Actual Reliance Research Articles

Actual reliance of catalytic activities tuned oxygen vacancies on VOx/Ce1-xZrxO2 catalyst for selective oxydehydrogenation of methanol to dimethoxymethane

Metal oxide catalysts like ceria-supported vanadia (VOx/Ce1-xZrxO2) with different Zr contents were prepared by coupling ceria-zirconia solid solution and vanadia. Characterization revealed that the insertion of zirconia into ceria significantly improved catalytic activity due to the generation of more oxygen vacancies and distortion of the composite structure. The oxygen vacancy concentration initially increased with the increase of Zr (x= wt%) and peaked at x=0.7 and then decreased. The reliance of oxygen vacancy concentration in VOx/Ce1-xZrxO2 catalyst on their catalytic activity in methanol oxydehydrogenation was further investigated. Results indicated that oxygen vacancies not only activated oxygen species but also cleaved C–H bonds alongside V5+ active site contained terminal oxygen atoms for cleaving O–H and C–H bonds within the adsorbed methanol. The VOx/Ce0.3Zr0.7O2 exhibited the best catalytic activity with the methanol conversion of 76 % and the dimethoxymethane selectivity of 96 % at 200 ℃ and atmospheric pressure in a fixed-bed reactor.

Communicative Aggression in the Russian Media Sphere: Background and Manifestations

Background/Objectives: The relevance of the study is due to the increase in frequency of manifestations of socially dangerous aggression in the public media discourse. Analysis of the genesis and dynamics of communication aggression is an important task for humanities and social practice. In this regard, the article aims to reveal both manifestations of communicative aggression in the Russian media sphere, and the creation of the methodology for the analysis of a new social phenomenon. Method: The essence of the problem determined the actual reliance on the methodology of value analysis of the media, allowing considering the genesis and the dynamics of communicative aggression in full. The object of the study is the Russian media sphere during public discussions (2014–15) on the issue of the Crimea reunification with Russia. Content analysis (target sample out of 11 publications) has been used on a quantitative level. A trigger-analysis has been applied on the qualitative level. Findings: In the article the following provisions have been justified: media discourse in Russia is the unity and confrontation between the sacred and the secular discourses; the sacred discourse establishes “value absolutes”, and a secular discourse is expressed in interpretations and discussions, tends to the liberal values; media discourse is influenced by stigmatization – an exclusion of certain values in the political and cultural spheres; mass media – spontaneously and purposefully – spread and reinforce phobia among the audience in the political and cultural spheres. Improvements: Article findings are of practical value to policy functionaries and political strategists, theorists of journalism and media managers.

Building a Safe Harbor for Whom? A Look at Cautionary Disclaimers and Investors' Reactions to Forward-Looking Statements

We examine investor perceptions of forward-looking statements in the presence and absence of cautionary disclaimers about forward-looking statements. Using two experiments, we first show that nonprofessional investors are largely credulous of forward-looking statements when a cautionary statement is omitted from an earnings press release. In addition, although including a cautionary disclaimer lowers their explicit perceptions of whether they can rely on the information in the press release, investors’ valuation judgments do not indicate a significant reduction in actual reliance. In Experiment 2, we explore additional ways to increase the impact of cautionary disclaimers, and we find that cautionary disclaimers which discuss specific risks at the end of a disclosure lead to the greatest reduction in investors’ explicit perceptions of reliability. However, we again find cautionary disclaimers to be much less effective in reducing actual reliance compared to their impact on investors’ beliefs about reliance. As such, our results raise questions about the merit of granting (denying) safe harbor to management on the basis of having provided (omitted) cautionary disclaimers that do little to induce caution among investors.

Damages and Reliance under Section 10(b) of the Exchange Act

A textualist interpretation of the implied private right of action under Section 10(b) of the Exchange Act concludes that the right to recover money damages in an aftermarket fraud can be no broader than the express right of recovery under Section 18(a) of the Exchange Act. The Act’s original legislative history and recent Supreme Court doctrine are consistent with this conclusion, as is the Act’s subsequent legislative history. Section 18(a), however, requires that plaintiffs affirmatively demonstrate actual “eyeball” reliance as a precondition to recovery and does not permit a rebuttable presumption of reliance. Accordingly, if the Exchange Act is to be interpreted as a “harmonious whole,” with the scope of recovery under the implied Section 10(b) private right being no greater than the recovery available under the most analogous express remedy, Section 18(a), then Section 10(b) plaintiffs must either demonstrate actual reliance as a precondition to recovery of damages, or the Court should revisit Basic, as suggested by four justices in Amgen, and overturn Basic’s rebuttable presumption of reliance. A textualist approach thus provides a rationale for reversing Basic that avoids the complex debate over the validity of the efficient market hypothesis, an academic dispute that the Supreme Court is not optimally situated to referee. Experience also demonstrates that Basic’s presumption of reliance, which is nominally rebuttable, is effectively irrebuttable once it attaches. This observation provides a further basis upon which to challenge Basic’s continuing vitality. The implications of this analysis are potentially profound. If plaintiffs must affirmatively demonstrate actual reliance, then many Section 10(b) securities fraud class actions become uncertifiable because individual questions will predominate. Private securities fraud litigation would then likely be dominated by class actions asserting violations of Section 11 of the Securities Act as well as by a scrum of individual actions brought by larger investors with significant damage claims in major cases. The battle would then likely move to Congress which could legislate a rebuttable presumption of reliance, or otherwise amend the statute to reform the securities litigation process.

Learner perceptions of reliance on captions in EFL multimedia listening comprehension

Instructional support has been widely discussed as a strategy to optimize student-learning experiences. This study examines instructional support within the context of a multimedia language-learning environment, with the predominant focus on learners’ perceptions of captioning support for listening comprehension. The study seeks to answer two questions: (1) do learners’ perceptions regarding dependence on captions match their actual reliance on captioning for listening comprehension? and (2) which learners’ perceptions are most influenced by proficiency: low-intermediate, intermediate, or high-intermediate? A total of 139 students from a high school English course in northern Taiwan, all accustomed to multimedia instruction that includes full captions, completed an English language proficiency test as well as a caption reliance test (CRT), and also provided their perceived degree of reliance on captions for English listening comprehension. The results show that overall perceived reliance was significantly related to actual reliance as assessed by the CRT. However, proficiency was also found to be a mitigating factor in the relationship: while low-intermediate level learners accurately perceived their reliance, no relation was found for either intermediate or high-intermediate learners, indicating that, at these levels, some learners may not accurately judge their reliance on captioning. Accordingly, the study offers pedagogical implications that captioning support, added or removed, based on learner self-reports, may not be inherently beneficial, as perceptions on the reliance of captioning may be inaccurate.

Propositions To Guide Evidence-Based Decision-Making

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0in 0.5in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">The methods by which managers make decisions in the face of inaccurate data, changing environments and other pervasive uncertainties, have been studied by researchers and business practitioners for many decades.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span>Much attention is given to highly quantitative decision-theoretic techniques; such methods generally deal with these inherent impediments to rational decisions using mathematical concepts from the theories of probability, stochastic processes, estimation and optimization, fuzzy sets, etc.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span>The very act of quantification itself has great implications for managers’ cognitive processes, the impact upon various groups within the organization, and the final outcomes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span>Indeed, use of formal methods and actual reliance on hard numbers improves decision quality and speed by providing efficient cognitive simplifications and convergent expectations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span>This paper synthesizes findings from several relevant streams of literature and proposes several simple propositions for further discussion and future research. It applies these ideas to two illustrative examples of major complex business decisions.</span></span></p>

Extraterritorial Application of US Securities Law – Will the US Become the Default Jurisdiction for European Securities Litigation?

US courts have analyzed the question of whether Section 10(b) of the 1934 Securities and Exchange Act and SEC Rule 10b-5 can be applied to foreign litigants in securities fraud cases as a question of subject matter jurisdiction. The most frequently used approach is the Second Circuit’s so-called “conduct and effects” test which looks at whether conduct contributing to the violation took place in the United States or whether the conduct had an effect on US investors. Before Morrison v. National Australia Bank, US courts have avoided a bright line rule to determine which cases can be litigated in US courts and which cannot. In the past decade, US courts have faced a rise in foreign cubed cases. In 2008, foreign cubed cases exceeded any previous year and the trend is continuing. One reason for this development could be a lack of securities class actions in European jurisdictions. This void increases incentives for forum shopping by plaintiffs’ lawyers. US law allows plaintiffs to proceed on the basis of the “fraud on the market theory” rather than requiring plaintiffs to prove actual reliance on misleading statements. The paper evaluates the impact of overlapping regulation and legal uncertainty. Section 7216 of H.R. 5173 would explicitly provide for extraterritorial jurisdiction with respect to antifraud provisions in the federal securities laws if there is “conduct within the United States that constitutes significant steps in furtherance of the violation, even if the securities transaction occurs outside the United States and involves only foreign investors”. The paper evaluates the impact of Section 7216 on European financial intermediaries, European lawyers, European investors and diplomacy.

Accounting for Bad News: Securities Fraud Litigation and the Equal Application of Market Efficiency

The Fraud-on-the-Market theory holds that high volume markets, such as the New York Stock Exchange, effectively incorporate all available information of present and expected value into a security’s price. As endorsed by the United States Supreme Court, fraud on the market serves an important procedural role within the context of securities litigation by providing a general reliance presumption for all investors. An investor, or class of investors, is able to sue upon a claim of management misrepresentation without having to show actual reliance on the fraudulent information. When a market is assumed to be efficient, misinformation is deemed to defraud investors who have relied upon the integrity of the market itself. The presumption of market efficiency may thus be seen as an aspirational device, for placing the costs of rebuttal upon a corporation is said to encourage market transparency and the very same integrity of information that is assumed theoretically. For the soundness of market information to be encouraged through such a litigation presumption, the effect should not become counter-distorting through the double compensation of litigation loss. If fraud on the market is to be applied with consistent logic, then one must assume that the instant a misrepresentation is made public that rational investors will automatically discount the stock price to account for the inevitable class action suit that will arise. A post misrepresentation fall in share price generally serves as the basis for securities fraud claims of loss. Yet, this entails that plaintiffs are able to recover on a market valuation that includes both the diminishment in the asset due to fraud and the anticipated cost of its future litigation. Unlike traditional fraud recovery, the operation of an anticipatory market incorporates litigation outcomes into asset valuation at the time of awareness. Accordingly, damage recovery may unwittingly grant relief on a loss assessment that is composed of two factors: 1) the market assessment of asset devaluation due to fraud; and 2) the market prediction of the very same plaintiff recovery. One can then see that plaintiffs have their litigation recovery count twice: as they receive it from the court, and as it formed the basis of the very amount of claimed loss. In response to this problem, the following paper draws upon methods of alternative company valuation to arrive at a simple formula for filtering out anticipated litigation loss from securities damages.

Closing the Gate on Ontario's Securities Class Actions

Ontario's new securities legislation, Bill 198, closes the gate on securities class actions. Yet the legislation does not make such an ulterior purpose initially evident. Indeed, the new statutory revisions to the Securities Act have thus far been touted as a compromise between the interests of securities class action defendants and plaintiffs. Defendants are leery of American-style strike suits. Plaintiffs are eager to ease the burden of proving reliance as a common issue. Bill 198 hides its politically charged message within layers of new gate keeping procedures that combine with existing class actions legislation to create a procedural mangle for securities class actions. One needs to actually chart the practical ramifications for bringing a securities class action under Bill 198 in order to discern that securities class actions are still unwelcome in Ontario. This paper exposes the logistical problems behind Bill 198's operation, and concludes that no reasonable plaintiff's counsel would take advantage of the new statutory cause of action. The benefits of having securities class actions in Ontario's procedural landscape are actually never realized through this legislation. Bill 198 appears to add a new cause of action which eliminates the traditional common law requirement of proving actual reliance. Such a revision would seem to make a securities class action far easier to litigate. But the layering of procedural deterrence from both Bill 198 and the Class Proceedings Act operate in conjunction to practically prevent securities class actions. Bill 198 adds to any potential securities class action the requirements of proving both good faith and reasonable possibility of success at trial. Damages are also capped. The Class Proceedings Act requires that all potential class actions pass a certification stage, where class plaintiffs must prove they have common issues tying the class together. In addition, all Ontario class actions require judicial approval of settlements. The paper questions the efficacy of Bill 198's targeting of securities class actions as a different kind of class action that should not be brought, for all practical purposes. Why are other class actions, such as products liability or vanishing premium cases, allowed to proceed in Ontario? What is so fundamentally different about a securities class action that it must be regulated to death by mismatched and duplicative procedures? Arguably, nothing.

Networks, Keiretsu, and Locations of the Japanese Electronics Industry in Asia

It has been assumed that industrial networks, particularly of keiretsu-based organizations, play the major role in dictating the formation of industrial agglomerations for Japanese investment in overseas locations. In this paper, I examine whether currently available establishment data on Japanese firms in Asia confirm this tendency for the electronics industry. The data show that actual reliance on keiretsu networks in Asia is relatively low, and keiretsu relationships are more likely to reflect a strong relationship at the global level, rather than relationships with suppliers within host countries. This result poses questions on the assumptions of network-based industrialization affecting locations of foreign direct investment.

Propositions and Reasoning in Russell and Frege

Both Russell and Frege were inclined to think that there is nothing essentially linguistic about thought: any actual reliance of ours upon language is a mere psychological contingency. If so then it should be possible to formulate logic in such a way that logical relationships are not represented or expressed as principles pertaining to linguistic forms. Russell and Frege take pains to achieve this, but fail. I explain this by looking at some features of Grundgesetz and Principia. Their failure, I suggest, is due to the nature of the case.

Expanding the role of methodology

One way of inducing economists to pay more attention to methodology is for methodologists to take up problems that practicing economists will see as relevant to their work and discuss them in a non-technical manner. The paper provides some examples of how methodologists could aid practicing economists in this way. The examples used are the validity of the new classical's insistence on reductionism, the tension between those who want to ground economic theory rigorously, and those willing to work with informal theory, and the related tension between the claimed reliance on ‘scientific’ theory and the actual reliance on informal evidence, conflicting interpretations of what science and theories are, and some low-level but important problems in econometrics.