Disclosure Frequency Induced Myopia and the Decision to be Public

This study examines whether disclosure frequency induced myopia influences the types of firms that go public and their choice of listing exchanges if they decide to do so. We find that the incentive to stay private in order to avoid disclosure frequency induced myopia creates a downward kink in the relation between the length of the cash conversion cycle and the proportion of public firms at the industry level around the time frame that corresponds to the mandatory reporting interval. Second, at the firm level, public firms with longer cash conversion cycles relative to industry peers are more likely to list on exchanges that require less frequent mandatory disclosure to minimize disclosure frequency induced myopia. Furthermore, when the mandatory reporting frequency increased from semi-annual to quarterly, we observe a sharper decline in the percentage of public firms from industries whose cash conversion cycles are between one quarter and two quarters relative to those from other industries both in the United States and in the United Kingdom

“À la Carte” versus “Prix Fixe” Regulation: Evidence from Investors’ and Managers’ Reactions to Post-IPO Provisions in the JOBS Act

Employing a unique retroactive application in regulation, we examine investors’ and managers’ reactions to a shock that introduces “à la carte” elements to the post-IPO mandatory framework. Relative to “prix fixe” mandates, à la carte elements shift the tradeoff between compliance costs and investor protection from regulators to the regulated firm, which enables local optimization. Upon the enactment of the JOBS Act, retro-activated emerging growth companies (EGCs) report higher short-window returns than the control group. Retro-activated EGCs’ return is lower when sales and sales growth rate are higher, both of which indicate a shorter expected duration of EGC status. Furthermore, managers act in investors’ interests and for their own benefit while using the à la carte elements in post-IPO years. The evidence suggests that investors perceive the benefits from local optimization associated with à la carte elements exceed potential costs from managerial opportunism and the loss of information and commitment

Trading incentives to meet the analyst forecast

We examine stock sales as a managerial incentive to help explain the discontinuity around the analyst forecast benchmark. We find that the likelihood of just meeting versus just missing the analyst forecast is strongly associated with subsequent managerial stock sales. Moreover, we provide evidence that managers manage earnings prior to just meeting the threshold and selling their shares. Finally, the relation between just meeting and subsequently selling shares does not hold for non-manager insiders, who arguably cannot affect the earnings outcome, and is weaker in the presence of an independent board, suggesting that good corporate governance mitigates this strategic behavior

Interactions of Water with Mineral Dust Aerosol: Water Adsorption, Hygroscopicity, Cloud Condensation, and Ice Nucleation

Mineral dust aerosol is one of the major types of aerosol present in the troposphere. The molecular level interactions of water vapor with mineral dust are of global significance. Hygroscopicity, light scattering and absorption, heterogneous reactivity and the ability to form clouds are all related to water–dust interactions. In this review article, experimental techniques to probe water interactions with dust and theoretical frameworks to understand these interactions are discussed. A comprehensive overview of laboratory studies of water adsorption, hygroscopicity, cloud condensation, and ice nucleation of fresh and atmspherically aged mineral dust particles is provided. Finally, we relate laboratory studies and theoretical simulations that provide fundemental insights into these processes on the molecular level with field measurements that illustrate the atmospheric significance of these processes. Overall, the details of water interactions with mineral dust are covered from multiple perspectives in this review article.United States. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Grant NNX13AO15G)Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Victor P. Starr Career Development Chai

Trading incentives to meet the analyst forecast

We examine stock sales as a managerial incentive to help explain the discontinuity around the analyst forecast benchmark. We find that the likelihood of just meeting versus just missing the analyst forecast is strongly associated with subsequent managerial stock sales. Moreover, we provide evidence that managers manage earnings prior to just meeting the threshold and selling their shares. Finally, the relation between just meeting and subsequently selling shares does not hold for non-manager insiders, who arguably cannot affect the earnings outcome, and is weaker in the presence of an independent board, suggesting that good corporate governance mitigates this strategic behavior

Monocyte chemoattractant protein-1 promotes macrophage-mediated tubular injury, but not glomerular injury, in nephrotoxic serum nephritis

Monocyte chemoattractant protein-1 (MCP-1) is upregulated in renal parenchymal cells during kidney disease. To investigate whether MCP-1 promotes tubular and/or glomerular injury, we induced nephrotoxic serum nephritis (NSN) in MCP-1 genetically deficient mice. Mice were analyzed when tubules and glomeruli were severely damaged in the MCP-1–intact strain (day 7). MCP-1 transcripts increased fivefold in MCP-1–intact mice. MCP-1 was predominantly localized within cortical tubules (90%), and most cortical tubules were damaged, whereas few glomerular cells expressed MCP-1 (10%). By comparison, there was a marked reduction (>40%) in tubular injury in MCP-1–deficient mice (histopathology, apoptosis). MCP-1–deficient mice were not protected from glomerular injury (histopathology, proteinuria, macrophage influx). Macrophage accumulation increased adjacent to tubules in MCP-1–intact mice compared with MCP-1–deficient mice (70%, P < 0.005), indicating that macrophages recruited by MCP-1 induce tubular epithelial cell (TEC) damage. Lipopolysaccharide-activated bone marrow macrophages released molecules that induced TEC death that was not dependent on MCP-1 expression by macrophages or TEC. In conclusion, MCP-1 is predominantly expressed by TEC and not glomeruli, promotes TEC and not glomerular damage, and increases activated macrophages adjacent to TEC that damage TEC during NSN. Therefore, we suggest that blockage of TEC MCP-1 expression is a therapeutic strategy for some forms of kidney disease.published_or_final_versio

Increased Numbers of IL-7 Receptor Molecules on CD4+CD25−CD107a+ T-Cells in Patients with Autoimmune Diseases Affecting the Central Nervous System

BACKGROUND: High content immune profiling in peripheral blood may reflect immune aberrations associated with inflammation in multiple sclerosis (MS) and other autoimmune diseases affecting the central nervous system. METHODS AND FINDINGS: Peripheral blood mononuclear cells from 46 patients with multiple sclerosis (MS), 9 patients diagnosed with relapsing remitting MS (RRMS), 13 with secondary progressive multiple sclerosis (SPMS), 9 with other neurological diseases (OND) and well as 15 healthy donors (HD) were analyzed by 12 color flow cytometry (TCRalphabeta, TCRgammadelta, CD4, CD8alpha, CD8beta, CD45RA, CCR7, CD27, CD28, CD107a, CD127, CD14) in a cross-sectional study to identify variables significantly different between controls (HD) and patients (OND, RRMS, SPMS). We analyzed 187 individual immune cell subsets (percentages) and the density of the IL-7 receptor alpha chain (CD127) on 59 individual immune phenotypes using a monoclonal anti-IL-7R antibody (clone R34.34) coupled to a single APC molecule in combination with an APC-bead array. A non-parametric analysis of variance (Kruskal-Wallis test) was conducted in order to test for differences among the groups in each of the variables. To correct for the multiplicity problem, the FDR correction was applied on the p-values. We identified 19 variables for immune cell subsets (percentages) which allowed to segregate healthy individuals and individuals with CNS disorders. We did not observe differences in the relative percentage of IL-7R-positive immune cells in PBMCs. In contrast, we identified significant differences in IL-7 density, measured on a single cell level, in 2/59 variables: increased numbers of CD127 molecules on TCRalphabeta+CD4+CD25 (intermed) T-cells and on TCRalphabeta+CD4+CD25-CD107a+ T-cells (mean: 28376 Il-7R binding sites on cells from HD, 48515 in patients with RRMS, 38195 in patients with SPMS and 33692 IL-7 receptor binding sites on cells from patients with OND). CONCLUSION: These data show that immunophenotyping represents a powerful tool to differentiate healthy individuals from individuals suffering from neurological diseases and that the number of IL-7 receptor molecules on differentiated TCRalphabeta+CD4+CD25-CD107a+ T-cells, but not the percentage of IL-7R-positive cells, segregates healthy individuals from patients with neurological disorders