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ABSTRACTIrreversibility does not only raise the user cost of capital and discourage new investment but also hinders disinvestment because of the hangover effect. This paper derives a theoretical model that separates the impact of conventional convex adjustment costs from the impact of irreversibility, based on which we test the hangover effect of irreversibility by using a panel of Dutch listed firms during 1985–2000. We find that the sample firms cut both the capital stock and the inventory stock facing shocks to sales and cash flow, but they cut the inventory stock by a larger magnitude than they cut the capital stock. Given that fixed investment is more irreversible than inventory investment, the result suggests that the diminished impact of irreversibility provides the firm with more flexibility in responding to uncertainty, which lends support for the hangover effect of irreversibility on investment.

We examine the investment–uncertainty relationship for a panel of Dutch non‐financial firms. The system generalized method of moments (GMM) estimates suggest that the effect of uncertainty on investment is nonlinear: for low levels of uncertainty an increase in uncertainty has a positive effect on investment, while for high levels of uncertainty an increase in uncertainty lowers investment. This result is in line with a number of theoretical studies, but has never been documented empirically.

Jing-quan Zhang, Bo HongDepartment of Neurosurgery, Changhai Hospital, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai 200433, People's Republic of ChinaBackground: miR520a-3p has previously had its antitumorigenic role in various types of cancers revealed, and been predicted as a posttranscriptional regulator of the NFκB-subunit RELA gene. Thus, miR520a-3p could function in carcinogenesis through suppressing RELA.Methods: Expression of miR520a-3p and RELA mRNA was quantified in glioma and normal tissue, and the correlation between them was analyzed statistically. Also, receiver-operating characteristic (ROC)–curve analysis was performed. Effects of miR520a-3p on cell viability, colony formation, migration, and invasion wereexplored in vitro. Whether RELA was a direct target of miR520a-3p or not was analyzed. Finally, restoration of RELA on the effect of miR520a-3p overexpression on proliferation of glioblastoma cells was detected.Results: Data showed that miR520a-3p expression was aberrantly downregulated and associated with malignance in glioma tissue. Areas under ROC curves of miR520a-3p and RELA mRNA expression were 0.9483 and 0.5967, respectively. Also, miR520a-3p expression was statistically correlated with RELA mRNA level in grade III–IV glioma tissue. Transfection of miR520a-3p mimic significantly increased miR520a-3p expression, and resulted in significant suppression of proliferation, migration, and invasion of glioblastoma cells in vitro. miR520a-3p overexpression resulted in statistical downregulation of RELA, both in mRNA and protein levels. RELA was direct target of miR520a-3p. In addition, restoration of RELA significantly weakened the inhibitory effect of miR520a-3p overexpression on viability and EdU-labeled glioblastoma cells.Conclusion: These findings suggest that miR520a-3p should be helpful in auxiliary glioma diagnosis and can attenuate the proliferation and metastasis of glioblastoma through suppressing RELA, and thus could be an attractive therapeutic target to eliminate glioblastoma.Keywords: miR520a-3p, RELA, proliferation, migration, invasion, glioblastoma

AbstractWe apply the theory of corporate social responsibility to analyse social welfare investment undertaken by Chinese State Owned Enterprises (SOEs). We present a simple theoretical model to illustrate how the presence of social objectives in the firm's objective function changes its investment behaviour. Our theoretical model accommodates special features of Chinese SOEs, whose social welfare investment is driven by both social objectives and profit concerns. The model is then tested using a panel of Chinese enterprises during the period 1995–1999. The empirical analysis indicates that despite of the corporatization reform social welfare investment undertaken by Chinese SOEs is still inefficient due to the lack of profit concerns, suggesting that social objectives still dominate profit concerns in motivating the SOEs' social welfare investment. However, we do obtain clear‐cut evidence showing that social objectives become less important as time progresses.

This paper investigates the effect of uncertainty on economic growth. We construct measures of export uncertainty, government policy uncertainty and price uncertainty to augment a growth model, and using econometric techniques we test for robustness of the effects of these measure on economic growth in a cross-section of 138 developing and developed economies during 1970-1995. The result clearly shows a robust and negative effect of uncertainty on economic growth. These results underline the importance of export stability and policy credibility.

This book presents an up-to-date overview of the theory as well as the empirics of the relationship between investment, financial imperfections and uncertainty. After reviewing the capital market imperfections literature and the empirical results, the authors discuss both traditional investment models with uncertainty and the more modern option based models. They present an overview of empirical results of the modelling of investment under uncertainty. In these examples, the effects of capital market imperfections on investment are carefully considered. The authors conclude that there is overwhelming empirical support for a negative uncertainty-investment relationship. This innovative book will appeal to academics with an interest in investment theory, professionals in the financial sector and students of macroeconomics and finance. Investment, Capital Market Imperfections, and Uncertainty assumes only a basic knowledge of mathematics and is easily accessible