Credit derivatives disclosure in banks’ risk reporting: empirical evidence from four large European banks.

Risk disclosure, and credit derivatives disclosure particularly, is a pivotal topic in banking. The attention on banking risks and risk reporting has improved enormously in the last times due to the turmoil in the financial systems, the growing regulatory and accounting requirements in the banking industry, and the growing complexity of banking activity, especially large and multi-business banks. In this paper we make an empirical analysis on credit derivatives disclosure with reference to four largest European banks, using the content analysis as a research method. The paper shows that different aspects of derivative disclosure can be improved, discusses some policy and theoretical implications, and provides some useful suggestions for further research

Bases cérébrales du conflit visuo-auditif spatial et sémantique : études en IRM fonctionnelle et EEG

Pour interagir de manière efficace avec notre environnement, nous créons une représentation du monde dans lequel nous évoluons à partir d'informations issues de plusieurs de nos sens. Lorsque ces informations sont contradictoires, le conflit engendré peut se manifester par une dégradation du niveau de notre performance. Dans ce travail de recherche, nous nous sommes intéressés au conflit visuo-auditif et à l'une de ses conséquences : l'insensibilité aux alarmes auditives parfois observée chez les pilotes d'avion. Les questions qui ont motivé cette recherche sont les suivantes : Quelles sont les structures cérébrales impliquées dans la gestion de ce conflit ? A quelle étape des processus sensorimoteurs et cognitifs ces différentes structures interviennent-elles ? Quels processus physiologiques peuvent expliquer l'insensibilité aux alarmes sonores observée chez le pilote d'avion dans une phase de vol cruciale, l'atterrissage ? Nous avons mis en évidence que la gestion du conflit visuo-auditif implique un réseau cérébral pariéto-frontal supramodal. Nous avons également montré que des mécanismes attentionnels et pré-attentionnels peuvent modifier la façon dont le cerveau perçoit certaines informations, et ce, à travers des interactions multimodales à différentes échelles du traitement sensori-moteur. De plus, nous proposons un modèle simplifié du fonctionnement du réseau cérébral impliqué dans la gestion du conflit visuo-auditif. Enfin, nous avons pu mettre en évidence que l'insensibilité aux alarmes chez le pilote était à la fois liée à une modulation pré-attentionnelle du signal auditif, et à la complexité de la prise de décision dans un contexte difficile.The human cognitive system receives environmental information through multiple sensory channels. Most of the time, the channels provide congruent content, the integration of which helps build an unified perception of the world, but sometimes the environment provides inconsistent stimuli that perturb efficient interpretation. These situations generate a conflict associated with a behavioral cost, and sometimes severe consequences. In this research, we were interested in the visuo-auditory conflict and one of its consequences: the insensitivity to auditory alarms, sometimes observed in pilots. These were the questions that motivated this research: What are the brain structures involved in this conflict management? When do they act during the sensorimotor and cognitive processes? What are the physiological processes that may explain the insensitivity to auditory alarms sometimes observed in pilots during the landing, phase of the flight? We showed that the parieto-frontal network involved in unimodal conflict management is also involved in visual-auditory conflict. We also showed that both attentional and pre-attentional mechanisms can modify our perception. These modulations occur through multimodal interactions at different levels of the sensorimotor processing. Lastly, we showed that the insensitivity to alarms in pilots was related to both a pre-attentional modulation of auditory signal and to decision making difficulty in a complex environment. We finally proposed a simplified model of the functioning of the brain network involved in visual-auditory conflict management

European Banking Union and bank risk disclosure: the effects of the Single Supervisory Mechanism

This paper provides evidence on the impact of European Banking Union (BU) and the asso- ciated Single Supervisory Mechanism (SSM) on the risk disclosure practices of European banks. The onset of BU and the associated rules are considered as an exogenous shock that provides the setting for a natural experiment to analyze the effects of the new supervisory arrangements on bank risk disclosure practices. A Difference-in-Differences approach is adopted, building evidence from the disclosure practices of systemically important banks supervised by the European Central Bank (ECB) and other banks supervised by national regulators over the period 2012–2017. The main findings are that bank risk disclosure increased overall following BU but there was a weakening of disclosure by SSM-super- vised banks relative to banks supervised by national authorities. We also find that the over- all positive effect of the BU on bank disclosure is stronger for less profitable banks and in the most troubled economies of the Eurozone (GIPSI countries), while the negative effect on centrally supervised banks is stronger if bank CEOs act also as chairmen (CEO duality). We interpret these findings in light of the fact that the new institutional arrangements for bank supervision under which the ECB relies on local supervisors to collect the information necessary to act gives rise to inefficiencies with respect to the speed and completeness of the information flow between SSM supervised banks and the ECB, which are reflected in bank disclosure practices

capital regulation and italian banking system theory and empirical evidence

This paper aims to investigate the role of capital for banking institutions and provide an empirical analysis on large Italian banks' capital adequacy. The paper is organized as follows. The first section introduces to the issue of the paper. The second section explains why the capital is important in the economics of banking firm. The paper reviews the theoretical literature on bank capital regulation. Empirical results on large Italian banks are reported on the third section. The final section contains summary and concluding comments

Évaluation et modulation des fonctions exécutives en neuroergonomie - Continuums cognitifs et expérimentaux

Des études en neuroergonomie ont montré que le pilote d’avion pouvait commettre des erreurs en raison d’une incapacité transitoire à faire preuve de flexibilité mentale. Il apparait que certains facteurs, tels qu’une forte charge mentale ou une pression temporelle importante, un niveau de stress trop élevé, la survenue de conflits, ou une perte de conscience de la situation, peuvent altérer temporairement l’efficience des fonctions exécutives permettant cette flexibilité. Depuis mes travaux initiaux, dans lesquels je me suis intéressé aux conditions qui conduisent à une négligence auditive, j’ai souhaité développer une approche scientifique visant à quantifier et limiter les effets délétères de ces différents facteurs. Ceci a été fait à travers l’étude des fonctions exécutives chez l’être humain selon le continuum cognitif (du cerveau lésé au cerveau en parfait état de fonctionnement) et le continuum expérimental (de l’ordinateur au monde réel). L’approche fondamentale de l’étude des fonctions exécutives en neurosciences combinée à l’approche neuroergonomique graduelle avec des pilotes et des patients cérébro-lésés, a permis de mieux comprendre la manière dont ces fonctions sont mises en jeu et altérées. Cette connaissance à contribuer par la suite à la mise en place de solutions pour préserver leur efficacité en situation complexe. Après avoir rappelé mon parcours académique, je présente dans ce manuscrit une sélection de travaux répartis sur trois thématiques de recherche. La première concerne l’étude des fonctions exécutives impliquées dans l’attention et en particulier la façon dont la charge perceptive et la charge mentale peuvent altérer ces fonctions. La deuxième correspond à un aspect plus appliqué de ces travaux avec l’évaluation de l’état du pilote. Il a été question d’analyser cet état selon l’activité de pilotage elle-même ou à travers la gestion et la supervision d’un système en particulier. La troisième et dernière thématique concerne la recherche de marqueurs prédictifs de la performance cognitive et l’élaboration d’entraînements cognitifs pour limiter les troubles dysexécutifs, qu’ils soient d’origine contextuelle ou lésionnelle. Ces travaux ont contribué à une meilleure compréhension des troubles cognitifs transitoires ou chroniques, mais ils ont aussi soulevé des questions auxquelles je souhaite répondre aujourd’hui. Pour illustrer cette réflexion, je présente en dernière partie de ce document mon projet de recherche qui vise à développer une approche multifactorielle de l’efficience cognitive, éthique et en science ouverte

project finance in the energy industry new debt based financing models

The paper aims to examine the development of new financing models for project finance to attract private investors to finance large European energy infrastructure projects. In particular, the paper investigates the uniqueness of the project finance as a rapidly growing field in finance, the financial characteristics of the project bond market as one of the vehicles for funding energy projects, and the role of the credit support provided by the European Investment Bank and the European Union to promote the bond-based financing schemes. The paper is organized as follows. Section 1 provides a general description of project finance. Section 2 identifies the economic reasons for using project finance and assesses the role of the project bond market to fund project finance in the energy industry. Section 3 evaluates the proposed financial support from the European Investment Bank and the European Union to boost the European project bond market. Final sections discuss policy implications and conclude

Dodatni nalaz rasprostranjenosti Seriola fasciata (Carangidae) u Sredozemnom moru

An additional record of the non-indigenous species (NIS) Seriola fasciata from the southern coast of Sicily (Central Mediterranean Sea) is here described in this note. The catch record is the first in the area and confirms the key role of the area for NIS spreading. In addition, an updated map of its spatial distribution is provided as well as a discussion on the possible misidentification and competition with the native greater amberjack Seriola dumerili.U ovoj je bilješci opisan dodatni nalaz o vrsti Seriola fasciata s južne obale Sicilije (Sredozemno more). Ovaj nalaz je prvi na tom području i potvrđuje ključnu ulogu područja za širenje stranih vrsta (NIS). Osim toga, prikazana je ažurirana karta prostorne raspodjele vrste Seriola fasciata, kao i rasprava o mogućoj pogrešnoj identifikaciji i kompeticiji s vrstom Seriola dumerili

Real-Time State Estimation in a Flight Simulator Using fNIRS

Working memory is a key executive function for flying an aircraft. This function is particularly critical when pilots have to recall series of air traffic control instructions. However, working memory limitations may jeopardize flight safety. Since the functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) method seems promising for assessing working memory load, our objective is to implement an on-line fNIRS-based inference system that integrates two complementary estimators. The first estimator is a real-time state estimation MACD-based algorithm dedicated to identifying the pilot’s instantaneous mental state (not-on-task vs. on-task). It does not require a calibration process to perform its estimation. The second estimator is an on-line SVM-based classifier that is able to discriminate task difficulty (low working memory load vs. high working memory load). These two estimators were tested with 19 pilots who were placed in a realistic flight simulator and were asked to recall air traffic control instructions. We found that the estimated pilot’s mental state matched significantly better than chance with the pilot’s real state (62% global accuracy, 58% specificity, and 72% sensitivity). The second estimator, dedicated to assessing single trial working memory loads, led to 80% classification accuracy, 72% specificity, and 89% sensitivity. These two estimators establish reusable blocks for further fNIRS-based passive brain computer interface development

"Automation Surprise" in Aviation

Conflicts between the pilot and the automation, when pilots detect but do not understand them, cause “automation sur- prise” situations and jeopardize flight safety. We conducted an experiment in a 3-axis motion flight simulator with 16 pi- lots equipped with an eye-tracker to analyze their behavior and eye movements during the occurrence of such a situation. The results revealed that this conflict engages participant’s at- tentional abilities resulting in excessive and inefficient visual search patterns. This experiment confirmed the crucial need to design solutions for detecting the occurrence of conflict- ual situations and to assist the pilots. We therefore proposed an approach to formally identify the occurrence of “automa- tion surprise” conflicts based on the analysis of “silent mode changes” of the autopilot. A demonstrator was implemented and allowed for the automatic trigger of messages in the cock- pit that explains the autopilot behavior. We implemented a real-time demonstrator that was tested as a proof-of-concept with 7 subjects facing 3 different conflicts with automation. The results shown the efficacy of this approach which could be implemented in existing cockpits

Effects of the audiovisual conflict on auditory early processes

Auditory alarm misperception is one of the critical events that lead aircraft pilots to an erroneous flying decision. The rarity of these alarmsassociatedwith their possible unreliabilitymay play a role in thismisperception. In order to investigate this hypothesis, we manipulated both audiovisual conflict and sound rarity in a simplified landing task. Behavioral data and event related potentials (ERPs) of thirteen healthy participants were analyzed. We found that the presentation of a rare auditory signal (i.e. an alarm), incongruent with visual information, led to a smaller amplitude of the auditory N100 (i.e. less negative) compared to the condition in which both signals were congruent.Moreover, the incongruity between the visual information and the rare sound did not significantly affect reaction times, suggesting that the rare sound was neglected. We propose that the lower N100 amplitude reflects an early visual-to-auditory gating that depends on the rarity of the sound. In complex aircraft environments, this early effect might be partly responsible for auditory alarm insensitivity. Our results provide a new basis for future aeronautic studies and the development of countermeasures