The Overlap of Cross Sectional and Time Series Momentum Strategies

This paper contributes to existing literature by providing an analysis of combined time series momentum and cross sectional momentum strategies in the Dow Jones Industrial Average from February, 1991 to December, 2015. Combined momentum strategies are shown to not outperform cross sectional momentum strategies, and all momentum strategies tested are shown to under perform the market index. The twelve month historical return serves as the foundation from which the momentum strategies are formulated. Holding periods discussed in this paper include portfolio’s offset by one month from the historical return calculations . Momentum results during the time period analyzed are driven primarily by positive moment um returns, demonstrated in long only position portfolios outperforming short only position portfolios. This paper concludes in line with existing research that momentum portfolios perform best with an offset period due to observed short term momentum reversal. This paper adds a theoretical analysis of the weaknesses associated with pure cross sectional and pure time series momentum strategies, as well as an analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of a combined momentum strategy

The Impact of Privatization on Economic Growth and Income Inequality in Developing Countries

In the 1960s and 1970s academicians, economists and politicians favored state ownership over private ownership in the production and provision of goods and services. By the end of the 1980s, however, there was a reversal of public policy from state domination of the production and provision of goods and services to private ownership and operation. This was due in part to what the World Bank referred to as state failure”, which was characterized by inefficient service delivery, unprofitable SOEs, high government debt, and stagnant economic growth rates. Accordingly, privatization caught on in many countries as a policy tool to foster efficiency, encourage investment, free public resources for investment in infrastructure and social programs to enhance economic growth and distributional equity. In recent years, however, privatization has come under attack. The main criticism being that privatization results in the abuse of market power and social welfare losses. The perception of most people in the developing countries is that privatization usually benefits the rich at the expense of the poor in society. This study therefore is an attempt to empirically examine the claims and counter claims of the impact of privatization on economic growth and income distribution in developing countries. The study sample is made up of 80 developing countries that privatized their state-owned enterprises between 1991 and 2002. The findings of the study indicate that privatization did not have a significant impact on economic growth, but had differential effects on the distribution of income. The results of the study, however, suggest that country-specific characteristics, including good governance may be more important in promoting growth and reducing income inequality than any economic policy per se

Letter from Samuel Adams to City of San Francisco, 1912 Oct 16.

SECRETARY\u27S OFFLCFEDEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIORWASHINGTON, D. O.October 16, 1912.So the City of San Francisco, holder of a permits authorising it, under certain circumstances, to occupy and ate for municipal water supply purposes lands of the United States in the Hetch Hetchy Valley la the Yosemite national Park, California, and to all Person, Associations, sad Corporations appearing on the files of the Departments of the Interior as objectors to said permit:You, and each of you, are hereby notified that, inpursuance to requests by parties interested era! arguments inthe aforesaid matter will be held before the Secretary of theInterior at his office in Washington, D. C., on November 25,1912, at 10:30 AM, instead of on November 27, 1912, as hereto fore armounced.[illegible]Acting Secretary633

Electricity access and income inequality in South Africa : Evidence from Bayesian and NARDL analyses

Access to modern energy services including electricity is fundamental to fulfilling basic social needs, driving economic growth and fueling human development, hence, the pathway out of poverty to prosperity. This study examined the impact of income level, inequality in the distribution of income and the control of corruption on access to electricity from 1990-2017 in South Africa, using Bayesian and nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag (NARDL) estimation approach. The long-run asymmetric effects of income level reveal a positive impact on electricity access, thus, validating the initial positive symmetric effect. While income inequality has positive effect on accessibility, corruption appears to hinder the roadmap towards achieving energy for all. Even though economic development is crucial to materialize access to electricity, yet, efficient and effective financing and investment climate alone are not enough to warrant energy security, but, right policies, good governance and institutional quality.publishedVersionUnit Licence Agreemen

Electricity access, human development index, governance and income inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa

publishedVersionUnit License Agreemen

Spiritual Well Being, Religiosity, and Demographic Variables as Predictors of the Use of Christian Counseling Techniques Among Members of CAPS, U.S.A.

Despite the increasing attention being given to understanding the relationship between psychology and Christianity, there is little research investigating the actual practices of Christian psychotherapists. This study explored the use of Christian counseling techniques by Christian therapists. Specifically, it identified a set of variables which predicted the use of certain Christian counseling techniques among Christian therapist members of the Christian Association for Psychological studies (CAPS, USA) and described the range and frequency of their use. Participants were 450 randomly sampled, clinical members of CAPS. Of the 450 surveyed, 340 responded, resulting in a 76% return rate. The total sample was split in half to produce two sub samples, representing the developmental and cross-validation samples. The criterion (dependent) variable was the use of Christian counseling techniques represented by the global score from the Christian Counseling Techniques Inventory (CCTI). There were eleven predictor (independent) variables measuring Spiritual Well Being, Religiosity, and various demographic variables. Stepwise multiple regression analysis was used to identify the variables which best predicted CCTI scores. A regression analysis was performed on the developmental and crossvalidation samples, both of which produced significant predictor equations. The regression analysis on the developmental sample chose four significant predictor variables: Spiritual Well Being, Counselor Approach, Practice of Personal Religious Disciplines, and Gender, accounting for 22% of the total variance of Christian counseling technique use. The cross-validation procedure also produced a significant regression equation. Spiritual Well Being, Counselor Approach, and Practice of Personal Devotions entered the equation, accounting for 15% of the total variance. Although limited information is available on the reliability and validity of the CCTI and the sample was rather homogeneous, these results provide an important step in clarifying the place of Christian counseling techniques in therapy. The study revealed that CAPS therapists profess to be highly religious, report frequent use of Christian counseling techniques in their therapy practice, and are more likely to use these techniques if they have high spiritual well being, tend to be directive in their approach, and have personal devotions more frequently. Limitations of the study and recommendations for future research are included

Molecular Similarity and Xenobiotic Metabolism

MetaPrint2D, a new software tool implementing a data-mining approach for predicting sites of xenobiotic metabolism has been developed. The algorithm is based on a statistical analysis of the occurrences of atom centred circular fingerprints in both substrates and metabolites. This approach has undergone extensive evaluation and been shown to be of comparable accuracy to current best-in-class tools, but is able to make much faster predictions, for the first time enabling chemists to explore the effects of structural modifications on a compound’s metabolism in a highly responsive and interactive manner.MetaPrint2D is able to assign a confidence score to the predictions it generates, based on the availability of relevant data and the degree to which a compound is modelled by the algorithm.In the course of the evaluation of MetaPrint2D a novel metric for assessing the performance of site of metabolism predictions has been introduced. This overcomes the bias introduced by molecule size and the number of sites of metabolism inherent to the most commonly reported metrics used to evaluate site of metabolism predictions.This data mining approach to site of metabolism prediction has been augmented by a set of reaction type definitions to produce MetaPrint2D-React, enabling prediction of the types of transformations a compound is likely to undergo and the metabolites that are formed. This approach has been evaluated against both historical data and metabolic schemes reported in a number of recently published studies. Results suggest that the ability of this method to predict metabolic transformations is highly dependent on the relevance of the training set data to the query compounds.MetaPrint2D has been released as an open source software library, and both MetaPrint2D and MetaPrint2D-React are available for chemists to use through the Unilever Centre for Molecular Science Informatics website.----Boehringer-Ingelhie