada, işletme bütçelerinin yapılması gibi bir çok alanda faydalar sağlar. Enerji muhasebesi, kendisinden beklenen görevleri yerine getirerek; işletmenin tüm birimlerini, enerji maliyetlerini düşürme konusunda motive etmekte ve harekete geçirmektedir