Oligarchs, political regime changes, and firm valuation

This paper examines the impact of a regime shift on the valuation of politically powerful oligarch firms. Focusing on the Yeltsin-Putin regime shift in Russia, we find that the valuations of outside shareholders claims are significantly higher under the Putin regime than under the Yeltsin regime after controlling for industry and time effects. The findings suggest that the increasing cost of extracting private benefits outweigh the reduction in the value of political connections following the political regime change. The results are also consistent with changes in the risk of state expropriation. Our results show that effects driven by the political regime change complement the traditional view stating that increased ownership concentration improved the performance of Russian oligarch firms.

From Francovich to Köbler and beyond : The evolution of a State liability regime for the EC

The aim of this paper is to present the evolution of the Francovich doctrine within the European legal order. The first part deals with the gradual development of the ECJ's case law on State liability in damages for breach of EC law. Starting from the seminal Francovich and Brasserie du Pêcheur, the clarification of the criteria set by the Court is attempted with reference to subsequent case law, whereas issues concerning the extent and form of the compensation owned are also mentioned. The second part concerns one of the more recent developments in the field, namely State liability for breaches of Community law attributed to national judiciary. The Court's ruling in Köbler is examined in connection with two other recent judgments, namely Commission v. Italy of 2003 and Kühne & Heitz, as an attempt of the ECJ to reframe its relationships with national supreme courts and appropriate for itself the position of the Supreme Court in the European legal order. The implications on State liability claims by the ruling in Commission v. France of 1997 constitute the theme of the third part, where it is submitted that Member States can also be held liable for disregard of Community law by private individuals within their respected territories. To this extent, Schmidberger is viewed as a manifestation of this opinion, with fundamental rights acquiring a new dimension, being invoked by the States, contra the individuals as a shield to liability claims. Finally, the third part examines the relationship between the Francovich doctrine and the principle of legal certainty and concludes that the solutions employed by the ECJ have been both predictable and acceptable by the national legal orders. Keywords: State liability, damages, Francovich, Köbler, Schmidberger

The Macroeconomic Effects of Fiscal Policy in a Small Open Economy under a Flexible Exchange Rate Regime

This licentiate's thesis analyzes the macroeconomic effects of fiscal policy in a small open economy under a flexible exchange rate regime, assuming that the government spends exclusively on domestically produced goods. The motivation for this research comes from the observation that the literature on the new open economy macroeconomics (NOEM) has focused almost exclusively on two-country global models and the analyses of the effects of fiscal policy on small economies are almost completely ignored. This thesis aims at filling in the gap in the NOEM literature and illustrates how the macroeconomic effects of fiscal policy in a small open economy depend on the specification of preferences. The research method is to present two theoretical model that are extensions to the model contained in the Appendix to Obstfeld and Rogoff (1995). The first model analyzes the macroeconomic effects of fiscal policy, making use of a model that exploits the idea of modelling private and government consumption as substitutes in private utility. The model offers intuitive predictions on how the effects of fiscal policy depend on the marginal rate of substitution between private and government consumption. The findings illustrate that the higher the substitutability between private and government consumption, (i) the bigger is the crowding out effect on private consumption (ii) and the smaller is the positive effect on output. The welfare analysis shows that the less fiscal policy decreases welfare the higher is the marginal rate of substitution between private and government consumption. The second model of this thesis studies how the macroeconomic effects of fiscal policy depend on the elasticity of substitution between traded and nontraded goods. This model reveals that this elasticity a key variable to explain the exchange rate, current account and output response to a permanent rise in government spending. Finally, the model demonstrates that temporary changes in government spending are an effective stabilization tool when used wisely and timely in response to undesired fluctuations in output. Undesired fluctuations in output can be perfectly offset by an opposite change in government spending without causing any side-effects.

Measurement of the WW+WZ Production Cross Section Using the lepton+jets Final State at CDF II

We report two complementary measurements of the WW+WZ cross section in the final state consisting of an electron or muon, missing transverse energy, and jets, performed using p\bar{p} collision data at sqrt{s} = 1.96 TeV collected by the CDF II detector. The first method uses the dijet invariant mass distribution while the second more sensitive method uses matrix-element calculations. The result from the second method has a signal significance of 5.4 sigma and is the first observation of WW+WZ production using this signature. Combining the results gives sigma_{WW+WZ} = 16.0 +/- 3.3 pb, in agreement with the standard model prediction.

Search for WW and WZ production in lepton plus jets final state at CDF

We present a search for WW and WZ production in final states that contain a charged lepton (electron or muon) and at least two jets, produced in sqrt(s) = 1.96 TeV ppbar collisions at the Fermilab Tevatron, using data corresponding to 1.2 fb-1 of integrated luminosity collected with the CDF II detector. Diboson production in this decay channel has yet to be observed at hadron colliders due to the large single W plus jets background. An artificial neural network has been developed to increase signal sensitivity, as compared with an event selection based on conventional cuts. We set a 95% confidence level upper limit of sigma_{WW}* BR(W->lnu,W->jets)+ sigma_{WZ}*BR(W->lnu,Z->jets)

First Observation of Vector Boson Pairs in a Hadronic Final State at the Tevatron Collider

We present the first observation in hadronic collisions of the electroweak production of vector boson pairs (VV, V=W, Z) where one boson decays to a dijet final state. The data correspond to 3.5  fb-1 of integrated luminosity of pp̅ collisions at √s=1.96  TeV collected by the CDF II detector at the Fermilab Tevatron. We observe 1516±239(stat)±144(syst) diboson candidate events and measure a cross section σ(pp̅ →VV+X) of 18.0±2.8(stat)±2.4(syst)±1.1(lumi)  pb, in agreement with the expectations of the standard model.

Measurement of the b-hadron production cross section using decays to μ-D0X final states in pp̅ collisions at √s=1.96 TeV

We report a measurement of the production cross section for b hadrons in pp̅ collisions at √s=1.96  TeV. Using a data sample derived from an integrated luminosity of 83  pb-1 collected with the upgraded Collider Detector (CDF II) at the Fermilab Tevatron, we analyze b hadrons, Hb, partially reconstructed in the semileptonic decay mode Hb→μ-D0X. Our measurement of the inclusive production cross section for b hadrons with transverse momentum pT>9  GeV/c and rapidity |y|<0.6 is σ=1.30  μb±0.05  μb(stat)±0.14  μb(syst)±0.07  μb(B), where the uncertainties are statistical, systematic, and from branching fractions, respectively. The differential cross sections dσ/dpT are found to be in good agreement with recent measurements of the Hb cross section and well described by fixed-order next-to-leading logarithm predictions.

First Observation of Vector Boson Pairs in a Hadronic Final State at the Tevatron Collider

We present the first observation in hadronic collisions of the electroweak production of vector boson pairs (VV, V=W,Z) where one boson decays to a dijet final state . The data correspond to 3.5 inverse femtobarns of integrated luminosity of ppbar collisions at sqrt(s)=1.96 TeV collected by the CDFII detector at the Fermilab Tevatron. We observe 1516+/-239(stat)+/-144(syst) diboson candidate events and measure a cross section sigma(ppbar->VV+X) of 18.0+/-2.8(stat)+/-2.4(syst)+/-1.1(lumi) pb, in agreement with the expectations of the standard model.

Measurement of the b-hadron production cross section using decays to μ-D0X final states in pp̅ collisions at √s=1.96 TeV

We report a measurement of the production cross section for b hadrons in pp̅ collisions at √s=1.96  TeV. Using a data sample derived from an integrated luminosity of 83  pb-1 collected with the upgraded Collider Detector (CDF II) at the Fermilab Tevatron, we analyze b hadrons, Hb, partially reconstructed in the semileptonic decay mode Hb→μ-D0X. Our measurement of the inclusive production cross section for b hadrons with transverse momentum pT>9  GeV/c and rapidity |y|<0.6 is σ=1.30  μb±0.05  μb(stat)±0.14  μb(syst)±0.07  μb(B), where the uncertainties are statistical, systematic, and from branching fractions, respectively. The differential cross sections dσ/dpT are found to be in good agreement with recent measurements of the Hb cross section and well described by fixed-order next-to-leading logarithm predictions.

Measurement of the b-hadron production cross section using decays to μ-D0X final states in pp̅ collisions at √s=1.96 TeV

We report a measurement of the production cross section for b hadrons in p-pbar collisions at sqrt{s}=1.96 TeV. Using a data sample derived from an integrated luminosity of 83 pb^-1 collected with the upgraded Collider Detector (CDF II) at the Fermilab Tevatron, we analyze b hadrons, H_b, partially reconstructed in the semileptonic decay mode H_b -> mu^- D^0 X. Our measurement of the inclusive production cross section for b hadrons with transverse momentum p_T > 9 GeV/c and rapidity |y|

Method-MS, final report 2010

Radiometric determination methods, such as alpha spectrometry require long counting times when low activities are to be determined. Mass spectrometric techniques as Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS), Thermal Ionisation Mass Spectrometry (TIMS) and Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (AMS) have shown several advantages compared to traditional methods when measuring long-lived radionuclides. Mass spectrometric methods for determination of very low concentrations of elemental isotopes, and thereby isotopic ratios, have been developed using a variety of ion sources. Although primarily applied to the determination of the lighter stable element isotopes and radioactive isotopes in geological studies, the techniques can equally well be applied to the measurement of activity concentrations of long-lived low-level radionuclides in various samples using “isotope dilution” methods such as those applied in inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). Due to the low specific activity of long-lived radionuclides, many of these are more conveniently detected using mass spectrometric techniques. Mass spectrometry also enables the individual determination of Pu-239 and Pu-240, which cannot be obtained by alpha spectrometry. Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS) are rapidly growing techniques for the ultra-trace analytical determination of stable and long-lived isotopes and have a wide potential within environmental science, including ecosystem tracers and radio ecological studies. Such instrumentation, of course needs good radiochemical separation, to give best performance. The objectives of the project is to identify current needs and problems within low-level determination of long-lived radioisotopes by ICP-MS, to perform intercalibration and development and improvement of ICP-MS methods for the measurement of radionuclides and isotope ratios and to develop new methods based on modified separation chemistry applied to new auxiliary equipment.

Search for the Higgs boson in the all-hadronic final state using the CDF II detector

We report on a search for the production of the Higgs boson decaying to two bottom quarks accompanied by two additional quarks. The data sample used corresponds to an integrated luminosity of approximately 4  fb-1 of pp̅ collisions at √s=1.96  TeV recorded by the CDF II experiment. This search includes twice the integrated luminosity of the previous published result, uses analysis techniques to distinguish jets originating from light flavor quarks and those from gluon radiation, and adds sensitivity to a Higgs boson produced by vector boson fusion. We find no evidence of the Higgs boson and place limits on the Higgs boson production cross section for Higgs boson masses between 100  GeV/c2 and 150  GeV/c2 at the 95% confidence level. For a Higgs boson mass of 120  GeV/c2, the observed (expected) limit is 10.5 (20.0) times the predicted standard model cross section.