L'activisme des investisseurs institutionnels, l'asymétrie d'informations et la liquidité du marché

Conference (2012, November 28)

The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of institutional investors’ ownership and their activism on informational asymmetry and stock market liquidity using a sample of 162 French-listed ... [more ▼]

The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of institutional investors’ ownership and their activism on informational asymmetry and stock market liquidity using a sample of 162 French-listed companies over a 3-year period (2007-2009). The findings show that the proportion of institutional investors, and particularly, pension funds positively influence stock market liquidity, which confirms the signalling and trading hypotheses. These investors perform important trades among their portfolios, leading to favourable effects on the market liquidity. These shareholders’ real involvement in companies is considered as a governance mechanism that tends to contribute to a better liquidity. [less ▲]

Cone de pollution à Lubumbashi: trois techniques pour le mettre en évidence

Speech (2012)

A cause des vents dominants de secteur Sud-Est, l'industrie métallurgique de Lubumbashi a été la source de dépôts atmosphériques spatialement concentrés en une zone conique, située au nord-ouest de la ... [more ▼]

A cause des vents dominants de secteur Sud-Est, l'industrie métallurgique de Lubumbashi a été la source de dépôts atmosphériques spatialement concentrés en une zone conique, située au nord-ouest de la fonderie de la Gécamines. Premièrement, l'existence de ce cône a été mise en évidence en utilisant des comparaisons de structure de la végétation et des sols nus dans deux zones d'étude : dans le cône de pollution et en dehors. Ensuite, dans une étude plus large et plus qualitative, une adaptation des théories de la perception urbaine de Kevin Lynch. Une présence plus faible et plus fragmentée de végétation dans le cône qu'hors du cône est détectée. De plus, un e ffet de la proximité à la source a été détecté. Deuxièmement, l'approche de Kevin Lynch a mis en évidence l'impact non seulement de l'activité de l'usine Gécamines, mais également des autres sites industriels installés plus récemment dans la région. Pour isoler davantage l'e ffet de la pollution atmosphérique liée à la cheminée des Gécamines par rapport à celui des autres usines ou de la coupe de bois de feu, l'utilisation des modèles neutres est envisagée. [less ▲]

Phénomènes physiques. Brentano et le partage entre corps et esprit

Conference (2012, November 28)

Parents-relais. Intervenir par l'entremise des parents

Scientific conference (2012, November 27)

Cette conférence avait pour objectif de présenter le premier groupe de mamans ayant suivis le programme "Ces années incroyables". Cette intervention est née d'une collaboration entre l'université de Liège ... [more ▼]

Cette conférence avait pour objectif de présenter le premier groupe de mamans ayant suivis le programme "Ces années incroyables". Cette intervention est née d'une collaboration entre l'université de Liège (Aurore Boulard) et l'AMO Reliance (Christophe Parthoens). [less ▲]

Why bother ?

Poster (2012, November 27)

Comment gérer la densification par les promoteurs, par les particuliers et par les outils d'urbanisme ?

Conference (2012, November 27)

A brief review of auroral emissions of the outer planets

Conference (2012, November 26)

Comparison Between Mornigstar Ratings And Traditional Performance Measures Ratings

E-print/Working paper (2012)

In this paper, we compare Morningstar ratings with those obtained using the same methodology of rating attribution with a set of commonly used performance measures. We look at three types of investment ... [more ▼]

In this paper, we compare Morningstar ratings with those obtained using the same methodology of rating attribution with a set of commonly used performance measures. We look at three types of investment horizons: 3-year, 5-year and 10-year ratings. Our analysis focuses on Open-End US Mutual Funds available in Morningstar Direct Database from which we create three sets of 16,617, 13,505 and 7,992 funds corresponding respectively to the three investment horizons analyzed. Our results show that Morningstar ratings are very close (correlation around 80%) to ratings obtained with Sharpe’s alpha, Jensen’s alpha, Four-factor alpha and Excess returns. And less significantly, we also observe that ratings given by the Sortino ratio, Sharpe MVaR, M-squared, Sharpe ratio, One-factor information ratio, Four-factor information ratio, Prospect ratio and Stutzer index are quite similar to Morningstar’s ratings (correlation lying between 70% and 78%). At the other end of the spectrum, however, ratings obtained with Annual return diverge widely from Morningstar ratings. We also analyse which explanatory variables can explain the differences between ratings computed with Morningstar as compared with the alternative performance measures using a probit regression. We find that Load adjustments, tax and risk included by Morningstar in the computation of MRAR are often determining. Expense ratio, Return Skewness and the three factors of the Fama-French model (Beta, Size load and Book-to-market loading) can be significant determinants depending on the performance measure analyzed and on the selected investment horizon. Fund characteristics such as Age, Fund size, Turnover rate and Manager tenure are not statistically significant in determining the differences in ratings. Besides, we analyze differences between ratings (in terms of number of STARs) and we confirm previous results (i.e. the link between Morningstar’s and the alternative performance measures, but also the explanatory capacity of the load for lots of differences between ratings). Finally, we test all possible combinations of our set of performance measures, and observe that Sharpe’s alpha, excess return, Sharpe MVaR, Four-factor alpha and Jensen’s alpha are part of the best combinations. As a conclusion, Morningstar ratings can be replicated using simple and traditional performance measures but the replication is less accurate when tax and loads features are important. Therefore, Morningstar data management and access bring the most of its ratings’ value added. [less ▲]

The nuclear physics of OHe

in Mankoc (Ed.) Proceedings of the 15th Bled Workshop "What Comes Beyond the Standard Models" (2012, November 24)

A recent composite-dark-matter scenario assumes that the dominant fraction of dark matter consists of O-helium (OHe) dark atoms, in which a lepton-like doubly charged particle O is bound with a primordial ... [more ▼]

A recent composite-dark-matter scenario assumes that the dominant fraction of dark matter consists of O-helium (OHe) dark atoms, in which a lepton-like doubly charged particle O is bound with a primordial helium nucleus. It liberates the physics of dark matter from unknown features of new physics, but it demands a deep understanding of the details of known nuclear and atomic physics, which are still unclear. Here, we consider in detail the physics of the binding of OHe to various nuclei of interest for direct dark matter searches. We show that standard quantum mechanics leads to bound states in the keV region, but does not seem to provide a simple mechanism that stabilizes them. The crucial role of a barrier in the OHe-nucleus potential is confirmed for such a stabilization. [less ▲]

FORMATION: "La mesure de l'efficacité de la prise en charge neuropsychologique. Pourquoi mesurer et comment faire?"

Conference (2012, November 24)