Legacy Theses and Dissertations (1940-2009)
Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/10657/6771
This collection gathers digitized University of Houston theses and dissertations dating from 1940.
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Browsing Legacy Theses and Dissertations (1940-2009) by Department "Finance, Department of"
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Item A study of Swiss watch imports from the standpoint of trade restrictions(1954) Gainous, Woodrow; Owen, John P.; Carey, Alan D.; Crouch, Rolland G.; Williams, Harry, Jr.A dollar shortage is world-wide, but it is particularly acute in Western Europe. The effect of a reduction in United States tariffs on the dollar shortage would be expected to close part of the gap in the dollar deficits of Western European countries by permitting them to earn more dollars through increased exports to the dollar countries. It would also induce the free countries to relax their trade restrictions against the United States resulting in a larger volume of exports by this country. The purpose of this thesis is to measure the impact of tariff removal on one commodity, Swiss watches, upon (1) the dollar shortage, (2) the Swiss economy and balance of payments, and (3) the United States watch industry. To do this, it was necessary to determine tariff as a percentage of total cost and to estimate the impact on imports that would result from tariff removal. [...]Item A test of the equivalent-risk class hypothesis and a multivariate analysis of firms' business risk discriminatory characteristics(1974) Idol, Charles Russell; Bolten, Steven E.; Locander, William B.; Sargent, William S.; Yeager, Francis S.The purpose of this paper was twofold: 1) to retest the assumptions of the equivalent-risk class hypothesis, and 2) to identify a set of business risk discriminatory characteristics. The equivalent-risk class hypothesis assumes firms grouped according to industry classifications are both intragroup business risk homogeneous and intergroup business risk heterogeneous. The findings and implications of many significant research studies in the basic areas of corporate finance and investment theory are contingent on the validity of these two assumptions. Previous attempts to test the assumptions of the equivalent-risk class hypothesis have had conflicting conclusions. Further, the methodologies and business risk measures employed by these test efforts have been challenged. Hence, the lack of consistency in the results of these previous test attempts and the general acceptance in the literature of the assumptions of the equivalentrisk class hypothesis provided justification for a retest of the equivalent-risk class hypothesis' assumptions. Before testing these assumptions, careful attention was given to both the development of a theoretically sound business risk measure and the appropriateness of the testing methodology. Neither assumption of the equivalent-risk class hypothesis was substantiated by the research findings. These findings strongly suggest industry classifications of firms are poor business risk discriminators for financial acamedicians and practitioners. If the assumptions of the equivalent-risk class hypothesis are invalid, researchers must find new methods for business risk discrimination among firms. One such method was presented in this paper. Thirty-five financial and operating variables (characteristics) were calculated for firms in two distinctly different business risk groups. A stepwise multiple discriminant analysis (MDA) program was applied to this data. The results of the MDA revealed discriminant functions containing only a small number of size and dividend policy related variables could correctly classify approximately 90% of the firms in the study into their respective business risk classes. Further, in the presence of size and dividend policy related variables, variables associated with long and short term capital turnover, profitability, and financial leverage were poor business risk discriminators among firms. Finally, the lower business risk firms were characterized by larger size (total assets) and more stable dividend policies with higher dividend payouts than the high business risk firms. The results of the MDA should be encouraging to the financial community, for they imply firms can be categorized into their respective business risk classes by observing a small set of financial characteristics. Further research is needed in this area to develop the implications of these research findings into a more universal working model.Item Random walk in the forward foreign exchange market(1975) Basu, Sambhu Nath; Bolten, Steven E.; Kretlow, William J.; Kapadia, Asha S.The present study investigates the applicability of the random walk hypothesis to the forward exchange market of British pounds in terms of U.S. dollars. The variables examined are first order daily price differences as well as the weekly first order differences of the net speculative forward exchange function, which is measured by the residual of the traditional Interest parity formulation. The sample periods for the price data cover five periods of approximately 90 days each. Three belong to the narrow gold band period and cover pre and post devaluation (1967) days. The other two belong to the freely fluctuating period. The speculative expectation data are from three periods, two under the fixed exchange system and one tinder freely fluctuating system. Serial correlation as well as distributional evidence, two independent aspects of the random walk hypothesis are examined by a number of statistical tools, parametric as well as non parametric. For price changes data, violation of serial independence is indicated. The distribution appears to be closer to stable Paretian with < = 1 than normal. For expectations data, violation of random walk model is less serious and distributional evidence indicates normality. Therefore, a series of efficient behavioral inputs is seen to give rise to series of non efficient economic output series. This seems to indicate the inefficient aspects of government intervent ion in the forward market.