Inhaltsangabe:Introduction: Since the beginning of the last century, investors in capital markets have strongly relied on rating agencies assessments of credit quality to decide on investments. Due to their important role in debt markets, they are supposed to provide accurate ratings without delay. However, cases like the defaults of WorldCom or Enron have damaged their reputation. In particular, credit rating agencies have been heavily criticized for their role during the financial crisis of 2007-2009. Many economists blame the rating agencies for having played a major part in the securitization process of mortgage loans by providing too high rating grades; and thus sowing the seeds of the crisis. Having rated credit derivatives like collateralized debt obligations with best grades, the rating agencies encouraged banks and other financial institutions to keep these assets in their portfolios. As a result, it caused severe problems for the banking sector when these products heavily lost in value. Along with imprecise assessments of creditworthiness, the slow reaction of rating agencies has been critizised over the last few years. Therefore, the question of how well the agencies assess credit quality arises. This question is of great importance because of their dominant role on capital markets and the fact that decisions are made upon their ratings. To put it more precisely, this study asks whether the agencies process and convey new information to the market. On the other hand, it might be the case that market participants anticipate any change in the credit quality of a company before these institutions publish their assessments. Answering this question is of particular importance: if the rating announcements convey unknown information and the market reacts, then rating agencies are a systemic part of capital markets and policy should consider stricter regulation to prevent manipulation and failures like those described above. Conversely, if their announcements do not contain any new information or to put it differently, if markets react faster then we could think about using market based indicators instead in order to assess credit risk. In this case, the economic task of signaling creditworthiness could be handed over, among others, to Credit Default Swaps (see Chapter 2), which is also suggested by Hart & Zingales. This thesis contributes to the field of rating agencies performance measurement. Evaluating their announcements with the [...]

Diploma Thesis from the year 2010 in the subject Economics - Statistics and Methods, grade: 1,3, University of Tubingen, language: English, abstract: Rating agencies play an important role on the capital markets; however, during the financial crisis 2007-2009 people began to question how good their assessments of credit quality really are. In my study, I empirically examine the effect of rating announcements from Standard & Poor's on the Credit Default Swap (CDS) Market. It contributes to the field of rating agencies' performance measurement. Based on Event Study Methodology and recent CDS data, I detect virtually no significant abnormal spread change at the announcement date neither for downgrades nor upgrades. However, the CDS show some anticipation prior to the event especially for downgradings. Considering the rating date, I find evidence for an asymmetric reaction where downgrades cause stronger movement in the spreads. As a result, it seems as if rating changes do not convey a great part of new information to the markets. At the same time, the significant anticipation indicates that the CDS market processes information more efficiently.

The question of whether ratings agencies convey new information to financial markets when they assign new ratings or change previous ratings has been debated for at least 40 years. In this study I first examine equity market, bond market and CDS market reactions to long and short term rating changes from S & P, Fitch and Moody's. I find that not all the credit rating changes affect the market but only those classified as unanticipated. Subsequently, I study whether the regulatory setting, in which the Credit Ratings Agencies work, can possibly affect the financial markets reactions. Lastly I show that the probability of a future rating change is severely affected by different factors proportional hazard rate models.

Rating announcements do convey entirely new information to the market which is in most cases followed by significant changes in CDS premiums. For positive credit rating events we obtained mixed results which makes a clear verdict, on the question whether the CDS market is also able to anticipate positive rating events, difficult.

Pneumatic Conveying Design Guide, 3rd Edition is divided into three essential parts, system and components, system design, and system operation, providing both essential foundational knowledge and practical information to help users understand, design, and build suitable systems. All aspects of the pneumatic conveying system are covered, including the type of materials used, conveying distance, system constraints, including feeding and discharging, health and safety requirements, and the need for continuous or batch conveying. This new edition also covers information on the other conveying systems available and compares them to this method. The existing content is brought up-to-date and the references are expanded and updated. This guide is an almost encyclopedic coverage of pneumatic conveying and as such is an essential text for both designers and users of pneumatic conveying systems. Each aspect of the subject is discussed from basic principles to support those new to, or learning about, this versatile technique. Highly practical with usable and unbiased information to enable you to choose, design and build suitable systems with a high degree of confidence New edition compares alternative conveying systems including pneumatic capsule conveying systems, and covers conveying of wet materials Contains updated information on by-pass systems, and will introduce you to simulation software

Many students find it daunting to move from studying environmental science, to designing and implementing their own research proposals. This book provides a practical introduction to help develop scientific thinking, aimed at undergraduate and new graduate students in the earth and environmental sciences. Students are guided through the steps of scientific thinking using published scientific literature and real environmental data. The book starts with advice on how to effectively read scientific papers, before outlining how to articulate testable questions and answer them using basic data analysis. The Mauna Loa CO2 dataset is used to demonstrate how to read metadata, prepare data, generate effective graphs and identify dominant cycles on various timescales. Practical, question-driven examples are explored to explain running averages, anomalies, correlations and simple linear models. The final chapter provides a framework for writing persuasive research proposals, making this an essential guide for students embarking on their first research project.