Signals of foreign bank entry on real sector FDI and foreign trade and their impact on economic development in the New EU Member States

Does financial sector foreign direct investment (FSFDI) trigger general capital inflows and foreign trade? Do these inflows to New EU Member States (NMS) provide positive signals (Spence, 1973) towards economic development or crowd out investment and trade? While the direct impact of financial deepening has received much attention (Hasan, Wachtel, Zhou, 2006; Detragiache, Tressel, Gupta, 2006), indirect effects have received less consideration. To fill this gap, we review the literature on possible links and provide descriptive data for NMS. We apply regression analysis and find coherence between FSFDI and non-financial FDI and trade in Bulgaria and Croatia, but there are various directions in which developmental repercussions can go and the impact on trade is not as significant as the effect on nonfinancial FDI. We argue that the relative impact of FSFDI, real sector FDI and trade needs to be taken into consideration in shaping economic policies conducive to economic development. --foreign banks,economic development,foreign trade,FDI,signal theory

Privileged Interfirm/Bank Relationships in Central Europe: Trigger or Trap for Corporate Governance?

The paper focuses on the question whether banks and capital markets in Central Europe are capable of exerting a positive influence on enterprise performance at the present stage of the economic transformation. These markets are characterised by privileged, collaborative interfirm/interbank relationships demonstrated through various channels. Among them is the competition for private deposits between commercial and national banks that are simultaneously supervisors of commercial banks, as is the case in Poland. Other channels include: heavily indebted large banks that are owners of industrial companies (as is the case in Slovakia with the steel mill VSZ owning the third largest bank IRB), investment funds that are facilitating industrial restructuring, and foreign banks holding only minority stakes in large domestic financial institutions.

Privileged Interfirm/Bank Relationships in Central Europe: Trigger or Trap for Corporate Governance?

The paper focuses on the question whether banks and capital markets in Central Europe are capable of exerting a positive influence on enterprise performance at the present stage of the economic transformation. These markets are characterised by privileged, collaborative interfirm/interbank relationships demonstrated through various channels. Among them is the competition for private deposits between commercial and national banks that are simultaneously supervisors of commercial banks, as is the case in Poland. Other channels include: heavily indebted large banks that are owners of industrial companies (as is the case in Slovakia with the steel mill VSZ owning the third largest bank IRB), investment funds that are facilitating industrial restructuring, and foreign banks holding only minority stakes in large domestic financial institutions.Interfirm, bank relationship, Central Europe

Corporate Governance in Central and Eastern Europe: Transition management is a tough job

1) Financing Firms in East European Countries: An Asymmetric Information and Agency Costs Approach, by Debora Revoltella 2) Seven Years of Financial Market Reform in Central Europe, by Peter H. Haiss and Gerhard Fink

Signals of foreign bank entry on real sector FDI and foreign trade and their impact on economic development in the New EU Member States

Does financial sector foreign direct investment (FSFDI) trigger general capital inflows and foreign trade? Do these inflows to New EU Member States (NMS) provide positive signals (Spence, 1973) towards economic development or 'crowd out' investment and trade? While the direct impact of financial deepening has received much attention (Hasan, Wachtel, Zhou, 2006; Detragiache, Tressel, Gupta, 2006), indirect effects have received less consideration. To fill this gap, we review the literature on possible links and provide descriptive data for NMS. We apply regression analysis and find coherence between FSFDI and non-financial FDI and trade in Bulgaria and Croatia, but there are various directions in which developmental repercussions can go and the impact on trade is not as significant as the effect on nonfinancial FDI. We argue that the relative impact of FSFDI, real sector FDI and trade needs to be taken into consideration in shaping economic policies conducive to economic development

Independent particle descriptions of tunneling from a many-body perspective

Currents across thin insulators are commonly taken as single electrons moving across classically forbidden regions; this independent particle picture is well-known to describe most tunneling phenomena. Examining quantum transport from a different perspective, i.e., by explicit treatment of electron-electron interactions, we evaluate different single particle approximations with specific application to tunneling in metal-molecule-metal junctions. We find maximizing the overlap of a Slater determinant composed of single particle states to the many-body current-carrying state is more important than energy minimization for defining single particle approximations in a system with open boundary conditions. Thus the most suitable single particle effective potential is not one commonly in use by electronic structure methods, such as the Hartree-Fock or Kohn-Sham approximations.Comment: 4+ pages, 4 figures; accepted to Phys. Rev. B Rapid Communication

Asset Management in Volatile Markets

The 27th SUERF Colloquium in Munich in June 2008: New Trends in Asset Management: Exploring the Implications was already topical in the Summer of 2008. The subsequent dramatic events in the Autumn of 2008 made the presentations in Munich even more relevant to investors and bankers that want to understand what happens in their investment universe. In the present SUERF Study, we have collected a sample of outstanding colloquium contributions under the fitting headline: Asset Management in Volatile Markets.derivatives, financial innovation, asset management, finance-growth-nexus; Relative Value Strategy, Pair Trading, Slippage, Implementation Shortfall, Asset Management, Fin4Cast

Surface stress of Ni adlayers on W(110): the critical role of the surface atomic structure

Puzzling trends in surface stress were reported experimentally for Ni/W(110) as a function of Ni coverage. In order to explain this behavior, we have performed a density-functional-theory study of the surface stress and atomic structure of the pseudomorphic and of several different possible 1x7 configurations for this system. For the 1x7 phase, we predict a different, more regular atomic structure than previously proposed based on surface x-ray diffraction. At the same time, we reproduce the unexpected experimental change of surface stress between the pseudomorphic and 1x7 configuration along the crystallographic surface direction which does not undergo density changes. We show that the observed behavior in the surface stress is dominated by the effect of a change in Ni adsorption/coordination sites on the W(110) surface.Comment: 14 pages, 3 figures Published in J. Phys.: Condens. Matter 24 (2012) 13500

Stabilizing single atom contacts by molecular bridge formation

Gold-molecule-gold junctions can be formed by carefully breaking a gold wire in a solution containing dithiolated molecules. Surprisingly, there is little understanding on the mechanical details of the bridge formation process and specifically on the role that the dithiol molecules play themselves. We propose that alkanedithiol molecules have already formed bridges between the gold electrodes before the atomic gold-gold junction is broken. This leads to stabilization of the single atomic gold junction, as observed experimentally. Our data can be understood within a simple spring model.Comment: 14 pages, 3 figures, 1 tabl

Large-Scale Atomistic Simulations of Environmental Effects on the Formation and Properties of Molecular Junctions

Using an updated simulation tool, we examine molecular junctions comprised of benzene-1,4-dithiolate bonded between gold nanotips, focusing on the importance of environmental factors and inter-electrode distance on the formation and structure of bridged molecules. We investigate the complex relationship between monolayer density and tip separation, finding that the formation of multi-molecule junctions is favored at low monolayer density, while single-molecule junctions are favored at high density. We demonstrate that tip geometry and monolayer interactions, two factors that are often neglected in simulation, affect the bonding geometry and tilt angle of bridged molecules. We further show that the structures of bridged molecules at 298 and 77 K are similar.Comment: To appear in ACS Nano, 30 pages, 5 figure