ABSTRACTTitle: Basel II ? The New Basel Capital Accord and its influence on small Swedish banks and their retail banking and risk management.Seminar: May 24th, 2007Course: FEK318 Bachelor thesis in Business Administration, 10 Swedish creditsAuthors: Mattias Kjellberg, David Uhlmann & Ivana ZubacAdvisor: Joakim WinborgKeywords: Capital cover, capital requirements, Basel II, credit giving, credit risk, risk management, retail banking, small banks, pillar 2Problem: What influence does Basel II and the new updated management of credit risks in pillar 1 and the active risk control in pillar 2 have on small Swedish banks retail banking?Purpose: Our essay seeks to explore what influence pillar 1 and the new updated management of credit risks in the new capital accord Basel II have on small Swedish banks and what influence pillar 2 have. We also want to explain if Basel II has influences on small Swedish banks credit analysis and possible effects in their risk management and pricing.Methodology: In our essay we use an inductive approach and our chosen research method is the qualitative one. We have chosen to look into four small Swedish banks, and the empirical data is obtained from telephone interviews with selected respondents from Länsförsäkringar Bank, SkandiaBanken, GE Money Bank and ICA Banken.Conclusions:? The work with credit scoring does not get influenced by Basel II if the Standardised Approach is chosen.? Banks that?ve early implemented high technological systems in the organization, that small banks normally do, have gotten an easier transition to Basel II.? Basel II will result in a risk adjusted pricing and a more fair credit market.? Internal Ratings-based Approaches is very demanding to develop, but at the same time it?s a more risk sensitive approach.? Pillar 2 results in a more sophisticated work for the small banks.? Basel II results in a further price press on residential loans in Sweden..

I denna uppsats studeras investeringsprocesser i det divisionaliserade företaget Södra Skogsägarna ekonomisk förening. Studiens syfte är att beskriva och förklara företagets investeringsprocesser och i vilken utsträckning dessa processer är standardiserade. I studien analyseras dessa investeringsprocesser utifrån befintlig teori. Studien visar att investeringsprocesser initieras i den operativa verksamheten för att sedan drivas fram i den operativa verksamheten och i ledningen på enhetsnivå. Beslut fattas på alla nivåer i företaget efter investeringars storlek.

The subject of this paper is to examine the view of diversity among ten teachers and three principals in the Swedish compulsory school. The purpose is to investigate how they relate to the diversity and in what ways it is involved in their work.The French sociologist Pierre Bourdieus basic ideas of habitus, capital and field are used as a theoretical starting point. The study is mainly based on interviews supported by literature in the subject area.The findings show that diversity is associated with ethnicity among all informants. The drawn conclusion is that this is partly due to the mediated picture but also since ethnicity mainly serves as a starting point in the literature..

Earth?s resources have been exploited unsustainably. If an entire conception of exploitationof natural resources does not change now, this will entail enormous costs in the future.This insight has lead to a recently increased interest in clean technologies among privateequity capitalists. In the fourth quarter of 2006 about 10 percent of all private equityinvestments made in the US market were placed in the cleantech industry. Despite a goodinvesting climate in Sweden, Swedish capitalists have shown little interest in cleantechinvestments.

This thesis project has focused on studying ÅF?s business concept Energy Collaboration, which is their way of selling energy efficiency services. Thereforeongoing projects have been analyzed. The purpose was to determine achieved energy efficiency, costs and profitability for the studied projects. It was concluded that the Energy Collaboration is a good way of selling energy efficiency services, since the customer takes no risk and energy savings of about 15-25 % can be achieved with simple measures.

Scania?s discount rate - the return requirement of investments - refers to Scania?s WACC or weighted average cost of capital. The capital markets return requirement on equity and the credit market interest cost of borrowing is weighted to become the single discount rate, the WACC. The purpose of this study is to investigate which asset pricing model of APT and CAPM Scania should use in their WACC calculations. The company now uses a group WACC of 11 percent which is used in all company levels.

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to increase the understanding of how a bank?s features and internal factors have affected its choice of method in calculating the capital requirement.Theoretical and Empirical Method: The research strategy of this study has been of a qualitative nature with a deductive approach. The choice of method was depth interviews with respondents from a targeted sample of Swedish banks. These respondents were chosen based on the knowledge they possess as key employees in the capital requirement process and their involvement in choosing their banks? method for calculating the capital requirement.

Purpose: The purpose of the study is to in a comparative and causal way explore whether there is a relationship between risk and return and also how it is perceived on the Nordic financial markets.Theory: The theoretical frame of reference applied in the thesis is considered relevant inthe perspective of the study?s purpose and research questions. We have among other theories used The Capital Asset Pricing Model, The Efficient Market Hypothesis and various Behavioural finance theories.Method: The study has its starting point in a quantitative approach with a quantitative data analysis supported by secondary data extracted from Thomson Reuters.Empirics: The empirics contains regression analyses made from calculated secondary data of 240 randomly chosen companies from Nasdaq OMX Stockholm, NasdaqOMX Copenhagen, Nasdaq OMX Helsinki and Oslo Bors.Conclusion: The study conclusions show that there are both a negative and positive relationship between volatility and actual return on the investigated markets. Considering this prior statement we can conclude that the Capital Asset Pricing Model can?t correctly describe the actual relationship between the parameters investigated on the current sample.

This essay aims to explain the fluctuations in the Swedish transition rate to higher education between 1923 and 2002. With theories of human capital, and screening, as points of departure, seven variables are selected and their correlation with the transition rate investigated by use of graphs and tables. The variables are unemployment, youth unemployment, the supply of academics, cohort size, number of high school graduates from programs preparing for ensuing studies, relative wage trends for worker categories with differing levels of education, and structural phase. Results show that no single variable nor the theories of human capital or screening can explain the fluctuations in transition rate in full. Instead I propose a theoretic model which amalgamates the above and places risk aversion as the driving force behind the individual?s educational decision.

Through participant observation in a local promoter group of hardcore punk shows inGothenburg and qualitative interviews with its members I have investigated links between taste in music, values and social structures in the hardcore punk scene. The theoretical framework of this essay is built upon the concept of subcultural capital, which is adapted from Pierre Bourdieu and developed by Sarah Thornton and Keith Kahn-Harris. The result shows how members among the hardcore punk scene create and preserve distinction towards others, while the distinction becomes important benchmarks for including and excluding practices in the scene..

This thesis has two aims: The main purpose is to describe and illustrate how a large Ltd. company can use voluntary redundancy as a tool for restructuring. The additional purpose is to challenge the concept of voluntary redundancy trough outlining alternative ways of reaching the intended achievements of the voluntary redundancy programme. The theoretical framework that has been used primarily contains knowledge assets theories. The chosen theories are intellectual capital and knowledge management theory to approach and analyse the empirical findings.

Talented people are recognised as being the most important corporate resource over the next twenty years and a competitive compensation system is an important tool in attracting and retaining talent. Traditional pay systems are recognised as being neither cost effective nor motivating people to do more. Often these systems do not contribute to strategic objectives. This study outlines what constitutes an intelligent remuneration system that will enhance the mind value added by knowledge workers, reward knowledge creation, and contribute to organisational strategies..

The aim of this research is to evaluate whether the social environment of Swedish high school students affects their views on the multicultural society. The research material was collected through the use of two focus groups containing high school students from two different schools, one group is used to a multicultural social environment while the other group is used to a less multicultural social environment. With the researcher acting as a moderator in the focus groups, the students discussed different questions regarding multiculturalism, gender equality and religion. The theory that this research is based on suggests that the social environment and the social capital affects the students views on the multicultural society. The results of the research were evaluated and connected to the theory.

Abstract The internationalisation of a company is enabled by integration of markets. New markets mean new revenues, but also demand capital to finance the expansion. To bring in new capital may offer new possibilities but also higher debt-equity ratios, which affect how external interested parties value the company. This thesis, inspired by previous and mainly US based research, researches the debt-equity ratio of Swedish multinational and domestic companies, sampled from the Stockholm Stock Exchange. The research questions have focused on the impact of certain internationalisation variables on the debt-equity ratio; how does the debt-equity ratio differ between international and domestic companies? Can a difference be explained by the degree of internationalisation? Can a difference be better explained by the presence of international ownership? By measuring the concept internationalisation as both trade and presence, the questions were operationalised into four hypotheses.

Women ledaers and profitability, is there a correlation? Earlier research show different outcome on the correlation between women leaders and profitability. A Swedish consultant firm, Caran has a belief that more women leaders would create more financial profit, we ask us if that is the true situation. Using two different IC measurement methods we have shown the difficulties in calculate intagible resources, which methods that can/ can not be used and if women leders create financial value. We found the women leaders in Caran to add more value per dollar spent on the woman leaders than the value added per dollar spent on men leaders.