Adopting IFRS-International Financial Reporting Standards

"Why do some countries adopt the European Union (EU)-based International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) when others do not?"

A 48-page working paper, available through the Harvard Business School Working Knowledge newsletter and website, explores this question. Some of the conclusions include the following:

"There is evidence that more powerful countries are less likely to adopt IFRS, consistent with more powerful countries being less willing to surrender standard-setting authority to an international body. There is also evidence that the likelihood of IFRS adoption at first increases and then decreases in the quality of countries' domestic governance institutions, consistent with IFRS being adopted when governments are capable of timely decision making and when the opportunity and switching cost of domestic standards are relatively low. We do not find evidence that levels of and expected changes in foreign trade and investment flows in a country affect its adoption decision: thus, we cannot confirm that IFRS lowers information costs in more globalized economies. Consistent with the presence of network effects in IFRS adoption, we find that a country is more likely to adopt IFRS if its trade partners or countries within in its geographical region are IFRS adopters."

Advertising Age - 100 Leading National Advertisers, 2009 edition

Advertising Age recently released its annual "100 Leading National Advertisers" database and special issue, with facts and figures on U.S. ad spending. You can access the electronic version of this advertising research 'classic' here.

The Futurist: Ten Forces Driving Business Futures

An article in the July-August issue of The Futurist magazine by Michael Richarme, from the market research firm Decision Analyst Inc., identifies the top ten social trends of the next 20 years, with implications for business:
1) the emergence of China as the world's largest economic power;
2) global demographic and migration shifts;
3) energy and water shortages;
4) managing waste, reusing products;
5) falling education standards, less-skilled thought leaders;
6) brand relationships intensify;
7) instant gratification shopping;
8) on-demand media;
9) customization, personalization, and community experiences; and
10) youth rules.

The July-August issue of The Futurist has other articles of interest, including "The automation of invention," "Assessing global trends for 2025," and "A rendezvous with austerity: American consumers are about to learn new habits." The magazine (full-text, PDF) is available through the USF subscription to the Academic Search Premier database. You can search the magazine or database as needed, or set up an alert to have the table of contents delivered to your email inbox for each new issue.

FASB Codification

"On July 1, 2009, the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) is instituting a major change in the way accounting standards are organized. On that date, the FASB Accounting Standards Codification™ (FASB Codification) will become the single official source of authoritative, nongovernmental U.S. generally accepted accounting principles (U.S. GAAP). After that date, only one level of authoritative U.S. GAAP will exist, other than guidance issued by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). All other literature will be non-authoritative." (http://aaahq.org/FASB/Access.cfm)

Read about some of the changes here and here. And stay tuned for more information about access to FASB Codification for USF students and faculty.

YourEconomy.org

YourEconomy.org is a free research tool for examining U.S. business activity at the local level over time. It was developed by the Edward Lowe Foundation and uses data from the National Establishment Time Series (NETS) database by Walls & Associates.

The database begins with Dun & Bradstreet information as its largest data source.

"YourEconomy.org presents a unique lens to view data from: Statistics are first sorted by three unique employer sectors (noncommercial, nonresident and resident establishments). Then, resident establishments are subdivided into four stages that reflect different issues companies face as they grow"

The data can be use for examining business and job growth and movement over the years at the national, state, metro and county levels. There is also an explanation of how the data from NETS differs from data available from BLS-Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Census Bureau.

New Business and Economics Books in the USFSP library

New BUSINESS and ECONOMICS books in the Poynter Library, USFSP
(in LC Call Number order, HB-HJ only)
May 4 – June 18, 2009

The following new business and economics books are kept on the “New Books” cart on the first floor in the library for a few weeks, and then moved to the circulating collection on the second floor, unless checked out…

Industrial clusters and innovation systems in Africa : institutions, markets, and policy / edited by Banji Oyelaran-Oyeyinka and Dorothy McCormick.
HC800.Z9 D55 2007

The politics of food supply : U.S. agricultural policy in the world economy / Bill Winders ; foreword by James C. Scott.
HD9006 .W56 2009

The green-collar economy : how one solution can fix our two biggest problems / Van Jones with Ariane Conrad ; Foreword by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
HD9502.U52 J66 2008

The myth of the oil crisis : overcoming the challenges of depletion, geopolitics, and global warming / Robin M. Mills.
HD9560.5 .M553 2008

The automobile and American life / John A. Heitmann.
HD9710.U52 H39 2009

China and the global political economy / Shaun Breslin.
HF1604 .B72 2009

Africa and the world trading system / edited by T. Ademola Oyejide & William Lyakurwa.
HF1611 .A36 2005

Alibaba : the inside story behind Jack Ma and the creation of the world's biggest online marketplace / Liu Shiying and Martha Avery.
HF5478 .L58 2009

Called to account : fourteen financial frauds that shaped the American accounting profession / Paul M. Clikeman.
HF5616.U5 C575 2009

The king of Madison Avenue : David Ogilvy and the making of modern advertising / Kenneth Roman.
HF5810.O34 A3 2009

The Financial services fact book (2009) / Insurance Information Institute [and] Financial Services Roundtable
HG181 .F643

Managing investment portfolios : a dynamic process / John L. Maginn ... [et al.].
HG4529.5 .M36 2007

A more complete list of new books at the Poynter Library can be found here.

Please let me know if there are any particular publications that you would like to see in the library collection. Thank you,
Marcy

Lithium, electric cars, and Bolivia

Auto Manufacturers Race for Bolivia’s Lithium Reserves

Bolivia has the world's largest lithium reserves, which are attracting multinational auto manufacturers exploring sources for new electric and hybrid auto technologies. Evo Morales, president of Bolivia, is considering partnerships and other options. A recent article in Knowledge@Wharton summarizes some of the political and social issues involved. Bolivia
hopes to attract international investment yet retain wealth within the country.

U.S. Travel & Tourism - 2005-2008

"The travel and tourism industry—as measured by the real output of goods and services sold directly to visitors—shrank in 2008 for the first time in 7 years, according to the most recent statistics from the travel and tourism satellite accounts of the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA)."

A recent article in the BEA's Survey of Current Business looks at data from 2003 to 2008, with revisions to the most current years. Included are trends in output by tourism commodity (e.g., food, transportation, recreation); trends in prices; the composition of tourism demand; and trends in direct and tourism-related employment.

The BEA web site is a wonderful resource for researching or monitoring the U.S. economy. Along with the Survey of Current Business, you'll also find current news releases, interactive data tables, papers and working papers. Review the BEA Customer Guide for some basic guidelines on using their resources.

Trust and the business school

In the June 2009 issue of Harvard Business Review, Joel Podolny writes about the apparent lack of trust in U.S. business schools in "The Buck Stops (and Starts) at Business School". In order to regain trust, Podolny offers the following recommendations for business schools: foster greater integration; appoint teaching teams; encourage qualitative research; stop competing on rankings; and withdraw degrees for violating codes of conduct.

The June issue of HBR is focused on "trust" and includes several timely articles on related topics.

To locate this article in PDF format through the USF libraries, login to the "Business Source Premier" database and search on "Harvard Business Review" and Podolny. USFSP faculty and students can also set up alerts to receive an email notices of new issues (with citations and embedded links). Drop me a note if you'd like assistance in setting up an e-alert for HBR or other publications or topics.

Online music

The Pew Research Center is using the ten-year anniversary of its Internet & American Life Project as an opportunity to release retrospective reports on selected topics. "The State of Music Online: Ten Years after Napster" is an 18-page report that looks at the dramatic changes in the music industry:

"While the music industry has been on the front lines of the battle to convert freeloaders into paying customers, their efforts have been watched closely by other digitized industries—newspapers, book publishing and Hollywood among them—who are hoping to staunch their own bleeding before it’s too late. And if the music market is any indication of how consumer expectations will evolve elsewhere, the demands for free content will extend far beyond the mere cost of the product."

home ownership = happiness?

Research from a real estate professor at Wharton, Grace Bucchianeri, seems to question the conventional wisdom that home ownership leads to happiness. Knowledge@Wharton newsletter profiles her research in the article, "So you think owning a home will make you happy? Don't be too sure." The article provides a link to the 38-page working paper:

"The results show that after controlling for household income, housing quality, and health, homeowners are no happier than renters by any of the following definitions: life satisfaction, overall mood, overall feeling, general moment-to-moment emotions (i.e. affect) and affect at home but instead derive more pain from their house and home. Time use pattern analysis reveals that homeowners tend to spend less time on enjoyable activities. There is little evidence that homeowners are better citizens. Homeowners who live in ZIP code areas with higher rates of homeownership report more positive attitudes only if other owners are similar to them in socio-economic terms, lending some support to the idea of beneficial social interaction among owners."

Internet advertising revenues

According to the most recent IAB Internet Advertising Revenue Report, internet advertising revenues in the U.S. reached $23.4 billion in 2008, up 10.6% over 2007.

The 21-page report includes information by advertising format (e.g., display banners, search, classified ads, etc.) and by major industry category (e.g., retail, financial services, automotive, etc.).

The "Internet Advertising Revenue Report" was initiated by the IAB-Interactive Advertising Bureau in 1996 and is conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP on an ongoing basis.

Trends: Foreverism, Nowism...

The most recent briefing from Trendwatching.com is focused on a trend dubbed "Foreverism":

"...Encompasses the many ways that consumers and businesses are embracing conversations, relationships, and products that are never done. Driving its popularity is technology that allows them to find, follow, interact and collaborate forever with anyone & anything."

One example provided is the enormous and growing quantity of online profiles, links, stories, photos, friends of friends..... creating a "forever presence" of individuals online. You will never be more than one or two degrees away from anyone else... and now with Google Latitude you can also follow the physical location of friends as well....

Twitter is an example of the forever and ongoing conversations. Businesses can also use Twitter to communicate with consumers -- Trendwatching.com provides excerpts from some corporate Twitter accounts such as Ford, Whole Foods, Wells Fargo, Jet Blue Airways, and others.

To follow these trends, subscribe to receive free monthly email briefings from Trendwatching.com.

Consumer electronics: Converged v. Dedicated Products

In the paper, “Technology Convergence: When do consumers prefer converged products to dedicated products”, two professors at Singapore Management University found that while consumers still generally prefer dedicated products, all-in-one products such as the iPhone are increasingly popular. Convenience, rather than performance, is one of the key benefits for converged products. For high performance products, consumers generally look for dedicated products....

"If anything, the study has shown that the contest between converged and dedicated products lie mainly with consumer perceptions. Consumer electronics manufacturers could stand to benefit from innovative products, but perhaps more so, through innovative marketing."

"Do friends influence purchases in a social network?"

A working paper from the Harvard Business School examines the question, "Do friends influence purchases in a social network?" The short answer from researchers Raghuram Iyengar, Sangman Han, and Sunil Gupta is: it depends.

So, while in general a friend's purchases has a positive impact on the purchase probability of a user, there are great differences across different types of users. For example, "Highly connected users tend to reduce their purchases of items when they see their friends buying them." (In other words, if others are buying it, it's no longer cool...)

You can read the abstract and executive summary here, and then link to the full-text PDF of the working paper.