Price Limits Research Articles

Current utilization patterns for long-acting insulin analogues including biosimilars among selected Asian countries and the implications for the future

Introduction Prevalence rates for diabetes mellitus continue to rise, which, coupled with increasing costs of complications, has appreciably increased expenditure in recent years. Poor glycaemic control including hypoglycaemia enhances complication rates and associated morbidity, mortality and costs. Consequently, this needs to be addressed. Whilst the majority of patients with diabetes have type-2 diabetes, a considerable number of patients with diabetes require insulin to help control their diabetes. Long-acting insulin analogues were developed to reduce hypoglycaemia associated with insulin and help improve adherence, which can be a concern. However, their considerably higher costs have impacted on their funding and use, especially in countries with affordability issues. Biosimilars can help reduce the costs of long-acting insulin analogues thereby increasing available choices. However, the availability and use of long-acting insulin analogues can be affected by limited price reductions versus originators and limited demand-side initiatives to encourage their use. Consequently, we wanted to assess current utilisation rates for long-acting insulin analogues, especially biosimilars, and the rationale for patterns seen, across multiple Asian countries ranging from Japan (high-income) to Pakistan (lower-income) to inform future strategies. Methodology Multiple approaches including assessing utilization and prices of insulins including biosimilars among six Asian countries and comparing the findings especially with other middle-income countries. Results Typically, there was increasing use of long-acting insulin analogues among the selected Asian countries. This was especially the case enhanced by biosimilars in Bangladesh, India, and Malaysia reflecting their perceived benefits. However, there was limited use in Pakistan due to issues of affordability similar to a number of African countries. The high use of biosimilars in Bangladesh, India and Malaysia was helped by issues of affordability and local production. The limited use of biosimilars in Japan and Korea reflects limited price reductions and demand-side initiatives similar to a number of European countries. Conclusions Increasing use of long-acting insulin analogues across countries is welcomed, adding to the range of insulins available, which increasingly includes biosimilars. A number of activities are needed to enhance the use of long-acting insulin analogue biosimilars in Japan, Korea and Pakistan.

The Assessment of Quality of Products Called Sandalwood Oil Based on the Information Provided by Manufacturer of the Oil on Polish, German, and English Websites.

Background Sandalwood oil is one of the most valuable raw materials worldwide. As a highly valued product, it has its own regulations based on the ISO 3518 standard, which clearly informs producers, distributors, and consumers of the requirements to be met. The aim of this study was to assess the quality of products called sandalwood oil based on the information provided by the manufacturer of the oils on Polish, German, and English websites. Methods A Google search was utilized to collect data on sandalwood oil offered by producers and distributors in Polish and foreign markets. Information from 50 websites in each of the aforementioned languages, including the description of sandalwood oil properties on websites, method for using it, safety limitations, and presence of a product description consistent with the INCI recommendations, was gathered using Microsoft Excel software and was analyzed. The information that enabled us to estimate the quality of the oils was the botanical name of the oil-bearing plant and the price. Good-quality oils were considered to be oils with the botanical name Santalum album in the description and with a price not considerably less than the price of white sandalwood oils sold by reliable distributors who control the quality of the oils by chromatography. Ultimately, the lower price limit for one milliliter of the oil was established as PLN 21. Results and Conclusions. Good-quality sandalwood oils derived from the Santalum album plant at a price equal to or greater than the chromatographically tested items amounted to a negligible percentage of products sold online. Without knowing the botanical name of the essential oil plant and the price range of unadulterated sandalwood oil, the likelihood of buying a reliable product is low on all of the analyzed websites, with the lowest probability being observed on the Polish websites.

The long-term impact of COVID-19 pandemic on Public Health and Economy: The Bangladesh perspective

Background: Countries have introduced a variety of measures to prevent and treat COVID-19 with medicines and personal protective equipment (PPE), with some countries adopting preventative strategies earlier than others. However, there has been considerable controversy surrounding some treatments. This includes hydroxychloroquine where the initial hype and misinformation lead to shortages, price rises and suicides. Price rises and shortages have also been seen for PPE. Such activities can have catastrophic effects on patients where there are high co-payment levels and issues of affordability. Consequently, there is a need to investigate this further. Objective: Assess changes in the availability, utilization and prices of relevant medicines and PPE during the pandemic among a range of Asian countries. Our approach: Narrative literature review combined with interviews among community pharmacists to assess changes in consumption, prices and shortages of medicines and PPE from the beginning of March 2020 until end of May 2020. In addition, suggestions on ways to reduce misinformation. Results: 308 pharmacists took part from five Asian countries. There was an appreciable increase in the utilization of antimicrobials in Pakistan (in over 88% of pharmacies), with lower increases or no change in Bangladesh, India, Malaysia and Vietnam. Encouragingly, there was increased use of vitamins/immune boosters and PPE across the countries, as well as limited price rises for antimicrobials in India, Malaysia and Vietnam, although greater price rises seen for analgesics and vitamin C/immune boosters. Appreciable price increases were also seen for PPE across some countries. Conclusion: Encouraging to see increases in utilization of vitamins/immune boosters and PPE. However, increases in the utilization and prices of antimicrobials is a concern that needs addressing alongside misinformation and any unintended consequences from the pandemic. Community pharmacists can play a key role in providing evidence-based advice, helping to moderate prices,

Financial player valuation from the perspective of the club: the case of football

ABSTRACT 1. Rationale/purpose Recent transfer periods clarified that the transfer fee paid for football players is a subject of social, economic and financial matter. This paper seeks to provide a comprehensible valuation method for athletes. 2. Design/methodology/approach The aim of this paper is to provide an approach to determine the financial value of a player based on future payment streams. A theoretical model following the investment theory is presented and the results are illustrated within a fictitious case study. 3. Findings The subjective value of an athlete is determined by club-specific expected future payment streams which require especially financial determinants. The value can be influenced by several factors: share of sporting success, merchandising potential or salary. Historic data can be used at best as an indicator. 4. Practical implications The approach can serve as economic benchmark to calculate a club’s individual price limits for player valuation and provides managers an initial direction in transfer negotiations. 5. Research contribution Recent models are missing factors such as future-orientation and subjectivity of a player’s value. This paper tries to add these elements to the existing literature. Moreover, it seeks to cushion the problem of uncertain valuation at the decision situation. Nevertheless, this study focuses on financial variables which must be supplemented by clubs with sporting factors.

Uncertain Execution in Order-Driven Markets

So-called `latency' refers to the various small but significant time delays that occur in the course of the communications between a trader and a market. Such delays happen between the time an exchange streams market data to a trader, the time at which the trader processes the information and decides to trade, and the time at which the exchange receives and processes the order from the trader. Latency is a challenge faced by all traders and is of great importance in modern financial markets. In the present work, we develop mathematical models to solve a variety of problems faced by liquidity takers regarding uncertainty in executions. Firstly, we devise a model for computing the price that traders are willing to pay to reduce their latency. This latency-optimal strategy balances the tradeoff, over a period of time, between the costs of walking the limit order book and the percentage of orders filled. This work may lead to social benefits, since it offers a way to stop the arms race to being faster in the marketplace. Secondly, we develop a latency-optimal trading strategy that improves the marksmanship of liquidity takers. We make use of the techniques of variational analysis to obtain the optimal price limit of each marketable limit order (MLO) that the trader sends. The price limit of each MLO is characterized as the solution to a new class of forward-backward stochastic differential equations (FBSDEs) driven by random measures. We prove the existence and uniqueness of the FBSDE solution and solve the FBSDE numerically to illustrate the performance of the strategies.\ Finally, we show how traders can optimally liquidate a position over a trading window when there is latency in the marketplace. We frame our model as an impulse control problem with stochastic delay -- this work contributes to the stochastic control literature by allowing one to have random delays before the impulses take place. We show that impatient liquidity takers submit MLOs that may walk the book (capped by the limit price) to increase the probability of filling the trades. Patient traders who are fast do not use their speed to hit the quotes they observe, nor to finish the execution programme early: they use speed to complete the execution with as many speculative MLOs as possible. We use foreign exchange data to implement the random-latency-optimal strategy and to compare it with various benchmarks. We find that for patient traders, the random-latency optimal strategy outperforms the bechmarks that do not account for latency by a quantity that is greater than the transaction costs paid by liquidity takers. Around news announcements, the value of the outperformance significantly increases. The superiority of the latency-optimal strategies is due to both the speculative MLOs that are filled and the price protection of the MLOs.

AN ECONOMIC ANALYSIS OF THE FACTORS AFFECTING EGGS IMPORTING IN IRAQ FOR THE PERIOD (2003 – 2018 (AND PREDECTION THE EGGS IMPORTING FOR THE PERIOD (2019 – 2025)

This study aimed to determine the most important factors affecting importing of table eggs in Iraq for the period 2003 - 2018. To achieve the objectives the analysis phase was divided into two parts, the first was to measure factors affecting the importing of table eggs in order to obtain a mathematical relationship between the dependent variable (imports) and the independent variables represented by the local price of table eggs and the price limits for table eggs, the exchange rate, the national income, the population, the local production of table eggs, and the number of table egg projects. The second stage was to predict for the period (2019-2025) using the simple regression method. The results showed that the continuous increase in the population will lead to an increase in the imported quantities of table eggs due to the increase in consumer demand for this product eggs, Most estimated parameters of importing function were significant at 5%. The highest expected amount of imported table eggs (10056 million eggs) on 2025, while the lowest amount (7631.36 million eggs) on 2019. It can be concluded that there is no government policies in subsidizing production inputs and supporting the final product. The study recommended for a policy to protect domestic products from foreign competition.

Variation in the prices of oncology medicines across Europe and the implications for the future

Introduction/Objectives: Health authorities are facing increasing challenges to the sustainability of their healthcare systems because of the growing expenditures on medicines, including new, high-priced oncology medicines, and changes in disease prevalence in their ageing populations. Medicine prices in European countries are greatly affected by the ability to negotiate reasonable prices. Concerns have been expressed that prices of patented medicines do not fall sufficiently after the introduction of lower-cost generic oncology medicines. The objective of this study was to examine the associations over time in selected European countries between the prices of oral oncology medicines, population size, and gross domestic product (GDP) before and after the introduction of generic versions. Evidence of periodic reassessments of the price, value, and place in treatment of these medicines was also looked for. The goal of this review was to stimulate debate about possible improvements in approaches to reimbursement negotiations. Methodology: Analysis was performed of reimbursed prices of three oral oncology medicines (imatinib, erlotinib and fludarabine) between 2013 and 2017 across Europe. Correlations were explored between GDP, population size, and prices. Findings were compared with previous research regarding prices of generic oral oncology medicines. Results: The prices of imatinib, erlotinib and fludarabine varied among European countries, and there was limited price erosion over time in the absence of generics. There appeared to be no correlation between population size and price, but higher prices of on-patent oral cancer medicines were seen among countries with higher GDP per capita. Conclusion: Limited price erosion for patented medicines contributed to increases in oncology medicine budgets across the region. There was also a concerning lack of evidence re-assessments of the price, value, and place in treatment of patented oncology medicines following the loss of patent protection of standard medicines. The use of such proactive re-assessments in negotiating tactics might positively impact global expenditures for oncology medicines.

Economic Evaluation of Wind Power Projects in a Mix of Free and Regulated Market Environments in Brazil

The electricity market in Brazil is basically organized under two parts: the regulated market, where energy is traded through auctions, and the free market, where market participants freely negotiate the price and quantity of electricity. Although revenues obtained in the regulated market tend to be lower than in the free market, the auctions’ results show that investors still value the lesser degree of uncertainty associated with the regulated market. However, a growing interest in the free market by investors is recognized since the price of electricity tends to be higher. Therefore, this study investigates four free market price scenarios to assess the expected return for investors, using the traditional discounted cash flow approach complemented with Monte Carlo simulation to address market uncertainty. The study breaks new ground by capturing the weekly price fluctuations and including the price elasticity of demand of the free market. The results seem to indicate that the disclosure of the ceiling and floor price limits for the spot price can signal important information about the agents’ price expectation in the free market and can be used for investment project evaluation.

A policy construction for sustainable rice food sovereignty in Indonesia

As an agricultural country with large natural resources, Indonesia still has considerable problems in managing food security. This is evidenced by the lack of agricultural land and human resources that can support people's food needs so that the government still imports food from other countries. These issues as; it are feared that population growth and high food consumption power, social exclusion (marginalization of agricultural laborers and agricultural land) will cause food security vulnerability in the future. This Mixed method quantitative and qualitative method by statistical and in-depth interview study involving 169 respondents from many stakeholders such as politicians, academicians, farmers, and students to determine policy construction for sustainable rice food sovereignty in Indonesia. The statistical study shows the rice consumption in Indonesia is correlated to education than the age and gender of the respondents. The study indicating problems such as; the welfare of farmers, the application of price limits for staple goods, and improving the quality of agriculture both natural resources, human resources and the provision of agricultural equipment assistance have not been resolved properly. To build food security, it should be balanced with the application of the concept of food sovereignty which is realized by aligning and maximizing competence between political resources, environmental resources capacity, and environmental diplomacy.

Threat of Entry, Complete Information and Pricing

This paper analyses the impact of new market entrants on the pricing patterns of the mobile network operators in the East African Community under complete information. The study verifies whether incumbent mobile network operators within the East African Community engage in limit pricing when faced with threat of entry by analysing the pricing patterns of 21 incumbent mobile network operators for the period 2000-2019 within the Community’s member states. The study examines panel data using geographical distance as a proxy to the threat of entry. The results reveal that the pricing patterns of incumbent mobile network operators are consistent with limit pricing.

Activities in Namibia to Limit the Prevalence and Mortality from COVID-19 Including Community Pharmacy Activities and the Implications

Considerable differences exist in prevalence and mortality rates from COVID-19 across countries due to the extent of prevention measures instigated and their timeliness. There has been considerable controversy surrounding hydroxychloroquine, with resultant misinformation increasing medicine prices and suicides. Prices have also increased for Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). There are also growing concerns regarding the unintended consequences from COVID-19 including patients with non-communicable diseases. Consequently, a need to investigate key areas and the preparedness of community pharmacists, who play a key role in Namibia and the wider global community to provide future direction. In view of this, we sought to assess changes in utilisation, prices and shortages of relevant medicines early in the pandemic in Namibia combined with the preparedness of community pharmacists to deal with key issues to guide future activities. This was achieved via a questionnaire survey among ’55 pharmacists and assistants from March to end June 2020 including suggestions on potential ways forward and comparisons with other African and Asian countries. We found limited increases in the utilisation of antimalarials and antibiotics in Namibia versus Bangladesh, Ghana, and Nigeria, enhanced by restrictions on self-purchasing in Namibia reflected by limited price rises and shortages. This is encouraging. Higher use of vitamin c and immune boosters in Ghana and Nigeria versus Namibia reflected in higher price rises, with increased utilisation and prices of PPE across a range of African and Asian countries. Encouragingly limited increases in herbal medicine use in Namibia. Future roles of community pharmacists in pandemics include education, good stock control, and screening. More research is needed assessing the unintended consequences of COVID-19.

An Economic, Environmental and Safety Analysis of Using Hydrogen Enriched Natural Gas (HENG) in Industrial Facilities

The enrichment of natural gas with hydrogen has been identified as a promising pathway for power-to-gas technology with the potential to reduce emissions while achieving feasible return on investment. The evolving regulatory market in the province of Ontario motivates the analysis of business cases for hydrogen on the industrial microgrid scale. This paper aims to investigate the financial and environmental returns associated with producing and storing electrolytic hydrogen for injection into the natural gas feed of a manufacturer’s combined heat and power plants (CHPs). A mathematical methodology was developed for investigating the optimal operation of the integrated system (power-to-gas along with the current system) by considering hydrogen-enriched natural gas. The result of this simulation is an operation plan that delivers optimal economics and an estimate of greenhouse gas emissions. The simulation was implemented across an entire year for each combination of generation price limit and storage coefficient. Because the provincial grid imposes a lesser carbon footprint than that of a pure natural gas turbine, any offset of natural gas by hydrogen reduces the carbon intensity of the system. From an environmental perspective, the amount of carbon abated by the model fell within a range of 3000 ton CO2/year. From a policy perspective, this suggests that a minimum feasible carbon price of $60/ton CO2e must be set by applicable regulatory bodies. Lastly, a Failure Modes and Effects Analysis was performed for the proposed system to validate the safety of the design.

Price Limit Expansion and Volatility: A Theoretical Perspective*

AbstractWe theoretically examine whether and how price limit expansion changes return volatility. This study incorporates competing hypotheses regarding investor reactions to limit‐hit events into a model that considers trader irrationality; we then conduct several simulations. We find that, when price limits are widened, stock return volatility tends to increase but may also remain unchanged or decrease. We consider the implications of the study’s main findings, which shed light on the mixed empirical results found in the price limit literature so far.

Multi-objective economic model predictive control of wet limestone flue gas desulfurisation system

Control of wet limestone flue gas desulfurisation (WFGD) system is critical for pollution reduction of the coal-fired power plant. To fulfill the environmental requirements with the least cost, economic model predictive control (EMPC) is utilized in this paper to tackle the difficulties of WFGD, such as nonlinearity, couplings and trade-off between efficiency and safety. First, a comprehensive first-principle model is developed to describe the overall nonlinear characteristics of WFGD, with special considerations on Gas-to-liquid contact zone and slurry pool module. Second, four objectives are formulated to evaluate the economic criterion from different perspectives, including cost, safety, control efforts and performance. Utopia strategy, combined with NSGA-II, is used to solve the EMPC problem and obtain the Pareto front of the multi-objective optimization. Simulation results show that the proposed strategy is able to efficiently ensure the emission requirement and reduce the economic cost simultaneously, regardless of load disturbance, adjustment of emission lower limit and fluctuation of limestone market price.

A highly promising high-nickel low-cobalt lithium layered oxide cathode material for high-performance lithium-ion batteries

Reducing cobalt dependency has attracted great interest for lithium batteries manufacturing due to limited cobalt resources and high prices. A highly promising LiNi0.6Co0.05Mn0.35O2 (NCM60535) high-nickel low cobalt lithium layered oxide cathode material is successfully prepared by systematically examining the two key synthesis conditions of pH and annealing temperature. The obtained materials exhibit a uniform size distribution, good spherical morphology, clear structure, and homogeneous element distribution. NCM60535 shows competitive electrochemical properties: when compared with the LiNi1/3Co1/3Mn1/3O2, with a higher output specific capacity and cycling stability at 4.3 V low voltage; when compared with the LiNi0.8Co0.1Mn0.1O2, with a comparable discharge capacity but relatively poor cycling stability at 4.5 V high voltage. A new type of electrolyte that combines high lithium salt concentration, EC-free solvent system, and VC and LiPO2F2 functional additives is designed and greatly improves the electrochemical properties of the material under high voltage. Moreover, it also delivers superior electrochemical properties in high voltage lithium full battery (270 Wh Kg−1). And we suggest that NCM60535 is expected to become a substitute for the currently widely commercialized LiNi1/3Co1/3Mn1/3O2 (NCM333), LiNi0.5Co0.2Mn0.3O2 (NCM523), LiNi0.6Co0.2Mn0.2O2 (NCM622), and LiNi0.8Co0.1Mn0.1O2 (NCM811) due to its relatively low production cost and competitive electrochemical properties.

Death Toll of Price Limits and Protectionism in the Russian Pharmaceutical Market

How harmful can government regulations and protectionism be? We provide evidence of a sizable negative impact of government interventions on population health. In 2012, the Russian government implemented a strategy to increase the affordability of pharmaceutical drugs and develop domestic generics for the majority of medications. It set price limits and implemented protectionist regulations that favor local producers of generics and biosimilars in several large groups of medicines. We show that the mortality rate for conditions affected by public programs reversed a previously declining trend and increased by 40% after the interventions compared to the overall mortality and an unaffected (control) group of diseases. For some affected diseases, the mortality more than doubled. Additionally, the growth is more notable among the elderly, in rural compared to urban areas, and areas with a shortage of medical facilities.

Costly arbitrage and skewness pricing: Evidence from first-day price limit reform in China

We examine the impact of a reform of China's stock market that limits first-day price movements on skewness pricing. We document that the reform causes a significant increase in the impact of IPOs' expected skewness on both their initial returns and trading interference effect, especially for IPO firms that are sensitive to the limitations imposed by price limits. There is also some evidence that the skewness pricing effect persists much longer along the idiosyncratic dimension than along the market-wide dimension. The results are consistent with the notion that price limits favor delayed arbitrage, thereby positively affecting skewness pricing.

IPO underpricing and long-term performance in China: the perspective of price limit policy

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to explore how the price limit policy implemented in 2014 affects initial public offering (IPO) underpricing and long-term performance in China.Design/methodology/approachThe data are the IPOs from Shanghai Stock Exchange (SSE) and Shenzhen Stock Exchange (SZSE) between 2004 and 2018. The data are firstly divided into the IPOs before the price limit policy and the IPOs after the price limit policy according to the time of issuance. Then the two groups are divided into 4 subsamples according to the market blocks and the P/E ratio. The authors use multiple regression models to explore the effect of price limit policy in each subsample.FindingsThe first-day price limit system for IPOs is similar to the upward fuse mechanism, the purpose of which is to suppress IPO underpricing. However, this study finds that the policy does not suppress IPO underpricing, but increases the underpricing rate in all subsamples. Besides, the long-term performance in each subsample is different from each other. Main Board stocks’ long-term performance is worse after the policy. The policy makes Small and Medium Enterprise Board (SME Board) and Growth Enterprise Market Board (GEM Board) stocks with high P/E ratios perform better in the long term. For SME Board and GEM Board stocks with low P/E ratios, the policy makes no significant effect.Practical implicationsGood policy intentions may sometimes lead to counterproductive effects. However, since the long-term performance of each subsample is different, it is difficult to judge whether the policy should continue to be implemented or cancelled. Implementing different policies for different subsamples may be a better way to solve this problem.Originality/valueThis paper contributes to the study of IPO underpricing and long-term performance from the perspective of price limit policy.

APLIKASI UV SPECTROSCOPY DAN METODE SIMCA UNTUK KLASIFIKASI KOPI LIBERIKA TUNGKAL JAMBI DAN KOPI LIBERIKA PROBOLINGGO

Tungkal Composite Jambi Liberika Coffee is one of the top qualities of Indonesian coffees that has received a geographic indication certificate (IGs). With its limited production and high prices, currently Tungkal Jambi Liberika coffee is one of the coffees that is prone to being counterfeited. The counterfeiting of Tungkal Jambi Liberika coffee is increasingly difficult to identify, especially in the form of ground roasted coffee. This study evaluated the potential application of UV spectroscopy technology to classify Tungkal Jambi Liberika coffee (with geographic indications) and normal Probolinggo Liberika coffee (non- geographic indications). A total of 120 samples for each Liberika coffee were prepared weighing 1 gram for each sample. Spectra measurements were carried out in the form of a coffee solution. Spectral data were taken using a UV-visible spectrometer with a wavelength interval of 200-400 nm (Genesys™ 10S UV-Vis, Thermo Scientific, USA). By using the average transformed spectra in the 250-350 nm interval, the differences between the two types of Liberika coffee can be clearly seen, especially at some wavelength peaks, namely 270 nm, 300 nm, 315 nm and 346 nm. The classification accuracy obtained for the SIMCA classification is 100% for both Tungkal Jambi Liberika and Probolinggo Liberika coffee. Keywords: authentication, classification accuracy, Tungkal Jambi Liberika coffee, SIMCA, UV Spectroscopy

CUSTOMER PREFERENCES ON SUSTAINABLE FASHION PURCHASES: A CONCEPTUAL MODEL

This research purpose is to investigate customer motivation when purchasing sustainable fashion. These research objectives are to investigate customers' perception toward sustainable fashion, to determine the preferences of customers in buying sustainable fashion, and the range of price limits of customers in purchasing sustainable fashion. Therefore, for this research, there are several papers that are being reviewed and preliminary research being conducted. The literature analysis and preliminary studies have shown that customer preferences such as Price, Quality, Design, Brand Image, and Promotion influencing sustainable fashion purchases. Based on the literature review and preliminary study, this research was able to produce a simple conceptual framework. This research’ findings will be useful for fashion brand owners in developing their business. These findings can be useful to create pricing strategies, marketing strategies, and product strategies.