Number Of Brokers Research Articles

Analysis of Physical Tourism Tickets: Can Security Printing be Used?

Selling physical tickets at tourist destinations is often a problem in the world of tourism. The number of brokers and fake tickets is always the main problem. Physical tickets are very easy to counterfeit and very easy to distribute to irresponsible brokers. As a result, many tourists are deceived and often have to pay twice or even more just because they bought fake tickets. This research analyzes the problems caused by physical tickets and analyzes alternative security printing solutions that can be applied to ticketing systems using descriptive qualitative research methods. The results of this research are that ticketing using security printing will require greater costs and still pose a risk of ticket counterfeiting. Security printing might have benefits if it were given more value, such as embossing for braille letters aimed at blind tourists. However, for greater benefits, digital ticketing will have a smaller risk of counterfeiting and have greater profits.

Attraction of Individuals to Russian Stock Market

The article studies investment activity of the population on Russian stock market in 2015–2022. The research used data and analytical information of the Federal Service of State Statistics, the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, the Moscow Exchange, NAFI Analytical Center. The authors ground the importance of attracting individuals to the stock market in conditions of economic sanctions introduced against Russia. They come to the conclusion that the growth in the number of private investors and the amount of funds on individual investment accounts are influenced by concessional taxation, higher real incomes of the population, improving financial literacy and trust to the stock market, as well as simplifying registration and trade on stock market and rising profitability of investing into shares and bonds. The adverse impact on the number of brokers’ clients and the amount of funds on individual investment accounts is rendered by deposit rates in banks, dropping confidence to stock market and deterioration in conditions for saving building. The authors provide recommendations on developing the stock market in Russia, which include extension of concessional taxation on transactions with securities by individuals, better accessibility of digital tools and services, for instance by the ‘Marketplace’ project, higher level of finance literacy of the population, especially in rural and remote regions.

A comprehensive model to analyze straw recycling logistics costs for sustainable development: Evidence from biomass power generation

AbstractLow straw recycling logistics costs are a key factor for biomass power generation enterprises to maximize their profits and ensure sustainable operation. Different from the existing literature, this paper divides straw recycling logistics patterns into two types (farmer—plant and farmer—broker—plant) and analyzes their influencing factors to reduce straw recycling logistics costs. In this pursuit, this paper first presents a comprehensive model to analyze straw recycling logistics costs using the calculus method. Then, a 25 MW biomass power plant was selected as a case study to calculate the straw recycling logistics costs. The results show that transportation cost is the most important component of the total straw recycling logistics costs, making up 44.35%. The sensitivity analysis results indicate that the straw recycling radius is the most sensitive factor affecting the straw recycling logistics costs. There is a u‐shaped relationship between the number of brokers and straw recycling logistics costs, and the straw recycling logistics costs have the smallest value when the broker number is 10. Based on the results, this paper proposes the following suggestions. Biomass power plants should conduct reasonable planning for site selection. Brokers should be recruited reasonably, and farmers should change straw planting patterns.

An Energy-Efficient Message Scheduling Algorithm with Joint Routing Mechanism at Network Layer in Internet of Things Environment

The rapid procreation of internet of things (IoT) has invigorated massive research efforts with the purpose to save and use the lifetime of battery-powered sensor nodes which ultimately increases the overall network lifetime. The erroneous and faulty states of these networks are due to the high consumption of batteries in the processing and transmission of data by these nodes. This research focuses on message scheduling in an IoT environment where things/sensors are connected to make IoT groups, where each group has a designated broker whose duty is to delivers the messages coming from the group members to the ultimate sink of the sensed data. At broker a message scheduler operating to decides which message goes first. This algorithm proposed cross layer architecture at application level and network level. The residual energy of the node and its distance is considered as a parameter while selecting broker among all nodes in new proposed methods as compared to traditional LEACH. The proposed method provides better results in terms of number of live nodes, network life time, number of brokers and total dissipated energy while stabilizing the response time of the messages in addition to it.

Kaat Wils, Raf de Bont, and Sokhieng Au, eds. Bodies Beyond Borders: Moving Anatomies 1750–1950

Stemming from a conference held in Leuven in January 2015, Bodies Beyond Borders brings together ten contributions discussing the circulation of anatomical and pathological knowledge, preparations, and images from the late eighteenth to the twentieth centuries. In the only contribution on the eighteenth century, Margaret Carlyle discusses the circulation of anatomical wax models across Paris, St. Petersburg, and London. Marie Marguerite Biheron is the protagonist of the essay, together with Catherine II in Russia, and a number of brokers and intellectuals, including Denis Diderot. Carlyle argues convincingly that wax models proved valuable tools, perfectly imitating real bodies minus the smell. Museums of wax models became obligatory stops for grand-tour Enlightenment travelers from northern Europe to Florence and Bologna. In his study of anatomy and sociability in Belgium, Joris Vandendriessche has taken “object biographies” as the methodology for his contribution. Anatomical and pathological preparations moved from patients to medical practitioners, from the periphery to urban centers, and from private to institutional collections, while becoming the centerpiece of sociability at a number of academies and medical societies across Belgium. Museums reflected and at the same time fostered the growth of pathological anatomy in the nineteenth century, shifting the focus from rare and exceptional curiosities to careful descriptions and systematic comparisons.

User Consent in MOOCs – Micro, Meso, and Macro Perspectives

While many strategies for protecting personal privacy rely on regulatory frameworks, consent, and anonymizing data, they are not always effective. Terms and Conditions often lag behind advances in technology, software, and user behaviours, and consent to use data for a range of unclear purposes may be provided unwittingly. As the commercial market for (student) data expands, so does the number of brokers who move, share and sell data across continents and legislative environments. This paper reviews four Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) providers from different geopolitical and regulatory contexts. It explores how consent to collect and use data is described to potential users, and how that consent applies at micro, meso, and macro levels.This paper proposes a need for greater transparency around the implications of users granting consent at the point of registration. Further, it highlights that though MOOC providers have a responsibility to make clear the potential uses and sharing of user data, users themselves should also be more aware and consider how meaningful student agency can be achieved.

The puzzling resilience of transnational organized criminal networks

Why is transnational organized crime so difficult to dismantle? While organized crime networks within states have received some attention, actual transnational operations have not. In this article, we study the transnational drug and gun trafficking operations of the Shower Posse, a violent international organized crime syndicate based in Jamaica, whose resilience proves particularly puzzling. We were curious to know whether there is any evidence that international borders have an effect on the structure of illicit networks that cross them. It turns out that transnational drug distribution networks such as the Shower Posse rely on a small number of brokers whose role is to connect otherwise distinct domestic markets. Due to the high transaction costs associated with developing and maintaining transnational movement, the role of such brokers appears particularly important in facilitating the flow of illicit commodities across national borders. These brokers coordinate their own smaller subnetworks, while still maintaining the communication and collaboration necessary to ensure that the overall aims of the network are achieved.

Intermediation in Markets with Buyer and Seller Selection: Theory and an Application to Real Estate Brokerage

Many markets are one-to-one matching markets in which match-making intermediaries enable pairs of buyers and sellers to negotiate a transaction price for a good or service. Examples are real estate markets in which realtors search for matches between potential home buyers and sellers, or labor markets in which employment services help the unemployed find work by filling firms’ vacancies. This paper investigates the socially optimal size and market structure of such markets. Firstly, it shows that it is socially optimal for intermediaries to have some market power. That is, it is socially optimal that intermediaries charge a service fee that is above the per-match cost as this excludes some low valuation buyers, which are disliked by sellers, as well as some high reservation price sellers, which are disliked by buyers. Secondly, it shows that matching markets are generally characterized by an excessive number of intermediaries that operate in the market compared to what is socially optimal. When calibrating the model using data from the Belgian real estate brokerage industry, the welfare counterfactuals suggest that the observed average commission rate of 4.3% is below the socially optimal commission rate, which is estimated to be in the range between 5.1% and 24%. A welfare gain of 1% to 11% could be established when regulating broker service fees, given the number of brokers that currently operate in the market. When also regulating broker entry, a further welfare gain of 7% to 69% could be realized. Various other policy relevant welfare counterfactuals are constructed and discussed.

Blockbusting: Brokers and the dynamics of segregation

The paper presents a dynamic model of neighborhood segregation where fee motivated real estate brokers match sellers optimally either to minority or to white buyers. In an initially all-white neighborhood, real estate brokers thus either keep the neighborhood in a steady-state white equilibrium or trigger racial transition by matching sellers to minority buyers, a process called blockbusting. Racial transition leads to a higher rate of property turnover in the neighborhood once the fraction of minorities has reached a tipping point—but racial transition also leads to lower prices, and this is the trade-off faced by a broker. The model shows that with multiple brokers, blockbusting profit per broker is lower as brokers free ride on each other's groundbreaking efforts. The model predicts that racial transition will happen in the neighborhood when (i) the number of brokers is limited, (ii) racial preferences lie in an intermediate range, (iii) the arrival rate of offers is intermediate. Otherwise, real estate brokers steer white households toward white buyers.

Blockbusting: Brokers and the Dynamics of Segregation

The paper presents a continuous-time dynamic model of a neighborhood in racial transition as triggered by a fee-motivated real estate broker. Racial transition occurs in an initially all-white neighborhood when the broker steers white sellers towards black buyers. Racial transition leads to a higher turnover in the neighborhood, but also leads to lower prices. Thus the broker faces a trade-off between higher turnover and lower prices. We show that racial transition will occur only when (i) white households have moderate racial preferences, (ii) the value of housing outside the neighborhood for black households is low, (ii) the broker is moderately patient, (iii) the rate of arrival of offers is moderate, (iv) the number of brokers is limited. Otherwise, the real estate broker steers white households towards white buyers.

The Opportunity Cost of Inaction in Financial Markets: An Analysis of Institutional Decisions and Trades

The ability of mutual funds, pension plans, endowments and other institutions to generate higher risk-adjusted return for the investors and beneficiaries is ideally measured by examining the stock returns from the point in time when they decide to implement a portfolio buy or sell decision to the point in time when they decide to reverse their position. However, the actual performance of a portfolio manager or an investment strategy can deviate significantly from the ideal paper performance. This implementation shortfall of institutional trading has two basic components. The first, execution cost, relates to the transactions you actually execute and arises from price impact, commission, and other transaction fees and taxes. The second, opportunity cost, relates to transactions that you fail to execute. We propose to present the first comprehensive analysis of an often ignored component of implementation shortfall -- the opportunity cost of unexecuted institutional decisions. The proportion of total decisions partly or wholly unfilled is 8.36% and the mean unfilled rate within the unfilled decisions is 51.64%. Opportunity costs of this failure to trade are 24 basis points or $20 billion in our sample period, much higher in magnitude when compared to price impact and five times that of commissions. There is a significant asymmetry in opportunity cost of buy versus sell decisions based on whether market conditions are bullish or bearish. Our initial pilot tests show that the opportunity costs decrease with firm size, speed of transaction, number of brokers, and exchange listing whereas they increase with market volatility.

Follow the Leader: The Cause and Consequences of Fund Managers Trading in Signal-Strength Sequence

In a sequence of trades in the same direction across fund managers, we expect the long-term return of a trade to be increasing in the number of subsequent trades if fund managers' trading is driven by private information. In contrast, information cascades imply the lack of such a relationship. Using the number of brokers and the number of zero trading days prior to a trade to identify the beginning of a trade sequence in our daily fund manager trade series, we find evidence of private information trading when there are less than four fund managers in a trade sequence and information cascade when there are four or more fund managers. We discover that multiple-broker trades have higher price impact as well as higher long-term returns. These trades are also associated with fewer subsequent trades by other fund managers. Finally, we observe that the post-completion returns of the lead trades in a trade sequence are increasing in the managers' portfolio weights in excess of the index weights. While there is evidence that fund managers follow the trades of their peers, they typically trade on private information and they leave some 'money on the table' when they face binding risk constraints.

Anonymity, Frontrunning and Market Integrity

This article investigates the existence of systematic frontrunning on the Toronto Stock Exchange and the role of anonymous orders in concealing frontrunning. There is no evidence of widespread frontrunning activity, with this activity confined to a small number of brokers. In the instances where trading ahead of clients does occur, we find a positive association between the magnitude and frequency of frontrunning with broker activity levels, order size, sell-side orders and informed (profitable) client orders. Although anonymous orders are used more frequently by proprietary traders than their clients, their overall use is low and, contrary to investor perceptions, there is no evidence that they are commonly used to conceal frontrunning.

The Krach of 1882, the Bourse de Paris and the Importance of Microstructure

The crash of the French stock market in 1882 presented the Paris Bourse with its worst crisis of the late nineteenth century. Three features of exchange's microstructure, a dominant forward market, a small number of brokers, and a common fund that guaranteed brokers' transactions, amplified the collapse. Using new archival data, this paper shows that the bourse's common fund, designed to guarantee the liquidity of the exchange from idiosyncratic shocks, made it susceptible to systemic shocks. Only an emergency loan from the Bank of France saved the bourse. Neither the New York nor the London exchanges, which had very different structures, experienced similar liquidity crises.

Metacomputing with Mobile Agents

In this paper we present Parallel Computing with Mobile Agents (PaCMAn), a mobile agent based Metacomputer that enables its users to utilize idle resources on the internet to tackle computational problems that could not be handled efficiently with their own resources. The PaCMAn launches multiple mobile agents that cooperate and communicate to solve problems in parallel. Each agent supports the basic communication and synchronization tasks of the classical parallel worker assuming the role of a process in a parallel processing application. Application tasks, however, are assigned dynamically to the PaCMAn's mobile agents via TaskHandlers. TaskHandlers are Java objects capable of implementing particular tasks of the application. The PaCMAn consists of three major components: Broker, Server and Client. A server machine has to be explicitly registered in order to take part in the PaCMAn Metacomputer. A number of brokers keep track of the available resources. In the PaCMAn system both server and client machines can be located anywhere in the Internet. The clients select the servers that they will utilize based on the specific resource requirements. We have developed and tested prototype systems with several applications. These prototypes provide proof of concept of our proposed Metacomputing philosophy. Furthermore they have demonstrated that PaCMAn provides parallel efficiency. We also demonstrate that the PaCMAn Metacomputer can be used as the computational engine for the creation of sophisticated Pervasive Services anywhere anytime.

Debt bondage in the brokerage system: a case study of sugarcane migrants in Tamil Nadu

In this paper, we deal with one form of bonded labour generating under the brokerage system. We have led a qualitative survey in a small village of South India to study the phenomenon of brokerage. In this village, labourers are seasonal migrants who in order to migrate, take advance from brokers. The village is characterised by a high number of brokers who are in competition to attract labourers to their team. In this environment, labourers have the bargaining power to demand high amount of advance. Therefore, brokers bond them in order to reduce their bargaining power and to avoid competition.

The Relationship among Volatility, Volume, Bid-Ask Spread and Number of Brokers

This study is the first to use minute-by-minute data to examine the simultaneous interrelationship among volatilities, volume, bid-ask spread, and the number of brokers for three actively-traded Hong Kong companies between October 2 and December 29, 1995. The results indicate that high volatility is typically associated with high volume, a large bid-ask spread, and a large number of brokers. Volume is found to be positively related to volatility and negatively related to the number of brokers. This result confirms the observation that large stock trades in Hong Kong are conducted by a small group of brokers who derive business primarily from the institutional investors. More brokers and high volatility tend to increase the bid-ask spread, while high volume decreases it. Finally, we find that the number of participating brokers in the market is positively related to the lagged volatility and negatively related to the lagged volume and bid-ask spread.

Informed Trading With Multiple Competitive Brokers

We study competitive, but strategic, brokers executing trades for an informed trader in a single and multi-period setting. When brokers act as principals and agents in the same transaction, informed traders benefit and uninformed traders are hurt relative to a model with no brokers. This result is opposite to related models with a single broker. When brokers act as principals and agents in different transactions, they can choose to execute the order, as agents, first, and trade for themselves, as dealers afterwards; or, trade for themselves first and execute the order later. The informed trader always prefers to have his order executed first. Surprisingly, for greater than a critical number of brokers, brokers also prefer to execute the informed trader's order first. We empirically show that this critical number is exceeded for the futures contracts in our sample. An important implication of our result is that competition between brokers can mitigate trading abuses (such as front-running) arising from a conflict between brokers' agency and principal functions.

Remunerating Information Providers: Commissions versus Fees in Life Insurance

(c,c+Q) would not rule out purchases by uninformed consumers under the commission regime. However, since the price is higher under the commission regime than under the fee regime, it is always the case that expected consumer surplus of uninformed consumers is greater under the fee regime. The welfare comparisons below will not therefore be qualitatively affected. 14 The last step follows because (p-c)F = kF = r, and equation (5) holds at the equilibrium. 15 See Gravelle (1991) where it is also demonstrated that it is possible for the commission equilibrium to be worse than the allocation produced by a cartel of firms. Introduction Potential purchasers are likely to be initially ignorant about the complex characteristics of life insurance products. They can be provided with information and advice by brokers who are remunerated by commissions paid by insurers. It has been suggested in the United Kingdom (see Office of Fair Trading, 1990), the United States (see Ferling, 1991, and Otis, 1991), and Australia (see McIlwaine, 1990) that it would be better if consumers directly paid a fee for advice about financial products rather than having the information providers receive a commission from the insurer if a sale is made. The suggestions are prompted by the argument that a commission system gives greater incentives to provide biased advice to unsophisticated potential customers. However, a change to a fee-for-advice system would also affect consumers by increasing the price of advice and reducing the price of the product. This article models the determination of the price of advice, the price of the product and the quality of advice under the two remunerations systems. The model is used to compare the welfare properties of the two systems and, particularly, to test the intuitively plausible assertion that a fee-for-advice system is better than the commission system because it leads to a lower product price and better advice. The maintained assumption of regulators and commentators is that brokers take advantage of consumers' ignorance and lack of sophistication. This article shows that the weak market position of consumers will be exploited under both the commission and fee-for-advice systems. Neither remuneration system will achieve even a second-best efficient allocation. It is also demonstrated that the fee system is not necessarily superior to the commission system once the number of brokers and purchases under the two regimes are taken into account. The next section describes the basic framework of the model that is used in the following two sections to examine the equilibrium with a commission system and with a fee-for-advice system. Next, the efficiency of the two systems is compared.(1) The model is then extended to allow for heterogeneous consumers who differ in the value they place on information. The penultimate section investigates the implications of the remuneration regime for the quality of advice. The last section summarizes the argument and contains some conclusions. Basic Framework The model of the life insurance market is deliberately stylized with many important features of the market ignored or assumed away. The justification for the strong assumptions and simple specification is that the aim of the article is to investigate the plausible view that a fee-for-advice regime is obviously better than a commission regime. If it can be shown that the welfare comparison of the two remuneration regimes is ambiguous even in such a simple framework then there is no need for a more elaborate and less tractable model. A simple framework also has the advantage of starkly illustrating the influence of different parameters and assumptions and points the way for further investigations by indicating the significant features of the specification. Life Insurers Life insurers are risk neutral, competitive, and produce identical policies and break even in equilibrium. …

DEVELOPMENT OF LOCAL VEGETABLE-FRUIT MARKETS AND FORMATION OF VEGETABLE-FRUIT GROWING AREAS IN NORTHERN PART OF SAITAMA PREFECTURE DURING EARLY SHOWA PERIOD

In this study the author tried to examine the trends in vegetable markets and brokers in the producing districts and to clarify how these trends affected the formation of the vegetable growing areas during the agricultural depression. Comprehensive descriptions are made about (A) nature of market places at the villages on the right bank of the Tone River, and on the alluvial fan of the Arakawa River and that of the Kanna River and (B) formation of the vegetable producing areas on the right bank of the Tone River. A-1. During the agricultural depression, production of vegetables and fruits for cash income was promoted actively in the rural communities in the northern part of Saitama Prefecture to compensate the loss of cash income due to the low market prices of silk. A-2. As a result, the following two areas were formed, reflecting physical and chemical characteristics of the soil e (a) a winter-spring vegetable area on the right bank of the Tone River and (b) a fruit and summer-fall vegetable area on diluvial tablelands. A-3. As these two vegetable areas developed, their situations in the outer fringe of suburban farming region around the Tokyo metropolitan area promoted the formation of unique distribution systems, which were characterized by dense occurrence of market places and accumulation of brokers in the producing areas. These systems caused to increase the vegetable production of individual farms and to expand the producing areas. A-4. The development of the distribution systems reflected the geographical characteristics of these vegetable-producing areas. On the right bank of the Tone River, this system developed markets which resembled a cooperative association. On the diluvial tablelands, it markets which were a market-oriented type were developed even though they were located in the producing areas. B-l. In the rural areas on the right bank of the Tone River, the intensive growing areas were resulted from the general management type (sericulture and winter-spring vegetables) which was based on the establishment of sericulture and fertile soil as well as the simple composition of vegetables. B-2. Shipping of welsh onions under the guidance of village agricultural associations contributed to expand the markets and to increase the production at the end of the Taisho period. Later increase in the production stimulated the establishment of market places run by the agricultural associations. As a result, the joint shipment system of the village agricultural associations was converted to the systems of market-at-producing-area, which would be open to brokers. B 3. Seasonality of local market places (held in the off-seasons of sericulture in this case) and the participation of peasants that were produced by the Tone River improvement works in brokerage caused an interdependent relationship between the brokers and the farms that needed multiple utilization of limited land. They worked together to develop the production of vegetables. B-4. The establishment of the system of market-at-producing-area and the activities of the brokers became a rather effective factor in increasing the vegetable production of farms in the early Showa period, when shipping and traffic means was not developed and the markets in urban places in the vicinities were immature. At the same time, the increase in the production of winter-spring vegetable combined with mulberry farming contributed to the increase in the number of brokers and the areal expansion of their activities. B-5. The vegetable farming on the right bank of the Tone River established indispensable distribution systems which included organizations of market at producing-area accumulation of local brokers. Supported by the development of munition industry in Ohta, Koizumi, Ojima, Isesaki, and the expansion of agricultural markets in rapidly expanding Tokyo, this area was cropped throughout the year and diversified its production items.