O controle do endividamento público no Brasil: uma perspectiva comparada com os Estados Unidos II

Estudando o controle do endividamento público nos Estados Unidos, este trabalho examina a eficácia das restrições constitucionais e legais existentes naquele país, os fatores políticos que afetam o deficit públic e o nível do endividamento e ainda os mecanismos de controle das finanças públicas através do mercado.

Essays in corporate risk management

This research investigates the factors that lead Latin American non-financial firms to manage risks using derivatives. The main focus is on currency risk management. With this purpose, this thesis is divided into an introduction and two main chapters, which have been written as stand-alone papers. The first paper describes the results of a survey on derivatives usage and risk management responded by the CFOs of 74 Brazilian non-financial firms listed at the São Paulo Stock Exchange (BOVESPA), and the main evidence found is: i) larger firms are more likely to use financial derivatives; ii) foreign exchange risk is the most managed with derivatives; iii) Brazilian managers are more concerned with legal and institutional aspects in using derivatives, such as the taxation and accounting treatment of these instruments, than with issues related to implementing and maintaining a risk management program using derivatives. The second paper studies the determinants of risk management with derivatives in four Latin American countries (Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Mexico). I investigate not only the decision of whether to use financial derivatives or not, but also the magnitude of risk management, measured by the notional value of outstanding derivatives contracts. This is the first study, to the best of my knowledge, to use derivatives holdings information in emerging markets. The use of a multi-country setting allows the analysis of institutional and economic factors, such as foreign currency indebtedness, the high volatility of exchange rates, the instability of political and institutional framework and the development of financial markets, which are issues of second-order importance in developed markets. The main contribution of the second paper is on the understanding of the relationship among currency derivatives usage, foreign debt and the sensitivity of operational earnings to currency fluctuations in Latin American countries. Unlikely previous findings for US firms, my evidence shows that derivatives held by Latin American firms are capable of producing cash flows comparable to financial expenses and investments, showing that derivatives are key instruments in their risk management strategies. It is also the first work to show strong and robust evidence that firms that benefit from local currency devaluation (e.g. exporters) have a natural currency hedge for foreign debt that allows them to bear higher levels of debt in foreign currency. This implies that firms under this revenue-cost structure require lower levels of hedging with derivatives. The findings also provide evidence that large firms are more likely to use derivatives, but the magnitude of derivatives holdings seems to be unrelated to the size of the firm, consistent with findings for US firms.

Ativos intangíveis, valor da firma e estrutura de capital no Brasil

Nos últimos anos, a importância dos ativos intangíveis vem crescendo consideravelmente, em função de ser um dos principais determinantes da vantagem competitiva de uma companhia. A implantação da nova lei contábil no Brasil em 2007, com a obrigatoriedade de divulgação do montante de ativos intangíveis em separado pelas companhias de capital aberto, abriu espaço para a realização de novos estudos acerca desse tema. Esse trabalho analisa o impacto dos ativos intangíveis sobre o valor de mercado e endividamento das companhias listadas na BM&FBovespa. Encontramos evidências de que o nível de ativos intangíveis impacta positivamente o valor de mercado e negativamente o grau de endividamento das companhias de capital aberto no Brasil.

Public debt and the limits of fiscal policy to increase economic growth

Research that seeks to estimate the effects of fiscal policies on economic growth has ignored the role of public debt in this relationship. This study proposes a theoretical model of endogenous growth, which demonstrates that the level of the public debt-to-gross domestic product (GDP) ratio should negatively impact the effect of fiscal policy on growth. This occurs because government indebtedness extracts part of the savings of the young to pay interest on the debts of the older generation, who are no longer saving. Therefore, the payment of debt interest assumes an allocation exchange role between generations that is similar to a pay-as-you-go pension system, which results in changes in the savings rate of the economy. The major conclusions of the theoretical model were tested using an econometric model to provide evidence for the validity of this conclusion. Our empirical analysis controls for timeinvariant, country-specific heterogeneity in the growth rates. We also address endogeneity issues and allow for heterogeneity across countries in the model parameters and for cross-sectional dependence.

A utilização do cartão de crédito como instrumento de dívida da população: um estudo do tema, causas e consequências com base na experiência da Coreia do Sul.

A crise bancária que atingiu a Coreia do Sul em 2002 está relacionada, em grande parte, com a grande velocidade de crescimento e penetração da população no segmento de cartões de crédito, fazendo com que o país recebesse a denominação de “República dos Cartões de Plástico” pela mídia internacional. Em 2003, como resultado deste crescimento, o sistema financeiro do país precisou ser socorrido pelo governo sul coreano, pois o endividamento do consumidor havia saído do controle. Atualmente, alguns estudos indicam que o Brasil pode estar caminhando para uma situação semelhante, compensando o alto nível de endividamento da população sul-coreana, com as altas taxas de juros cobradas neste segmento pelos bancos brasileiros. Com base na experiência da Coreia do Sul, este trabalho explora as principais causas deste fenômeno, a motivação da população em buscar este tipo específico de financiamento, a dicotomia dos agentes ao tratar deste crescimento e quais medidas podem ser tomadas para evitar um possível colapso no sistema financeiro.

Capital structure in Brazil : review of studies during the period of 1988-2003

A systematic review was made of studies regarding the capital structure in Brazil during the period of 1988-2003. The recurring themes relate to the static tradeoff and pecking order in various moments of the economy, the fiscal benefits of indebtedness and interest on privately-owned capital, and the inefficacies of the stock market. The Brazilian companies enjoy little leverage as compared to other emerging markets. BNDES is responsible for 5% of the gross formation of fixed capital. The funding of resources occurs at opportune moments, and the financing decision may precede that of investment. Efficacy of the judiciary system and company transparency positively affect access to credit.

Alasdair Gray`s 1982 Janine (1984): a postmodernist scottish novel

Alasdair Gray is now an established figure in the Scottish literary scene and has numerous claims to be considered an important voice writing in English. First Lanark: A Life in Four Books (1981) and then 1982 Janine (1984) contributed to the recognition of Gray as one of the founding fathers of the new Scottish writing and as a figure of importance in international contemporary fiction due to his innovative, experimental and postmodernist novels. As the title of this dissertation - “Alasdair Gray’s 1982 Janine (1984): A Postmodernist Scottish Novel” - suggests, it aims at analysing the author’s second novel, 1982 Janine (1984), in a thematic and formal perspective, in order to justify the choice of the terms - Postmodernist and Scottish - to classify this novel. 1982 Janine projects a world through Jock McLeish’s mind and is a powerful stream-of-consciousness narrative. Jock is an alcoholic who lives a personal crisis and, therefore, tries to escape from his depressing reality through sexual fantasies and political diatribes. During a single night in a Scottish hotel room, he drinks and dreams, and spends the whole night alone with his fantasies and fears, his memories and hopes. In Chapter 11, the most daring experimental section of the novel, Jock attempts to commit suicide by taking an overdose of tablets with alcohol but fails. Following this, he decides to review his life and make for a new beginning; the novel thus closing with an optimistic note. Also, the narrative is based on a constant interweaving of sex fantasy with political satire, that is, it is through his protagonist that Gray manages to convey the state of Scotland as well as the concerns and aspirations of the Scottish people and then, proceed to a political and social critique. This dissertation appears structured in three chapters. In Chapter I - “Alasdair Gray: A Postmodernist Scottish Writer” - I present Gray as a powerful postmodernist writer who also sees himself as a Scottish author, and more particularly as a Glaswegian, who concentrates on Scottish subject matter in his literary work. In a first section, I offer a brief survey of the Scottish literary scene from the fourteenth to the twentieth century, in order to understand Gray’s choice of setting and themes and to check his influence or indebtedness to previous Scottish authors. As 1982 Janine is also a good example of selfconscious experimental writing, in a second section, I present various seminal fictional works that introduced and developed experimentalism in British fiction, in order to evaluate the influence of modernist developments in form and technique on recent experimental writing. The third section consists of an introduction to Gray’s work for he is not only a novelist, but also an artist, a playwright, a poet, an activist and a scholar. Chapter II - “Postmodernist Features in 1982 Janine” - aims at listing and examining the postmodernist devices that the novel includes, in what content and form are concerned. On the one hand, the use of a developed type of the modernist stream of consciousness, the presence of a protagonist who feels entrapped in a specific system, the quest for freedom, the incoherence and fragmentation of time, the nonchronological order of the narrative, the blending of fantasy and “reality”, as well as the importance of the Scottish material are definitely current aspects within postmodernist literature that can be found in Gray’s novel. On the other hand, the handling of literary self-conscious devices, such as typographical experimentation, presence of metafiction and intertextuality, and inclusion of an Epilogue, are likewise among recurrent postmodernist features. As the title - “A Narratological Analysis of 1982 Janine” - evidences, Chapter III offers a description of the mechanics of the narrative and its functioning in order to better understand the narrative technique of postmodernist fiction. This study is based primarily on Gérard Genette’s theoretical framework and terminology, presented in Narrative Discourse: An Essay in Method, an analytical tool that allows me to provide a more objective and scientific analysis. Hence, I follow the Genettian division of narrative discourse in Time, Mood and Voice while examining the novel. Finally, I proceed to a description of the intertextual relationships 1982 Janine establishes with other texts.

Determinantes da Estrutura de Capital de Companhias Abertas Brasileiras Não-Financeiras: Um Estudo Empírico com Dados em Painel

When a company desires to invest in a project, it must obtain resources needed to make the investment. The alternatives are using firm s internal resources or obtain external resources through contracts of debt and issuance of shares. Decisions involving the composition of internal resources, debt and shares in the total resources used to finance the activities of a company related to the choice of its capital structure. Although there are studies in the area of finance on the debt determinants of firms, the issue of capital structure is still controversial. This work sought to identify the predominant factors that determine the capital structure of Brazilian share capital, non-financial firms. This work was used a quantitative approach, with application of the statistical technique of multiple linear regression on data in panel. Estimates were made by the method of ordinary least squares with model of fixed effects. About 116 companies were selected to participate in this research. The period considered is from 2003 to 2007. The variables and hypotheses tested in this study were built based on theories of capital structure and in empirical researches. Results indicate that the variables, such as risk, size, and composition of assets and firms growth influence their indebtedness. The profitability variable was not relevant to the composition of indebtedness of the companies analyzed. However, analyzing only the long-term debt, comes to the conclusion that the relevant variables are the size of firms and, especially, the composition of its assets (tangibility).This sense, the smaller the size of the undertaking or the greater the representation of fixed assets in total assets, the greater its propensity to long-term debt. Furthermore, this research could not identify a predominant theory to explain the capital structure of Brazilian

Delays in stabilization or in reforms? The debt crisis

Empirical analyses attributing the 1980s' debt crisis to inconsistent stabilization policies rest on an inappropriate long-run approach. Revising this long-run approach yields opposite results: terms of trade shocks and foreign indebtedness explain this crisis, regardless of domestic stabilization policies. This prompts us to consider a new hypothesis, of delays in trade-policy reforms, with a model in which terms-of-trade variation (under shocks) is endogenous to export structure and efficiency of resource allocation. Evidence from the structural equations model shows that allocation distortions negatively affect changes in terms of trade, which then explain this crisis. A political economy extension demonstrates that income inequality and regional trade policy determine the distortions, which in turn leads to this crisis.

The debt crisis: a re-appraisal

The 1980s' debt crisis is a landmark in developing economies' growth and stabilization. According to the most quoted empirical articles, external shocks and vicissitudes gave rise to crisis just because of delays in stabilization policies, engendered by internal conflicts and institutional immaturity. I review some of these papers, and find out some problems - in the measurement of shocks and foreign indebtedness, namely - whose corrections lead to opposite results: external shocks and foreign indebtedness explain that crisis regardless of domestic policies. At the same time, the strong correlation of income distribution to terms of trade changes and foreign indebtedness suggest that inequality may have contributed differently to that crisis: either through an economic channel, or through a political channel based on delays in reforms.

Argentine convertibility: is it a relevant precedent for the dollarization process in Ecuador?

Includes bibliography

Los efectos de los desastres en 2004 y 2005: la necesidad de adaptación de largo plazo

Incluye Bibliografía