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Market Risk in Project Finance: Approaches to Review and Minimisation

Relevance. Development of an investment project is commonly associated with many risks, and one of the most significant risks is a market risk i.e. is a possible failure to achieve prices, volumes and sales projected in total compared to those planned in the business plan and financial model of a project. Modern literature pays not enough attention to many relevant and practical issues of the market risk (i.e. is a possible failure to achieve prices, volumes and sales projected) review and reduction in the project finance and investment review, as well as to issues of work with independent marketing consultants, possible areas and ways for risk reduction and quality improvement.Purpose. The previous article considered approaches to understanding significance of the market risk and measures to deal with the risk in the review of price forecasts for an investment project. This article is supposed to consider the issues of risk reduction by organising optimal work with an independent consultant on these issues.Objectives. It is supposed to consider the possibility of engaging an independent marketing consultant, the requirements to the consultant by the financing organisation or investor, to provide an example of detailed scope of work for the independent analysis, give examples of comments to the marketing report and proposed measures to adjust the analysis in the report. It is also necessary to consider approaches to the use of the financial model in order to reduce market risk effects in project financing.Methodology. Methods of analysis and synthesis, induction and deduction as well as modelling are used in the article.Results. The article considers two major issues related to the accounting for or reduction of the market risks in the development of investment projects and providing project finance: the range of questions regarding working with a marketing consultant in order to decrease market risk effects is discussed, examples of requirements to the consultant and potential scope of work as well as some possible errors examples are given; author discusses instruments for considering these risks in financial model, including increased required levels for liquidity and debt service ratios in case of high risks and uncertainties.Conclusion. The market risk is one of the key risks in the development of an investment project and project review in project finance. A set of measures is needed to reduce and account for the risk. Proper application of these and other reasonable measures should enable project initiators and sponsors to ensure their successful development and compliance with the debt service schedule to third-party lenders.

Ideas for Estate and Transition Planning: Gifting

For many farm and ranch families, bringing children or grandchildren into the operation is the ultimate goal. Successfully bringing additional family members into the operation may require some creativity as all parties need to maintain a viable standard of living. This article is part of a series that will highlight ideas and tactics for bringing another family member into the operation. If this is the first article you are seeing in this series, I would encourage you to go back to the previous article for background and additional guidance. The second tactic to transfer wealth between generations is gifting. The U.S. tax code has two main laws that apply to gifting: the annual gift tax exclusion and the gift and estate tax basic exclusion amount.” In this article, the person gifting assets is going to be called the donor, and the person receiving the gift is going to be called the donee

Ermakov Equations can be Derived from Zel’dovich Pancake, and they are Cold and Nonlocal through using Neutrosophic Venn Diagram

As we argue in the previous article [3], the labyrinthine worlds of Jorge Luis Borges are more than captivating narratives; they are portals to a deeper understanding of existence. By weaving elements of science-fiction fantasy with philosophical and ethical inquiries, Borges's short stories bridge the seemingly disparate realms of physics and the humanities, offering fertile ground for contemporary physics research. The present-day universe consists of galaxies, galaxy clusters, one-dimensional filaments and two-dimensional sheets or pancakes, all of which combine to form the cosmic web. The so called ”Zeldovich pancakes”, are very difficult to observe, because their overdensity is only slightly greater than the average density of the universe. Falco et al. presented a method to identify Zeldovich pancakes in observational data, and the method were used as a tool for estimating the mass of galaxy clusters [2]. Here we provide an outline from Zel’dovich pancake to Burgers equations to represent cosmic turbulence, and then from Burgers equations to Ermakov dynamics systems, which in turn they plausibly lead to nonlocal current.

Machine Learning Approach to Forecast the Tensile Strength of Bamboo

Bamboo holds significant global economic importance as a non-timber forest product. Its fibers can be utilized in concrete reinforcement, a concept known as bamboo fiber reinforced concrete. Nevertheless, further investigation is required for Bamboo Fiber Reinforced Concrete, with a specific focus on bamboo tensile strength. This study aimed to foretell the BTS through several machine learning techniques, including artificial neural network, extreme learning machine, and support vector regression. A total of 30 samples from the previous literature article were considered for predicting Bamboo Tensile Strength. The dataset was split into two parts, with 80% allocated for training data and 20% for testing data. The outcome from the data testing shows that the extreme learning machine predict very sensitive to random errors in the observed target. The results show that a positive correlation was found between key input parameters, such as the shorter dimension of bamboo, the longer dimension of bamboo, cross- sectional area, modulus of elasticity, and area, in relation to the output bamboo tensile strength.

Dynamical Analysis of the Redshift Drift in FLRW Universes

Redshift drift is the phenomenon whereby the observed redshift between an emitter and observer comoving with the Hubble flow in an expanding FLRW universe will slowly evolve—on a timescale comparable to the Hubble time. In a previous article, three of the current authors performed a cosmographic analysis of the redshift drift in an FLRW universe, temporarily putting aside the issue of dynamics (the Friedmann equations). In the current article, we add dynamics while still remaining within the framework of an exact FLRW universe. We developed a suitable generic matter model and applied it to both standard FLRW and various dark energy models. Furthermore, we present an analysis of the utility of alternative cosmographic variables to describe the redshift drift data.

Distributive Epistemic Justice in Science

Previous articleNext article No AccessDistributive Epistemic Justice in ScienceGürol Irzik and Faik KurtulmusGürol Irzik Search for more articles by this author and Faik Kurtulmus Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science Just Accepted Society: The British Society for the Philosophy of Science Views: 141Total views on this site Views: 141Total views on this site Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/715351 Views: 141Total views on this site HistoryAccepted May 04, 2021 PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

A Model for Describing the Management Processes in the Scientific Sector. Verification

The model of management in the scientific sector presented in the previous article, as well as some alternative models applied to the organization of science management are used to interpret various statistical data. The article also considers intersectoral comparisons of science financing in countries of different levels of economic development, including the costs of basic research. It is shown that the correlation between science costs and gross domestic product (GDP) is 32.9% in more than 120 countries of the world and GDP per capita is 50.9%. They are not statistically significant. On average, the share of basic study costs in domestic research and development expenses does not depend on the level of wealth of countries. This allows us to conclude in favor of a mutually consistent management model in the scientific sector. The author analyzes the dynamics of the number of researchers and small enterprises in the sector of science and scientific services, as well as the dynamics of the number of academic employees in the sectors of science in the 1990s. It is demonstrated that the decrease in their number mainly occurred in the applied sectors and to a lesser extent in the fundamental research sector. These data are described more fully by the proposed mutually consistent model of science than by the alternative models. Possible adjustments in the organization of the scientific sector management system are examined, including in terms of changes in input impacts on the science sector, output indicators characterizing its effectiveness, as well as changes in the organization of the scientific sector and management bodies, which follow from the considered mutually agreed management model in this sector of the economy.

The Role of Mothers-in-Law in Determining Women’s Work: Evidence from India

Previous articleNext article No AccessThe Role of Mothers-in-Law in Determining Women's Work: Evidence from IndiaDivya Pandey and Madhulika KhannaDivya Pandey Search for more articles by this author and Madhulika Khanna Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Economic Development and Cultural Change Just Accepted Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/724307 Views: 18Total views on this site HistoryAccepted January 19, 2023 © 2023 The University of Chicago. All Rights reserved.PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

Optimal classification trees with leaf-branch and binary constraints

Using empirical models to predict whether sections within pipes have defects can save inspection costs and, potentially, avoid oil spills. Optimal Classification Tree (OCT) formulations offer potentially desirable combinations of interpretability and prediction accuracy on unseen pipes. Approaches based on powerful state-of-the-art OCT formulations have enabled researchers to solve decision tree problems optimally instead of using traditional sub-optimal greedy approaches. Yet, the recently proposed formulations also have limitations. Some of the most recent formulations require a large number of decision variables and constraints leading to computational inefficiencies. Previous formulations have optimal solutions with undesirable or invalid tree structures which may depend on the particular software implementation. Additionally, some formulations always grow a full tree even when desirable parsimonious tree options are available. This article proposes the Modified Optimal Classification Tree (M-OCT) formulation with novel leaf-branch-interaction constraints, which could stabilize the previous formulation and reduce the chance of invalid tree structures when generating optimal trees. By incorporating the idea of binary encoding of thresholds from a previous article, we reduce the total number of binary variables. We then extend M-OCT to construct a novel formulation called Binary Node Penalty Optimal Classification Tree (BNP-OCT) with binary splits and node complexity constraints, which support efficiency in standard branch-and-cut solvers and prevents the overfitting issue when learning the optimal tree models. We compare the proposed methods with alternatives including standard formulations using 15 standard data sets. In addition, we use 750 test cases to compare the computational stability of pre-existing formulations to those involving the proposed leaf-branch constraints. We demonstrate that the proposed formulation offers advantages in accuracy, computational efficiency, and structural stability. We also describe how the proposed methods are able to achieve 94% classification accuracy on balanced test sets for unseen pipes.

(Non-)unitarity of strictly and partially massless fermions on de Sitter space II: an explanation based on the group-theoretic properties of the spin-3/2 and spin-5/2 eigenmodes

Abstract In our previous article (Letsios 2023 J. High Energy Phys. JHEP05(2023)015), we showed that the strictly massless spin-3/2 field, as well as the strictly and partially massless spin-5/2 fields, on N-dimensional ( N ⩾ 3 ) de Sitter (dS) spacetime (dS N ) are non-unitary unless N = 4. The (non-)unitarity was demonstrated by simply observing that there is a (mis-)match between the representation-theoretic labels that correspond to the unitary irreducible representations (UIR’s) of the dS algebra spin ( N , 1 ) and the ones corresponding to the space of eigenmodes of the field theories. In this paper, we provide a technical representation-theoretic explanation for this fact by studying the (non-)existence of positive-definite, dS invariant scalar products for the spin-3/2 and spin-5/2 strictly/partially massless eigenmodes on dS N ( N ⩾ 3 ). Our basic tool is the examination of the action of spin ( N , 1 ) generators on the space of eigenmodes, leading to the following findings. For odd N, any dS invariant scalar product is identically zero. For even N > 4, any dS invariant scalar product must be indefinite. This gives rise to positive-norm and negative-norm eigenmodes that mix with each other under spin ( N , 1 ) boosts. In the N = 4 case, the positive-norm sector decouples from the negative-norm sector and each sector separately forms a UIR of spin(4, 1). Our analysis makes extensive use of the analytic continuation of tensor-spinor spherical harmonics on the N-sphere (S N ) to dS N and also introduces representation-theoretic techniques that are absent from the mathematical physics literature on half-odd-integer-spin fields on dS N .

Some (relatively) new conceptual ‘frames’ supplementing the study of human capital in rural sociology

The article continues the authors’ thoughts about the necessary conceptual frameworks that would help rural sociology provide more reliable insights and data in the study of such a relatively new (in the conceptual-analytical perspective) social phenomenon as rural human capital. In the previous article, we presented a brief overview of such half-forgotten but still relevant theoretical foundations of rural sociology as agricultural economics, theories of peasant agrarianism, and theory of rural-urban continuum, which to a greater or lesser extent can be applied in the analysis of rural development and rural social and human capital. In this article, we provide a brief overview of some more recent agrarian ideas that seem to have sufficient but questionable heuristic potential for rural sociology. First, the idea and repeatedly tested projects of the Green Revolution, or the Third Agricultural Revolution, which implied technology transfer initiatives to greatly increase crop yields, opposed the concept of “Red Revolution” (comprehensive agrotechnological transformations instead of radical political ones), despite some skeptical assessments, in the last decades of the 20th century contributed to the reduction in global hunger, and, especially in its Soviet interpretations, seemed to be consonant with the more recent intellectual direction - development studies. Second, Peasant Studies defending the position that the very question about the need for a special theory of the peasantry and peasant societies is untenable, and presenting an attempt to develop a middlerange theory within historical sociology, which is based on the four most important characteristics of the peasantry in the past and present: family economy, work on land in interaction with nature, local culture of self-organization (rural community), and marginal role in relation to the state. Today’s disputes about the peasantry in the contemporary world are complemented by two macroconcepts - theory of international food regimes and theory of global rural development. Thus, we still miss unambiguous theoretical generalizations regarding rural development due to the extreme diversity of both rural areas (and their social/human capital) and interpretations/definitions of rural/agricultural development (for instance, deagrarianization and extractivism or rural-urban glocalization and optimistic “unorthodox” social-ecological model).

Lean Photovoltaik

Abstract The expansion of renewable energies poses a significant challenge worldwide. Numerous national and international agreements and laws promote and demand a much stronger expansion than before. A significant contribution is expected from the increased use of photovoltaics (PV). Large scale solar power plants cover vast areas and consist of hundreds of thousands of modules. With increasing quantities, the potential to make installation more efficient using factory operation methods also increases. However, established approaches such as Lean Production Systems (LPS) cannot be transferred from the factory to the PV construction site without adaptations, due to the different preconditions. In a previous article, the challenges in the installation of PV power plants and the potential for the implementation of LPS have been analysed based on a study of the current state of production efficiency. For this purpose, solar projects by Sunstall Inc., USA, were accompanied. In this article, the implementation and the results of an experimental application of LPS on these solar projects are presented.

Labor Market Information and Parental Attitudes toward Women Working Outside the Home: Experimental Evidence from Rural Pakistan

Previous articleNext article No AccessLabor Market Information and Parental Attitudes toward Women Working Outside the Home: Experimental Evidence from Rural PakistanMomoe MakinoMomoe Makino Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Economic Development and Cultural Change Just Accepted Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/722160 Views: 13Total views on this site HistoryAccepted August 09, 2022 PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

The Impact of Armed Conflict Shocks on Local Cross-Border Trade: Evidence from the Border between Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo

Previous articleNext article No AccessThe Impact of Armed Conflict Shocks on Local Cross-Border Trade: Evidence From the Border Between Uganda and the Democratic Republic of CongoAndreas Eberhard-RuizAndreas Eberhard-Ruiz Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Economic Development and Cultural Change Just Accepted Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/722967 Views: 32Total views on this site HistoryAccepted October 11, 2022 PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

Nursing assessment and care for a patient with a neurological disorder.

The previous article discussed the pathophysiology involved in disorders of the nervous system. Having considered some of the most prevalent disorders, this second part uses a case study to explore effective patient assessment and emphasise the importance of facilitating patient self-management for improved outcomes. By addressing these key aspects, nursing professionals can enhance the quality of care and the support provided to individuals experiencing neurological disorders.

SoTL in student affairs graduate preparation programs

AbstractIn the previous article, we defined the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) and the scholarship of practice (SoP) and identified characteristics and qualities related to these topics. In this article, we provide examples of scholars who have conducted a SoTL project related to student affairs. Each of these entries describes the project and gives us insights into why scholars choose to engage in this work and the impact of their work on teaching and learning.

Which Models of Scientific Explanation Are (In)Compatible with Inference to the Best Explanation?

Previous articleNext article No AccessWhich Models of Scientific Explanation are (In)Compatible with IBE?Yunus PrasetyaYunus Prasetya Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science Just Accepted Society: The British Society for the Philosophy of Science Views: 83Total views on this site Views: 83Total views on this site Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/715203 Views: 83Total views on this site HistoryAccepted April 30, 2021 PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

Entrepreneurial Spillovers from Corporate R&D

Previous articleNext article No AccessEntrepreneurial Spillovers from Corporate R&DTania Babina and Sabrina T HowellTania Babina Search for more articles by this author and Sabrina T Howell Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Journal of Labor Economics Just Accepted Published for the Society of Labor Economists, Economics Research Center/ NORC Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/723501 Views: 58Total views on this site HistoryAccepted November 15, 2022 PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

Second-order linear recurrences with identically distributed residues modulo p^e

Let $p$ be an odd prime and let $u(a,-1)$ and $u(a',-1)$ be two Lucas sequences whose discriminants have the same nonzero quadratic character modulo $p$ and whose periods modulo $p$ are equal. We prove that there is then an integer $c$ such that for all $d\in\mathbb Z_p$, the frequency with which $d$ appears in a full period of $u(a,-1)\pmod p$ is the same frequency as $cd$ appears in $u(a',-1)\pmod p$. Here $u(a,b)$ satisfies the recursion relation $u_{n+2}=au_{n+1}+bu_n$ with initial terms $u_0=0$ and $u_1=1$. Similar results are obtained for the companion Lucas sequences $v(a,-1)$ and $v(a',-1)$. This paper extends analogous statements for Lucas sequences of the form $u(a,1)\pmod p$ given in a previous article. We further generalize our results by showing for a certain class of primes $p$ that if $e>1$, $b=\pm 1$, and $u(a,b)$ and $u(a',b)$ are Lucas sequences with the same period modulo $p$, then there exists an integer $c$ such that for all residues $d\pmod{p^e}$, the frequency with which $d$ appears in $u(a,b)\pmod{p^e}$ is the same frequency as $cd$ appears in $u(a',b)\pmod{p^e}$.

Making Sense of the Agreement on Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction: The Road Ahead

The negotiations of the future regulation governing the conservation and sustainable use of marine biological diversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction successfully concluded last March 2023 and the BBNJ Agreement was formally adopted by consensus on 19 June 2023. The previous article “Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction: ways forward to reach a necessary Agreement”, published in the EPL 52 (1) 2022, defended the BBNJ Agreement potential to make a very positive impact on the governance of the oceans in general and proposed some formulas to facilitate the adoption of the treaty in a scenario where States had very different expectations. The present work reviews that article, first, to update what the result of the negotiation has been with respect to the main issue areas of the regulation; secondly, to identify which negotiation formulas have certainly helped to adopt the treaty; and thirdly, to reflect on to what extent the final text of the Agreement will be ambitious and effective enough to fulfil its objectives.