The Emergence of Captive Finance Companies and Risk Segmentation of the Consumer Loan Market:Theory and Evidence

A parental seller with market power to some degree in its product market can earn rents. In this context, there is a gain to granting credit for the purchase of the product and thus the establishment of captive finance company for expanding the sales by offering loans to consumers who need financing for purchase of durable good. This paper examines the optimal behavior of such a durable good seller and its captive finance company when the consumer loan market is segmented into captive and independent lending institutions under symmetric and imperfect information on borrower’s creditworthiness. The model presents that one critical difference for captive finance company will be its credit standard. Specifically, the model indicates that captive finance company will follow a more lenient credit standard, leading to the prediction that the likelihood of repayment of a captive loan is lower than that of a bank loan, other things equal. This prediction is tested using unique data sets drawn from a major credit bureau in the U.S. The analysis of credit bureau data shows that a captive automobile loan is less likely to be repaid than a bank automobile loan, which supports the theoretical prediction.Monopolistic Competition, Consumer Loan Market, Captive Finance Company, Differential Loan Performances

Characterizing optical chirality

We examine the recently introduced measure of chirality of a monochromatic optical field [Y. Tang and A. E. Cohen, Phys. Rev. Lett. 104, 163901 (2010)] using the momentum (plane-wave) representation and helicity basis. Our analysis clarifies the physical meaning of the measure of chirality and unveils its close relation to the polarization helicity, spin angular momentum, energy density, and Poynting energy flow. We derive the operators of the optical chirality and of the corresponding chiral momentum, which acquire remarkably simple forms in the helicity representation.Comment: 3 pages, no figures, to appear in Phys. Rev.

MDL Convergence Speed for Bernoulli Sequences

The Minimum Description Length principle for online sequence estimation/prediction in a proper learning setup is studied. If the underlying model class is discrete, then the total expected square loss is a particularly interesting performance measure: (a) this quantity is finitely bounded, implying convergence with probability one, and (b) it additionally specifies the convergence speed. For MDL, in general one can only have loss bounds which are finite but exponentially larger than those for Bayes mixtures. We show that this is even the case if the model class contains only Bernoulli distributions. We derive a new upper bound on the prediction error for countable Bernoulli classes. This implies a small bound (comparable to the one for Bayes mixtures) for certain important model classes. We discuss the application to Machine Learning tasks such as classification and hypothesis testing, and generalization to countable classes of i.i.d. models.Comment: 28 page

Anisotropic thermal expansion of Fe1.06Te and FeTe0.5Se0.5 single crystals

Heat capacity and anisotropic thermal expansion was measured for Fe1.06Te and FeTe0.5Se0.5 single crystals. Previously reported phase transitions are clearly seen in both measurements. In both cases the thermal expansion is anisotropic. The uniaxial pressure derivatives of the superconducting transition temperature in FeTe0.5Se0.5 inferred from the Ehrenfest relation have opposite signs for in-plane and c-axis pressures. Whereas the Gruneisen parameters for both materials are similar and only weakly temperature-dependent above ~ 80 K, at low temperatures (in the magnetically ordered phase) the magnetic contribution to the Gruneisen parameter in Fe1.06Te is significantly larger than electron and phonon contributions combined

The effects of room design on computer-supported collaborative learning in a multi-touch classroom.

While research indicates that technology can be useful for supporting learning and collaboration, there is still relatively little uptake or widespread implementation of these technologies in classrooms. In this paper, we explore one aspect of the development of a multi-touch classroom, looking at two different designs of the classroom environment to explore how classroom layout may influence group interaction and learning. Three classes of students working in groups of four were taught in the traditional forward-facing room condition, while three classes worked in a centered room condition. Our results indicate that while the outcomes on tasks were similar across conditions, groups engaged in more talk (but not more off-task talk) in a centered room layout, than in a traditional forward-facing room. These results suggest that the use of technology in the classroom may be influenced by the location of the technology, both in terms of the learning outcomes and the interaction behaviors of students. The findings highlight the importance of considering the learning environment when designing technology to support learning, and ensuring that integration of technology into formal learning environments is done with attention to how the technology may disrupt, or contribute to, the classroom interaction practices

Laser induced breakdown of the magnetic field reversal symmetry in the propagation of unpolarized light

We show how a medium, under the influece of a coherent control field which is resonant or close to resonance to an appropriate atomic transition, can lead to very strong asymmetries in the propagation of unpolarized light when the direction of the magnetic field is reversed. We show how EIT can be used to mimic effects occuring in natural systems and that EIT can produce very large asymmetries as we use electric dipole allowed transitions. Using density matrix calculations we present results for the breakdown of the magnetic field reversal symmetry for two different atomic configurations.Comment: RevTex, 6 pages, 10 figures, Two Column format, submitted to Phys. Rev.

Overview of the 1st international competition on plagiarism detection

The 1st International Competition on Plagiarism Detection, held in conjunction with the 3rd PAN workshop on Uncovering Plagiarism, Authorship, and Social Software Misuse, brought together researchers from many disciplines around the exciting retrieval task of automatic plagiarism detection. The competition was divided into the subtasks external plagiarism detection and intrinsic plagiarism detection, which were tackled by 13 participating groups. An important by-product of the competition is an evaluation framework for plagiarism detection, which consists of a large-scale plagiarism corpus and detection quality measures. The framework may serve as a unified test environment to compare future plagiarism detection research. In this paper we describe the corpus design and the quality measures, survey the detection approaches developed by the participants, and compile the achieved performance results of the competitors

Overview of the 2nd international competition on plagiarism detection

This paper overviews 18 plagiarism detectors that have been developed and evaluated within PAN'10. We start with a unified retrieval process that summarizes the best practices employed this year. Then, the detectors' performances are evaluated in detail, highlighting several important aspects of plagiarism detection, such as obfuscation, intrinsic vs. external plagiarism, and plagiarism case length. Finally, all results are compared to those of last year's competition

Overview of the 3rd international competition on plagiarism detection

This paper overviews eleven plagiarism detectors that have been developed and evaluated within PAN'11. We survey the detection approaches developed for the two sub-tasks "external plagiarism detection" and "intrinsic plagiarism detection," and we report on their detailed evaluation based on the third revised edition of the PAN plagiarism corpus PAN-PC-11

Fracture healing following high energy tibial trauma: Ilizarov versus Taylor Spatial Frame

Introduction: The optimal treatment of high energy tibial fractures remains controversial and a challenging orthopaedic problem. The role of external fi xators for all these tibial fractures has been shown to be crucial. Methods: A fi ve-year consecutive series was reviewed retrospectively, identifying two treatment groups: Ilizarov and Taylor Spatial Frame (TSF; Smith & Nephew, Memphis, TN, US). Fracture healing time was the primary outcome measure. Results: A total of 112 patients (85 Ilizarov, 37 TSF) were identifi ed for the review with a mean age of 45 years. This was higher in women (57 years) than in men (41 years). There was no signifi cant difference between frame types (p=0.83). The median healing time was 163 days in both groups. There was no signifi cant difference in healing time between smokers and non-smokers (180 vs 165 days respectively, p=0.07), open or closed fractures (p=0.13) or age and healing time (Spearman's r=0.12, p=0.18). There was no incidence of non-union or re-fracture following frame removal in either group. Conclusions: Despite the assumption of the rigid construct of the TSF, the median time to union was similar to that of the Ilizarov frame and the TSF therefore can play a signifi cant role in complex tibial fractures