Companies today are facing more and different kinds of demands from the society and their stakeholders. It is no longer enough to just deliver the products, and not just the quality of the products that matter. The consumers are getting more conscious about the many ways in which companies affect the society and the environment in which we live. The financial sector, that among others includes stakeholders such as insurance companies, banks and fund companies are starting to realise the importance of the non- financial issues that companies are encountering. Analysing the companies sustainability when it comes to social and environmental issues, has become an increasingly important factor when for example choosing companies to invest in.

Many companies have historically forced their interests through without any thoughts about the future needs of the humans and the society. In the last few years voices have been raised for a change, companies need to take their responsibility regarding sustainable development.The purpose of the report is to describe and explain possible relations between sustainabil-ity performance of companies and profitability, valuation, industry and size respectively.To be able to judge the sustainability performance of the companies Folksam (2006a) have been used. This is a solid investigation of the companies listed on the A- and O-lists of the Stockholm Stock Exchange by the end of 2005. The sustainability marks have been com-pared with the chosen key values for each hypothesis respectively. With this quantitative data as foundation, a quantitative approach and a deductive method have been used.In the first area of the investigation, profitability, the authors found correlation for the main hypothesis between sustainability performance and ?Return on Total Assets? through a statistical test.

This study aims to investigate whether or how the tour operator Fritidsresors customers gets affected by their sustainable environmental work and what kinds of effects the work has generated. A secondary data analysis of Fritidsresors website has been made, and an in-depth interview with Fritidsresors sustainability manager. Also a quantitative survey was conducted by fifty respondents, all customers of Fritidsresor. The answers have since been interpreted and processed in accordance with a comparative and phenomenological approach and with an exploratory purpose. Scientific articles have been studied and analyzed in order to generate an explanation for the phenomenon as a research field, and how previous research has looked.

This thesis aims to study the effects of the infrastructure project Västlänken in Gothenburg, a rail tunnel to be built through the city center. The study focuses on the community of Haga where one of the three exits will be constructed and also the surrounding urban environment, to see if the project can be sustainable. Sustainable urban development was selected as the theory, and the term "sustainable" is defined in this study using a number of criteria that two scientists developed. The criteria include economic, ecological and social perspectives on how a place or a geographical area can meet today's needs as well as possible needs in the future. The methods used were semi-structured interviews and content analysis of government documents. Interviews were conducted with various institutions in the city, and companies involved in the planning of the project in Gothenburg.

This thesis aims to open the Pandora?s Box of hedge fund styles through an index-based style analysis. This information asymmetry is due to both less strict disclosure requirements and inherent nature of hedge funds. We employ a multiple unconditional linear regression model wherein 23 Swedish hedge funds are regressed on 10 style indices. In addition to the increased interest in hedge funds and their performance drivers, our unique approach with regressing return on return motivates this study.

Sustainability is today a current topic and companies are more or less forced to work with it even though it contradicts the historical role of companies, which is to generate a profit for shareholders. In recent years there has been a rising interest from banks to work with sustainability but research has shown a growing dissatisfaction among customers even though banks are spending a lot of money and time working with sustainability. This shows that there is an asymmetry between how the banks act and what their customers demand. The purpose of this paper is to create an understanding of how business customers perceive banks´ CSR-reports by investigating customers? interest in these reports.

The purpose of this study was to analyze the two thinning models: Bergvik Skog´s thinning model, which is based on total stems and dominant height, And Swedish forest agency´s thinning model which is based on basal area, habitat index, dominant height and recommended number of stems at final felling in Heureka´s StandWise and PlanWise. The data we chosen for our study were taken from the Swedish National Forest Inventory and we were creating a simulated stand based on a great number of sample plots in Region three from The Swedish National Forest Inventory. We had chosen to create one stand with low habitat index (T20) and one with high habitat index (T24). Our purpose were to come as close as possible to a natural stand in central Sweden. We performed the thinning in StandWise and analyzed the data I Excel files. Our thinning optimizing´s were performed and analyzed in PlanWise. There wasn´t any big differences between the thinning on the lower habitat index.

The depth-to-water-index (DTW-index) is derived from digital elevation models (DEM) to map soil wetness, in terms of distance from soil surface to the ground water table. The aim of this GIS based study was to investigate the existence of a relationship between DTW-index and forest site productivity (SP). The belief of such an assumed relationship was based on knowledge that the ground water level is related to site properties that can either promote or impede tree growth. Data primarily comprised rasters of the Krycklan catchment in northern Sweden and depicted DTW-index and a laser scanned vegetation height. The 100th height percentile of each pixel in the vegetation raster was assumed to mirror the top-height, letting it act as a relative measure of SP within a delineated area of equal stand age.

Background and Introduction: Environmental report drew attention in the 1980s when the Va?rldskommissionen fo?r miljo? och utveckling received a mandate from the FN to investigate the relationship between economic development and environmental degradation. In connection with this, although sustainability a new item for many businesses. But to say exactly what sustainability is all about is very difficult. In 1996 the then Government Redovisningskommissionen a study on the introduction of an amendment to the Annual Accounts Act, which would force companies to report on environmental issues in their annual or consolidated accounts.

The world is facing huge challenges to overcome the climate crisis. A contributing actor to the environmental footprints are the textile industry and their production processes, which highlights the importance to act. The purpose of this study is therefore to investigate how a middle size company's purchase- and design department work to contribute to sustainable fashion and sustainable consumption. As well as to examine the challenges and possibilities that the fashion company faces in its sustainability work. The qualitative study has been prepared and is based on 15 interviews with employees in the purchase- and design department.

Abstract  Title: High-Risk Funds vs. Mutual- Index FundsA study of macro -variables influence on different funds choice Level: Final assignment for Bachelor Degree in Business Administration Author: Moses Yokie & Bo Lemar Supervisor: Ogi Chun & Cheick Wagué Date: 2011-05-25 Aim: The purpose with this thesis is to compare two different types of mutual-index fond and a high-risk fund in relation to the macro variables. The purpose also includes an investigation about if an investor will receives a higher return on high-risk fund than on mutual-index fund in a 10 years period.Method: A quantitative method has been use in this study, where the information has been received from Morningstar. Microsoft Excel has been used to process the collected data in order to calculate the expected return and the risk measures. The result is presented in graphs and tables on the empirical capital, in order to analyse and compare it with the theories and the selected macro- variables to see if there will be any correlation. Conclusion: This research shows that there is no possibility that the macro-variable factors can benefit an investment on high-risk fund or on mutual-index fund in the short run.

 Problem: For what type of investors are index funds versus exchange-traded index funds best suited?Objective: The purpose of the paper is to determine how an index fund or an exchange-traded index fund (ETF) suits different types of investors with different requirements in terms of time frame, investment size and purpose of investment. The comparison is based on fees and trade practicality. This is going to describe the advantages and disadvantages with the two different financial instruments.Method: The study is a comparative study using two methods; one of which is a case study, the other is a qualitative interview. The case study focuses on fees and is made on an exchange traded fund (XACT OMXS30) and a simple equity index fund (Erik Pensér equity enhanced index).

Sustainable development is often pictured as containing of three interlinked dimensions- namely environmental, economic and social. ?Social sustainability? is a vague concept that is often thought of as highly context-dependent. This thesis sets out to investigate the meaning of ?social sustainability? in a given context.

This thesis provides a systematic literature review of a selection among current papers andarticles on Green Information Systems (IS). The main focus is on the current state of Green ISin academic research. This study aims at gaining a deeper understanding and a clearer view ofthe state-of-the-art of IS for environmental sustainability research, with the goal of clarifyingthe diffuse idea of what Green IT/IS is, and what differentiates Green IS from Green IT.To support the objective of this study, the articles selected for data analysis were collected byusing a systematic literature review as research and analytical method. Within the thesis, adescriptive angle with an interpretative character is used to analyse the data extracted.A theoretical framework based on concepts from sustainability, Green IS and Green IT isemployed in order to analyse and compare terminologies and frameworks used in the studiedarticles. Furthermore, the different dimensions of sustainability and the various terms used todescribe Green IS are analysed comparatively.The result and analysis are discussed in a conclusion confirming the on-going ambiguity ofthe terms Green IT and Green IS and the transformative power of IS.

This essay is a study of the motives and driving forces affecting how a food producer looks at, and incorporates, an environmental-labeling and its impact on their organization and strategy. Driving forces and motivations is an important part of a business strategy and impacts its content and its expression. Sustainability can be part of the overall company strategy but could also define the entire company. This study has shown that the main motive for working with eco-labelling is a genuine interest in issues concerning sustainability. This creates an opportunity for the company to communicate their environmental policies to their customers. For a company that works proactive and innovative with sustainability and climate issues, the new climate framework does not mean any major organizational or strategic changes.When the framework is incorporated in the organization the farms need to be analyzed with a climate impact perspective. This essay shows that this process, together with tools developed to handle the framework, make change in the way dairy farmers think and how they relate to their daily work..