Board Composition, Political Connections and Performance in State-Owned Enterprises

This paper analyses the effects of board composition on the behaviour and performance of a sample of 114 Italian local public utilities, for which information about 1630 directors during 1994-2004 has been collected. This period is particularly interesting because of the legal changes that forced many firms to alter their juridical form and allowed the entrance of private investors. We investigate whether board size and/or board composition do affect decisions about employment and how they ultimately impact on performance. Our main findings indicate that politically connected directors, representing the state or the local municipality, dominate boards of directors in the Italian public utilities in the period under investigation. Politically connected directors exert a positive and significant effect on employment, while they impact negatively on performance.board size; board composition; politicians; local public utilities

Euskararen etxea

Reseña bibliográfica de la obra "Euskararen etxea" de Pello Salaburu. Lo que el autor trata de transmitir con esta obra es que el euskera ha avanzado muchísimo en los últimos años pero los costes personales y económicos de este crecimiento han sido enormes

Geometric mechanics and Hamilton-Jacobi theory

A review of analytical mechanics in the language of differential geometry is given. The classical formulations of Newton, Lagrange and Hamilton are discussed in detail, with special interest in the Hamilton-Jacobi equation. The latter is studied in a new framework, which allows to identify the interesting geometric structures underlying the classical Hamilton-Jacobi theory. Some relevant examples are analysed in this context

Representation of Energy Bands in a 1D Periodic Potential

The quantum mechanical equations that determine the electronic band structure of a perfectly periodic material can be approximately solved by truncation of the Fourier series of the interaction potential. For didactic purpose, a user friendly interface has been developed, designed to represent the bands arising from an adjustable spatially periodic potential in one dimension. In this work, we describe the use of the interface and apply the program to the particular case of an optical lattice.2015/201

Implantacio d’un nou pla d’estudis d’electricitat industrial i automatismes a un centre de formació professional a Conakry mitjançant el desenvolupament de nous laboratoris i la formació de professors i personal tècnic

La present memòria explica la feina realitzada per dos alumnes de l’ETSEIB-UPC en un centre de formació professional a Conakry (capital de Guinea). Aquesta feina es va dur a terme entre octubre del 2006 i juliol del 2007 en un centre que pertany a La Salle. La feina dels projectistes continua el treball realitzat per quatre estudiants de l’ETSEIB-UPC que hi van treballar amb anterioritat. La idea de fer aquest projecte a Conakry sorgeix de l’ONGD ETNIA que té com a objectiu fomentar l’ensenyament tècnic a l’Àfrica. És aquesta organització qui es posa en contacte amb La Salle i amb el Departament d’Enginyeria Elèctrica i el CITCEA-UPC, demanant-ne la seva col·laboració. La feina dels autors es va centrar en l’especialitat d’electricitat industrial impartida al centre i va consistir en la preparació de diferent material didàctic, en la formació d’alguns professors i en la preparació de cursos per a empreses. Una de les tasques més importants va ser la confecció de diverses plataformes didàctiques amb les seves corresponents pràctiques. Aquestes pràctiques a part de ser les que s’inclouen al nou pla d’estudis es feien servir per a la formació dels professors. Es poden dividir en tres grans grups: lògica cablejada, autòmats industrials i variadors de freqüència. L’especialitat d’electricitat industrial feia anys que existia al centre, però se l’ha volgut dotar de nou material i continguts així com donar-li un altre enfoc per a actualitzar els continguts de l’assignatura. Aquesta memòria presenta la feina realitzada separant-la en dues parts. Una part que es podria qualificar com a social on s’inclou informació de la situació actual del país, del funcionament del centre, de l’abast i objectius del projecte, del funcionament de les classes impartides...etc i una altra part on es tracta la part més purament tècnica de la feina, on s’expliquen les plataformes que s’han fet

Extreme points of Lorenz and ROC curves with applications to inequality analysis

We find the extreme points of the set of convex functions ℓ : [0,1] → [0,1] with a fixed area and ℓ(0) = 0, ℓ(1) = 1. This collection is formed by Lorenz curves with a given value of their Gini index. The analogous set of concave functions can be viewed as Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curves. These functions are extensively used in economics (inequality and risk analysis) and machine learning (evaluation of the performance of binary classifiers). We also compute the maximal L1-distance between two Lorenz (or ROC) curves with specified Gini coefficients. This result allows us to introduce a bidimensional index to compare two of such curves, in a more informative and insightful manner than with the usual unidimensional measures considered in the literature (Gini index or area under the ROC curve). The analysis of real income microdata illustrates the practical use of this proposed index in statistical inferenceA. Baíllo and J. Cárcamo are supported by the Spanish MCyT grant PID2019-109387GB-I00. C. MoraCorral is supported by the Spanish MCyT grant MTM2017-85934-C3-2-

Editorial of the special issue on advanced electrochemical technologies for environmental applications

This special issue of Separation and Purification Technology gathers 27 articles, which are related to keynotes and oral or poster presentations at the 2nd European Workshop of Electrochemical Engineering entitled ‘New Bridges for a New Knowledge on Electrochemical Engineering’. The workshop was held from 1st to 5th October 2017 in Barcelona (Spain), as a Joint Event of the 10th World Congress of Chemical Engineering (WCCE10). This congress was promoted by the World Chemical Engineering Council (WCEC), the European Federation of Chemical Engineering (EFCE) and the European Society of Biochemical Engineering Sciences (ESBES) to approach researchers and specialists in all areas of chemical engineering and to improve their strategy for the development of innovative processes that will be vital for the society of tomorrow. The joint event was promoted by the Working Party on Electrochemical Engineering (WPEE) of the EFCE and co-organized with the Spanish Excellence Network on Environmental and Energy Applications of the Electrochemical Technology (thus being the 2nd Workshop of E3TECH Network). It took place at Fira de Barcelona, one of the most important trade fair institutions in Europe

La constancia de la inscripción registral del aplazamiento del pago

Encontramos que se puede pactar en una compraventa de bienes inmuebles el pago a plazos. El problema se encuentra en que, entre partes, la solución de este pacto es más o menos sencilla, pero cuando intervienen terceros se complica la relación jurídica. El mejor método de protección frente a terceros o, por decirlo de otro modo, el mejor método que tienen los terceros para protegerse es el Registro de la Propiedad mediante la fe pública registral que hace que, confiando en lo que se encuentra en los asientos, un tercero pueda actuar de una manera u otra dependiendo de las cargas que contenga la finca, pues el fin primordial del Registro de la Propiedad es dar a conocer la vida de las fincas que se inscriban en la institución administrativa. Siendo así, el art. 11 LH, que regula la inscripción de los aplazamientos del pago, indica que, a no ser que se inscriba con una garantía como es la condición resolutoria expresa o la hipoteca, no perjudicará a los terceros, y de ahí la importancia de inscribir el aplazamiento del pago garantizado con condición resolutoria expresa, para desplegar toda la eficacia que conlleva la inscripción en el Registro de la Propiedad.We find that it is possible to agree in a trade of real property their payment in installments. The problem lies in the fact that the solutions are quite simple between the parts, but when third parties intervene, the legal relationship gets complicated. The best way of protection against third parties, or the best way for third parties to protect themselves, is the Land Registry through the public registry faith. By relying on what is found in the entries, it makes the third party to act in one way or another depending on the charges contained in the property in order to constitute, or not, a right over it, since the primary purpose of the Land Registry is that the life of the properties registered in the administrative institution are made known. Thus, art. 11 LH, which regulates the registration of payment continuance, indicates that unless it is registered with a guarantee such as the express resolutory condition or the mortgage, it will not be prejudicial to third parties. Hence the importance of registering the payment continuance with an express resolutory condition, in order to deploy all the effectiveness that the registration in the Land Registry entails.Departamento de Derecho CivilGrado en Derech

Banks' ownership structure, risk and performance

This paper studies empirically the effect of ownership concentration on the risk and performance of commercial banks, controlling for shareholders protection laws, bank regulations, and other country and bank specific traits. The sample used comprises 795 banks of 47 countries, in the period from 1997 to 2007. Our main finding is the existence of a cubic relationship between ownership concentration and bank performance. Such evidence is supportive of theoretical hypotheses of effective monitoring at low levels of ownership concentration, expropriation or losses connected to managerial discretion at moderate ownership concentration, and high costs of expropriation at high levels of ownership concentration. We also find that ownership concentration is more important to increase the performance of banks with low concentrated ownership structures, when legal protection of shareholders is low, and that capital regulations stringency is effective in simultaneously reducing risk and improving performance of banks. Regarding bank risk, we find a U-shape relationship between ownership concentration and earnings volatility, supporting that shareholder’s incentive to take risk prevails when her equity stake is above a threshold.The authors wish to thank the financial support of the Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnologia (grant # SEJ2006- 09401)