This article analyzes the efficiency of Comunitat Valenciana (Spain) local governments and their main explanatory variables. The analysis is performed in two stages. Firstly, efficiency is measured via (nonparametric) activity analysis techniques. The measurement techniques also enable the...

Increased competition and the attempts of European banks to increase their presence in other markets may have affected the efficiency and credit risk. The first of this aspects is based on the incentive to the banks to reduce cost in order to gain in competitiveness. The second is associated to...

Hypothesis testing and statistical precision in the context of nonparametric efficiency and productivity measurement have been investigated since the early 1990s. Recent contributions focus on this matter through the use of resampling methods?i.e., bootstrapping techniques. However, empirical...

The last few years have witnessed a rapid evolution in the literature evaluating mutual fund performance using frontier techniques. The instruments applied, mostly DEA (Data Envelopment Analysis) and, to a lesser extent, FDH (Free Disposal Hull), are able to encompass several dimensions of...

The aim of this paper is to analyse the role of human capital in the productivity gains of the countries of the OECD in the period 1965-90, breaking down the productivity gains into technicalchange and gains in efficiency. For this purpose we use both a stochastic frontier production function...

The aim of this study is to analyse the efficiency in costs and in profits of the Spanish banking sector (SBS) in the period 1985-96 using a non-parametric approach. The results obtained show the existence of profit efficiency levels well below those corresponding to cost efficiency, alternative...

This paper examines the reaction of the Spanish continuous market to the announcement of securitisation operations by listed banks in the period 1993-2003. Results indicate the existence of positive and significant abnormal returns on the day immediately following the announcement date. The...

The aim of this study is to analyze labor productivity convergence in the countries of the OECD over the period 1965-90. A non-parametric frontier approach is used to calculate the Malmquist productivity index. By breaking it down, the contribution to the growth of labor productivity of...

This study analyzes the links between efficiency and the decentralization of competencies among Spanish local governments for years 1995 and 2000. The aim is pursued by considering a two-stage activity analysis model in which the performance of eachmunicipality is first evaluated against other...

Several studies have shown that the contrarian strategy, or the forming of a zeroinvestmentportfolio that buys the stocks that have performed poorly in the past (losers) andsells those that have performed well (winners), creates abnormally positive returns in thefuture. Many hypotheses have been...