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The purpose of this paper is to investigate if the volatility of stock prices in the days surrounding the Chapter 11 bankruptcy process predicts a firm’s likelihood to successfully restructure and emerge from bankruptcy.

The authors use a sample of Chapter 11 cases between 1980 and 2016 that have available stock price data surrounding the bankruptcy filing dates. Following Goyal and Wang (2013), the KMV–Merton model is utilized to estimate the probability that a firm successfully emerges from its restructuring process. In order to interpret the market’s assessment about a firm, the authors use the analogy of a European call option to derive the assessment of the firm’s prospects as the probability that it will emerge from bankruptcy. This estimated probability of emergence is compared to actual outcomes of bankruptcy cases and tested for significance using various regression techniques.

This study exploits the information found in stock prices surrounding the bankruptcy process and finds that volatility after, but not before, filing for bankruptcy significantly predicts a firm’s likelihood to emerge. In addition, the market-based probability of emergence has better predictive power on the recovery rates of unsecured creditors than measures based on financial statements.

Predictors of bankruptcy have been extensively studied by scholars over the decades, with early studies focusing on accounting-based measures and recent studies incorporating market-driven variables. However, in recent years, studies have begun to assess bankrupt firms’ ability to reorganize and successfully emerge from bankruptcy. This study contributes to the recent literature investigating market-based predictors of successful emergence.

A “state-driven” approach suggests that colonists use census categories to rule. However, a “society-driven” approach suggests that this state-driven perspective confers too much power upon states. A third approach views census-taking and official categorization as a product of state–society interaction that depends upon: (a) the population's lay categories, (b) information intellectuals' ability to take up and transform these lay categories, and (c) the balance of power between social and state actors. We evaluate the above positions by analyzing official records, key texts, travelogues, and statistical memoirs from three key periods in India: Indus Valley civilization through classical Gupta rule (ca. 3300 BCE–700 CE), the “medieval” period (ca. 700–1700 CE), and East India Company (EIC) rule (1757–1857 CE), using historical narrative. We show that information gathering early in the first period was society driven; however, over time, a strong interactive pattern emerged. Scribes (information intellectuals) increased their social status and power (thus, shifting the balance of power) by drawing on caste categories (lay categories) and incorporating them into official information gathering. This intensification of interactive information gathering allowed the Mughals, the EIC, and finally British direct rule officials to collect large quantities of information. Our evidence thus suggests that the intensification of state–society interactions over time laid the groundwork for the success of the direct rule British censuses. It also suggests that any transformative effect of these censuses lay in this interactive pattern, not in the strength of the British colonial state.

The abolition of slavery in the British Empire demanded a complete transformation of the global legal and political order. Focusing on British India, this chapter argues that this restructuring was, in and of itself, a vital racial project that played out on a global stage. Examining these dynamics over the nineteenth century, I trace how this project unfolded from the vantage point of the Bombay Presidency and the western coast of India, tightly integrated into Indian Ocean networks trading goods, ideas, and, of course, peoples. I show how Shidis – African origin groups in South Asia and across the Middle East – were almost the sole subjects of British antislavery interventions in India after abolition. This association was intensified over the nineteenth century as Indian slavery was simultaneously reconfigured to recede from view. This chapter establishes these dynamics empirically by examining a dataset of encounters at borders, ports, and transit hubs, showing how the legal and political regime that emerged after abolition forged novel configurations around “race” and “slavery.” Documenting these “benign” encounters shifts attention to the racializing dimensions of imperial abolition, rather than enslavement. Once “freed,” the administrative and bureaucratic apparatus that monitored and managed Shidis inscribed this identity into the knowledge regime of the colonial state resulting in the long-term racialization of Shidis in South Asia, the effects of which are still present today.

Studies the introduction of individualised employment relations at the Bengalla Open Cut mining operation in the Hunter Valley coalfields of New South Wales, Australia. Describes and explains the “greenfield” strategy of the managing owner of the mine, the US multinational, the Peabody Group, and the reaction and counter‐strategy of the miners’ union, the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU). Argues that management’s greenfield strategy has provided some immediate benefits to the employer and rendered the CFMEU almost powerless to develop a delegate structure at the mine and bargain collectively with management. Yet the peculiar type of individualism, its justification and the CFMEU’s efforts to maintain a presence at the mine indicate that individualised employment relations may only be a transient phenomenon at the Bengalla mine.

Investigates the differences in protocols between arbitral tribunals and courts, with particular emphasis on US, Greek and English law. Gives examples of each country and its way of using the law in specific circumstances, and shows the variations therein. Sums up that arbitration is much the better way to gok as it avoids delays and expenses, plus the vexation/frustration of normal litigation. Concludes that the US and Greek constitutions and common law tradition in England appear to allow involved parties to choose their own judge, who can thus be an arbitrator. Discusses e‐commerce and speculates on this for the future.

People with a history of homelessness often have complex needs and vulnerabilities which may affect their ability to manage future tenancies. If not given adequate support, there is a risk that their tenancies may break down causing a ‘revolving door’ of repeat homelessness. Having better information available at the point of re‐housing allows the receiving landlord to arrange appropriate housing‐related support from the start of the tenancy, reducing this risk. Local Authorities can assist by improving the way they gather, assess and share information about housing clients prior to their move on to permanent accommodation. One way of doing this is by using the Housing Corporation's Information Sharing Protocol. This article explains how the ISP was implemented in the City of Westminster.

Communications regarding this column should be addressed to Mrs. Cheney, Peabody Library School, Nashville, Term. 37203. Mrs. Cheney does not sell the books listed here. They are available through normal trade sources. Mrs. Cheney, being a member of the editorial board of Pierian Press, will not review Pierian Press reference books in this column. Descriptions of Pierian Press reference books will be included elsewhere in this publication.

Chester Barnard's insistence that authority rests on the consent of the subordinate is difficult to reconcile with the opposing reality that superiors do have the last word. Resolution of this dilemma is unlikely to bo found by prolonging discussions of the legitimation of authority, which may have reached a point of diminishing returns. Co‐existence of coercion and consent may be more satisfactorily explained in terms of Simon's concept of the subordinate's zone of acceptance of authority and the resulting distinction between two different sets of decisional premises, one at the boundary of this zone and the other inside the zone. An addition to Simon's theory of the concept and analysis of compliance proposed by Etzioni gives further insight into the interdependency of superior and subordinate in the authority situation.

Communications regarding this column should be addressed to Mrs. Cheney, Peabody Library School, Nashville, Tenn. 37203. Mrs. Cheney does not sell the books listed here. They are available through normal trade sources. Mrs. Cheney, being a member of the editorial board of Pierian Press, will not review Pierian Press reference books in this column. Descriptions of Pierian Press reference books will be included elsewhere in this publication.

Peabody supply advanced blade coater to West Germany. The Peabody Division of Sale Tilney Technology PLC have been awarded a contract by aluminium producers Alunorf, of Neuss, West Germany to supply an electrostatic oiling machine for their new No.6 slitting line. The machine, a blade coater, will apply an inhibiting/presslube oil on to aluminium strip.