Trading Energy ETFs with an Improved Moving Average Strategy

In this paper we employ the recently introduced improved moving average methodology of Papailias and Thomakos (2011) and we apply it in two energy ETFs. We compare it to the standard moving average methodology and the buy and hold strategy. Investors who are interested in energy-related sectors and trade using averages, could benefit by forming their strategies based on this improved moving average methodology as it returns higher profits accompanied by decreased risk (measured in terms of drawdown).

Trading off dietary choices, physical exercise and cardiovascular disease risks

Despite several decades of decline, cardiovascular diseases are still the most common causes of death in Western societies. Sedentary living and high fat diets contribute to the prevalence of cardiovascular diseases. This paper analyses the trade-offs between lifestyle choices defined in terms of diet, physical activity, cost, and risk of cardiovascular disease that a representative sample of the population of Northern Ireland aged 40-65 are willing to make. Using computer assisted personal interviews, we survey 493 individuals at their homes using a Discrete Choice Experiment (DCE) questionnaire administered between February and July 2011 in Northern Ireland. Unlike most DCE studies for valuing public health programs, this questionnaire uses a tailored exercise, based on the individuals’ baseline choices. A “fat screener” module in the questionnaire links personal cardiovascular disease risk to each specific choice set in terms of dietary constituents. Individuals are informed about their real status quo risk of a fatal cardiovascular event, based on an initial set of health questions. Thus, actual risks, real diet and exercise choices are the elements that constitute the choice task. Our results show that our respondents are willing to pay for reducing mortality risk and, more importantly, are willing to change physical exercise and dietary behaviours. In particular, we find that to improve their lifestyles, overweight and obese people would be more likely to do more physical activity than to change their diets. Therefore, public policies aimed to target obesity and its related illnesses in Northern Ireland should invest public money in promoting physical activity rather than healthier diets.

Momentum Trading in New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) Energy Stocks

This paper investigates whether the momentum effect exists in the NYSE energy sector. Momentum is defined as the strategy that buys (sells) these stocks that are best (worst) performers, over a pre-specified past period of time (the 'look-back' period), by constructing equally weighted portfolios. Different momentum strategies are obtained by changing the number of stocks included in these portfolios, as well as the look-back period. Next, their performance is compared against two benchmarks: the equally weighted portfolio consisting of most stocks in the NYSE energy index and the market portfolio, and the S&P500 index. The results indicate that the momentum effect is strongly present in the energy sector, and leads to highly profitable portfolios, improving the risk-reward measures and easily outperforming both benchmarks.

Trading Activity in Options and Stock Around Price-Sensitive News Announcements

This study investigates the trading activity in options and stock markets around informed events with extreme daily stock price movements. We find that informed agents are more likely to trade options prior to negative news and stocks ahead of positive news. We also show that optioned stocks overreact to the arrival of negative news, but react efficiently to positive news. However, the overreaction patterns are unique to the subsample of stocks with the lowest pre-event abnormal option/stock volume ratio (O/S). This finding suggests that the incremental benefit of option listing is related to the level of option trading activity, over and beyond the presence of an options market on the firm's stock. Finally, we find that the pre-event abnormal O/S is a better predictor of stock price patterns following a negative shock than is the pre-event O/S, implying that the former may contain more information about the future value of stocks than the latter.

Trading-up on unmet expectations? Evaluating consumers’ expectations in online premium grocery shopping logistics

Geography and retail store location are inherently bound together; this study links food retail changes to systemic logistics changes in an emerging market. Current logistic practices underplay demand-led models and online market evolution in large metropolises such as Istanbul, Rio de Janeiro, and Delhi. The later include raising income and education, access to a wide range of technologies, traffic and transport difficulties, lagging retail provision, changing family structure and roles, as well as changing food culture and taste. The study incorporates demand for premium products defined by Kapferer and Bastien, (2009b) as comprising a broad variety of higher quality and unique or distinctive products and brands including in grocery organic ranges, healthy options, allergy free selections, and international and gourmet/specialty products through an online grocery model (n=356) that integrates a novel view of home delivery (HD) in Istanbul. More importantly from a logistic perspective our model incorporates any products from any online vendors broadening the range beyond listed items found in any traditional online supermarkets. Data collected via phone survey and analysed via structural equation modelling (SEM) suggest that the offer of online premium products significantly affects consumers’ delivery logistics expectations. We discuss logistics operations and business management implications, identifying the emerging geography of logistic models which respond to consumers’ unmet expectations using multiple sourcing and consolidation points.

Happy hour followed by hangover: financing the UK brewery industry, 1880-1913

In the last 15 years of the nineteenth century c.300 British brewers incorporated and floated securities on the stock market. Subsequently, in the 1900s, the industry suffered a long-lived hangover. In this paper, we establish the stylised facts of this transformation and estimate the gains enjoyed by brewery investors during the boom as well as the losses suffered by investors during the bust of the 1900s. However, not all brewery equity shares suffered alike. We find that post-1900 performance correlates positively with capital-market discipline and good corporate governance and negatively with family control, but does not correlate with indebtedness.

The significance of interconnector counter-trading in a security constrained electricity market

Throughout the European Union there is an increasing amount of wind generation being dispatched-down due to the binding of power system operating constraints from high levels of wind generation. This paper examines the impact a system non-synchronous penetration limit has on the dispatch-down of wind and quantifies the significance of interconnector counter-trading to the priority dispatching of wind power. A fully coupled economic dispatch and security constrained unit commitment model of the Single Electricity Market of the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland and the British Electricity Trading and Transmission Arrangement was used in this study. The key finding was interconnector counter-trading reduces the impact the system non-synchronous penetration limit has on the dispatch-down of wind. The capability to counter-trade on the interconnectors and an increase in system non-synchronous penetration limit from 50% to 55% reduces the dispatch-down of wind by 311 GW h and decreases total electricity payments to the consumer by €1.72/MW h. In terms of the European Union electricity market integration, the results show the importance of developing individual electricity markets that allow system operators to counter-trade on interconnectors to ensure the priority dispatch of the increasing levels of wind generation.

Beyond work-hour restrictions: a qualitative study of residents' subjective workload

INTRODUCTION: Following the introduction of work-hour restrictions, residents' workload has become an important theme in postgraduate training. The efficacy of restrictions on workload, however, remains controversial, as most research has only examined objective workload. The purpose of this study was to explore the less clearly understood component of subjective workload and, in particular, the factors that influenced residents' subjective workload.

METHOD: This study was conducted in Japan at three community teaching hospitals. We recruited a convenience sample of 31 junior residents in seven focus groups at the three sites. Audio-recorded and transcribed data were read iteratively and analyzed thematically, identifying, analyzing and reporting themes within the data and developing an interpretive synthesis of the topic.

RESULTS: Seven factors influenced residents' subjective workload: (1) interaction within the professional community, (2) feedback from patients, (3) being in control, (4) professional development, (5) private life, (6) interest and (7) protected free time.

DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION: Our findings indicate that residents who have good interaction with colleagues and patients, are competent enough to control their work, experience personal development through working, have greater interest in their work, and have fulfilling private lives will have the least subjective workload.

Eurozone Network Connectedness During Calm and Crisis: Evidence from the MTS Platform for Interdealer Trading of European Sovereign Debt

This paper examines the connectedness of the Eurozone sovereign debt market over the period 2005–2011. By employing measures built from the variance decompositions of approximating models we are able to define weighted, directed networks that enable a deeper understanding of the relationships between the Eurozone countries. We find that connectedness in the Eurozone was very high during the calm market conditions preceding the global financial crisis but decreased dramatically when the crisis took hold, and worsened as the Eurozone sovereign debt crisis emerged. The drop in connectedness was especially prevalent in the case of the peripheral countries with some of the most peripheral countries deteriorating into isolation. Our results have implications for both market participants and regulators.