Corporate Social Responsibility has been defined as the responsibility towards stakeholders and the society in whole and the expression was founded in the 1950´s. Reporting in corporate social responsibility has been termed corporate social disclosure and has been divided into three areas: environment, ethics and human resources. The aim of this study is to explain variations in corporate social disclosure and the different media used by corporations to communicate these disclosures. A survey was conducted, which included all Swedish corporations listed on the Stockholm Stock Exchange, and all public-owned corporations. The results show that corporate characteristics such as size, industry and profitability can explain some of the variation in social disclosures and also have an effect on the extent and variation of the media used.

Practitioners of financial statement analysis are dependent on key ratios in a multiple number of situations, one in particular being equity valuation. A lack of historical benchmarks, and knowledge regarding the time series behaviour of such ratios, has been identified regarding Swedish companies. Therefore, this study sets out to provide such data and knowledge. Companies listed on the Stockholm Stock Exchange are examined over the period 1979-2009 where the sample is divided into nine industry groups. Historical values for eight common key ratios are documented with regards to median, mean, standard deviation and percentiles.

AbstractAccording to several researchers finance is scarce, scarcer for small businesses than for big enterprises. Small and medium-sized enterprises, SMEs, that want to start exporting and sales or manufacturing abroad need capital to get ready. Which capital structure and financial costs do they have, and which forms of finance do they actually use for that purpose. New american research by Mansi, Reeb (2002) has suggested, that there is a positive connection between leverage and a negative one between financial costs and internationalization, and that a non-linear model better describes this connection.This study has gathered data in two ways: Through a questionnaire from 37 SMEs and balance sheet figures from totally 166 manufacturing SMEs. In order to examine, whether the company was active on the international market, 200 SMEs in south Sweden were asked, if they exported to, produced or sold on any other market than their home market.

Our purpose of this paper is to seek an understanding of which service quality factors that affects customers in their decision making progress regarding purchasing financial services such as pension products. We also seek to evaluate the different service quality factors by compare their relative strength against each other. The study aim to investigate if there are any connections between customer behavior variables such as gender, age and income in comparison to these service quality factors related to pension products.The findings aim to help a small financial institute such as our case company Plain Capital to understand how their customers experience service quality regarding pension products.In order to find empirical results we conducted a qualitative research as well a quantitative research. The qualitative research employed both a focus group interview with pension savers and an interview with our case company Plain Capital. We were able to identify the service quality factors for pension?s products with help from the focus group interview.

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has recently become increasingly important for companies to integrate into their ongoing work. CSR is about social, environmental- and financial responsibilities. The tourism industry often involves large impacts especially on environmental and social factors, which is why CSR-work plays an important role according to previous studies. One trend that has increased among consumers in the tourism industry during recent years is to travel to the lowest possible price. It has for example become increasingly common to book airfare by budget airlines.

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.

The Swedish business cycle is in a strong position at the moment, leading to great results and larger profits. This strong business posture has encouraged companies to increase both their liquidity and revenue. Now there is a dilemma, what actions should or could a respectable business take on these newfound liquid assets.The purpose of this paper is to deliver a clear picture of what options there are for such companies listed on the Swedish stock-market, and how the market wants them to act. To these means we have studied the basic theories linked to this subject and reviewed the cause and effects that motivates them. We have also conducted interviews with the people representing the market through their line of business.In the theory we found several options on what companies in similar situations tend to do.

Lately it has become more common to question the companies? actions in how they affect their surroundings. Today, the expression ?Corporate Social Responsibility? often is mentioned in this connection. Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), is a concept whereby companies voluntarily integrate social and environmental concerns in their business operation.In Sweden there is a big difference between different businesses when it comes to their Corporate Social Responsibility.

The purpose of this paper is to find out which portfolio theory one should use during a financial crisis. We will examine two different portfolio theorys, the Minimum Variance portfolio and the beta portfolio.We have chosen to study two different portfolios, and followed their development during the financial crisis with its start in 2008 and the IT bubble with its start in the middle of 2000.The data has been collected from OMX internet database making it quantitative study. The beta portfolio's objective is to follow the index and the Minumim Variance portfolio´s objective is to spread the risk by investing in stocks with low volatility. By following the two different portfolios, and compare the development to the index, we will be able to determine which theory is most suitable to use during a recession. The studyperiods we chose were both in a recession and it turned out that the most appropriate portfolio to use was the Minimum Variance portfolio because stock in this portfolio tends to be less sensitive to economic fluctuations..

?CSR and political consumption ? a study of Nike?s and Puma?s CSR-reports?The purpose of this dissertation is to examine if political consumption has influenced multinational corporations to improve their Corporate Social Responsibility reports and policies more, than a company who has not been a target for political consumption.This dissertation is a content analysis of Nike?s and Puma?s first (Nike 2001, Puma 2001) and latest (Nike 2007/09, Puma 2007/08) CSR- reports. Archie Carroll?s model of Corporate Social Responsibility is used as theoretical framework in this study. The model is used to focus on four areas within CSR; economic, legal, ethical and philanthropic.

Background: Research results show that the potential of corporate social responsibility (CSR) has increased. That means there is a growing pressure on Swedish companies to act with responsibility: general public has a positive attitude towards companies that communicate their CSR. Advertising agencies have been criticized by their way to manage the question of social responsibility. One of the characteristics of an advertising agency is their anonymity; even though their products are extremely visible, it is rarely clear who gave rise to an advertising production. If this is put in relation to CSR in general, we find ourselves in a contradictory situation when CSR in many cases is about exposure of the responsible corporation.

In the beginning of the 21th century several successful companies filed for bankruptcy. These bankruptcies have been known as large accounting scandals and the largest scandals did Enron and Worldcom stand for. These bankruptcies arose without any warning signal from the auditors about the companies? financial problems and their inability to continue as a going concern. The bankruptcies damaged the reputation of auditors and broad criticism has developed at the auditors? inability to discover companies? financial problems and their unwillingness to reveal a going concern opinion in the audit report.

Background and problem: The importance of banks was clearly shown during the last financial crises, when the crises that started in the banking sector spread to the rest of the world. This is one of the reasons that this thesis is focused on banks in particular, one other reason is that a lot of previous studies has chosen to exclude banks because of the fact that their balance sheet differ from non-financial companies. This thesis is a beginning in filling in the gap that exists in the knowledge of banks capital structure. Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to prove that it is possible to explain the capital structure in banks and that differences in the capital structure of the banks in Great Britain, Sweden and the United states of America exists. Method: The fact that our study is partly a replication of two earlier studies made a deductive approach most appropriate.

I en värld där individer möts av mängder av ekonomiska begrepp och ekonomisk information dagligen har forskning visat att människor har svårt att engagera sig och ha den förståelse som krävs för att hantera sin egen privatekonomi. Begreppet ?Financial Literacy? nämns ofta som en förklaring till människors olika kunskapsnivå och förståelse. I människors yrkesmässiga roll tas denna förmåga ofta för given vara uppfylld. Denna uppsats har undersökt ekonomiska kunskaper och ekonomisk förståelse hos enskilda näringsidkare, en företagsform där privatekonomin och näringsverksamhetens ekonomi är nära sammankopplade.

Children from different backgrounds, cultures and home environments attend school everyday. The educational system of today focus on the importance for every individual pupil to take responsibility, in order to gain knowledge. From an early age should the pupils learn how to work independant and take responsibility for their education. My questian, and what I have decided to discuss in this paper, is wether everyone has the same opportunity to gain knowlwdge and learn trough this method. In preperation for this essay I read litterature where the authors claims that this kind of educational system is not for everyone, but it benefits those pupils that comes from a middleclass background.So, is our school system fair and equal? Can everyone, no matter what social and cultural group they belong to, get the education thay have right to? In order to get a deeper understanding I interviewed three teachers that works in different schools.