Capital Structure and Political Risk in Asia-Pacific Real Estate Markets

This study investigates the determinants of capital structure decisions by real estate firms, with a specific focus on the impact of political risk on leverage. Using a sample of Asia-Pacific REITs and listed property trusts, we find those firms with properties located in countries characterized by relatively high degrees of political risk, such as political instability, and/or greater uncertainty in the ability to repatriate and monetize profits from international investment activities, employ less debt than their counterparts operating in more politically stable environments. This core finding remains robust to alternative sample selection criteria including the division of the sample into high versus low market-to-book value firms, and also holds within the subset of organizations that are active in raising additional capital in the secondary markets

Advisor Choice in Asia-Pacific Property Markets

This paper examines advisor choice decisions by publicly traded REITs and listed property companies in Asia-Pacific real estate markets. Using a sample of 168 firms, we find robust evidence that firms strategically evaluate and compare the increased agency costs associated with external advisement against the potential benefits associated with collocating decision rights with location specific soft information. Our empirical results reveal real estate companies tend to hire external advisors when they invest in countries: 1) that are more economically and politically unstable, 2) whose legal system is based on civil law, 3) where the level of corruption is perceived to be high, and 4) when disclosure is relatively poor. Additionally, we find the probability of retaining an external advisor is directly related to the expected agency costs. Lastly, we find evidence of return premiums in excess of 13 % for firms whose organizational structure matches their investment profile. As such, we conclude that the decision to hire an external advisor represents a value relevant trade-off between the costs and benefits of this organizational arrangement

The Impact of Geographic and Cultural Dispersion on Information Opacity

This paper investigates the influences of intrafirm geographic and cultural dispersion, the distance between the location of a firm’s investments and its headquarters, on the firm’s information environment. Specifically, using a sample of publicly traded real estate companies across the Asia-Pacific region, we examine how intrafirm geographic and cultural distance impacts a firm’s capital acquisition costs. As a consequence of both the heavily regulated operating environment faced by these firms, as well as the capital intensive nature of this industry, funding costs should be of pronounced importance to firms within this sector. Consistent with this paradigm, we find that firms with geographically disperse investments exhibit enhanced informational opacity. Specifically, firms with more geographically disperse investments exhibit higher capital acquisition costs than their more geographically concentrated counterparts. Similarly, firms with more culturally disparate investments also exhibit enhanced informational opacity, as evidenced by increased capital costs. Additionally, we present evidence that the impact of both physical and cultural distance is increasing following the global financial crisis. Taken together, our results provide strong evidence that both intrafirm geographic and cultural dispersion materially impact both an organization’s information environment and funding costs

Fermion Determinants

The current status of bounds on and limits of fermion determinants in two, three and four dimensions in QED and QCD is reviewed. A new lower bound on the two-dimensional QED determinant is derived. An outline of the demonstration of the continuity of this determinant at zero mass when the background magnetic field flux is zero is also given.Comment: 10 page

Correlating the nanostructure of Al-oxide with deposition conditions and dielectric contributions of two-level systems in perspective of superconducting quantum circuits

This work is concerned with Al/Al-oxide(AlO$_{x}$)/Al-layer systems which are important for Josephson-junction-based superconducting devices such as quantum bits. The device performance is limited by noise, which has been to a large degree assigned to the presence and properties of two-level tunneling systems in the amorphous AlO$_{x}$ tunnel barrier. The study is focused on the correlation of the fabrication conditions, nanostructural and nanochemical properties and the occurrence of two-level tunneling systems with particular emphasis on the AlO$_{x}$-layer. Electron-beam evaporation with two different processes and sputter deposition were used for structure fabrication, and the effect of illumination by ultraviolet light during Al-oxide formation is elucidated. Characterization was performed by analytical transmission electron microscopy and low-temperature dielectric measurements. We show that the fabrication conditions have a strong impact on the nanostructural and nanochemical properties of the layer systems and the properties of two-level tunneling systems. Based on the understanding of the observed structural characteristics, routes are derived towards the fabrication of Al/AlO$_{x}$/Al-layers systems with improved properties.Comment: 28 pages, 4 figure

On the Structure of the Observable Algebra of QCD on the Lattice

The structure of the observable algebra ${\mathfrak O}_{\Lambda}$ of lattice QCD in the Hamiltonian approach is investigated. As was shown earlier, ${\mathfrak O}_{\Lambda}$ is isomorphic to the tensor product of a gluonic $C^{*}$-subalgebra, built from gauge fields and a hadronic subalgebra constructed from gauge invariant combinations of quark fields. The gluonic component is isomorphic to a standard CCR algebra over the group manifold SU(3). The structure of the hadronic part, as presented in terms of a number of generators and relations, is studied in detail. It is shown that its irreducible representations are classified by triality. Using this, it is proved that the hadronic algebra is isomorphic to the commutant of the triality operator in the enveloping algebra of the Lie super algebra ${\rm sl(1/n)}$ (factorized by a certain ideal).Comment: 33 page

Development of a protocol for maintaining viability while shipping organoid-derived retinal tissue.

Retinal organoid technology enables generation of an inexhaustible supply of three-dimensional retinal tissue from human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs) for regenerative medicine applications. The high similarity of organoid-derived retinal tissue and transplantable human fetal retina provides an opportunity for evaluating and modeling retinal tissue replacement strategies in relevant animal models in the effort to develop a functional retinal patch to restore vision in patients with profound blindness caused by retinal degeneration. Because of the complexity of this very promising approach requiring specialized stem cell and grafting techniques, the tasks of retinal tissue derivation and transplantation are frequently split between geographically distant teams. Delivery of delicate and perishable neural tissue such as retina to the surgical sites requires a reliable shipping protocol and also controlled temperature conditions with damage-reporting mechanisms in place to prevent transplantation of tissue damaged in transit into expensive animal models. We have developed a robust overnight tissue shipping protocol providing reliable temperature control, live monitoring of the shipment conditions and physical location of the package, and damage reporting at the time of delivery. This allows for shipping of viable (transplantation-competent) hPSC-derived retinal tissue over large distances, thus enabling stem cell and surgical teams from different parts of the country to work together and maximize successful engraftment of organoid-derived retinal tissue. Although this protocol was developed for preclinical in vivo studies in animal models, it is potentially translatable for clinical transplantation in the future and will contribute to developing clinical protocols for restoring vision in patients with retinal degeneration

Simulating nonequilibrium quantum fields with stochastic quantization techniques

We present lattice simulations of nonequilibrium quantum fields in Minkowskian space-time. Starting from a non-thermal initial state, the real-time quantum ensemble in 3+1 dimensions is constructed by a stochastic process in an additional (5th) ``Langevin-time''. For the example of a self-interacting scalar field we show how to resolve apparent unstable Langevin dynamics, and compare our quantum results with those obtained in classical field theory. Such a direct simulation method is crucial for our understanding of collision experiments of heavy nuclei or other nonequilibrium phenomena in strongly coupled quantum many-body systems.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, PRL version, minor change