In this thesis we have examined Västra Götalandsregionens ways to lobby and network in the European Union. Our aim was to examine which kind of methods the region uses to lobby in a successful way in Brussels. We found that the region uses both formal and informal methods of lobbying to gain advantages in Brussels. We also wanted to locate various networks which the region is involved in to more easily have their interests satisfied. We found that they had a lot of different alliances and that it is necessary to be involved in different networks to have a chance to lobby the EU institutions.

Abstract: Private equity used to be synonymous with tremendous yields and rates of return. However, the private equity market trembled in 2008, due to the financial meltdown caused by the worldwide credit crisis. Considering the current low number of exits within the private equity industry, the purpose of this thesis is to examine if there has been any change in how private equity firms control their portfolio companies since the inception of the crisis. One private equity company and two portfolio companies have been studied. The case study is prepared from interviews with senior directors in the portfolio company and investment managers in the private equity firm.

The subsidiary company of Swedish Match AB called Intermatch Sweden AB has submitted a claim to RegR for them to change the notification of SRN, regarding the company?s settlement of foreign tax. To make the matter clear Intermatch Sweden AB has pointed out that they consider deductions for depreciations not to have an effect on the foreign income when the amount to settle is calculated. The intention with this study is to analyse the legal situation regarding how the level of the settlement is affected by the consolidated costs. Such as additional depreciations regulated in the law ?Settlements of foreign tax?.

During recent years, financial innovation has given rise to numerous structured investment opportunities aimed towards the general public. These have enabled private investors to engage in high-risk investments offering as much as 400 per cent leverage while oftentimes not fully having grasped the risk involved. The issuers of these securities have been criticized for using advertising of a too aggressive and misleading nature.By presenting 819 potential investors with two different investment opportunities yielding the same return over a six day period, we have aimed to assess whether the inclination of being affected by judegmental heuristics varies with factors such as knowledge, overall attitude towards the asset class, risk appetite and experience from previous investments.We have observed that investors' perception of the attractiveness of an investment can be distorted by altering the information presented to the investor. However, our findings show that this tendency decreases with an increased level of knowledge, experience and risk appetite..

Since Africa?s decolonization a number of foreign economic actors have begun toemerge in several African countries and they prove a vital role in many ways. China isone of the largest actor and they have a long history of political and economic ties withAfrica. China act primarily in Africa to meet their growing economy?s demand fornatural resources, and by providing aid and trade with development countries in Africathey get important natural resources like oil and iron ore in return.

In 1985 the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions published a paper on recommended depreciation time on capital assets for the public sector. This paper should only be seen as guidance, but many municipals use it without any further investigations. Swedish municipals are not like private companies; one very distinguished difference is that they are not allowed to make any profit. The municipals in Sweden are regulated by the constitution law which means that they can not go bankrupt. The public and the private sector have different legislations that result in different ways on how they for example treat depreciations.

The ongoing harmonization process aims to incorporate IFRS regulations into the Swedish accounting. As a consequence investment property?s starting from 2005 may be valued using the fair value method, in accordance to IAS 40. This involves major changes for listed property enterprises that from now on can value a large extent of their assets to fair value. All parties don?t appreciate this progress, opponents to fair value have expressed great concern that fair value don?t work in practice.

This paper is intended to provide a picture of which associations water can wake in the human mind from the perspectives of garden history as well as from that of environmental psychology. I hope to paint a fairly broad picture of our perception of water that can serve as a basis for discussion and as a starting point for different forms of design work in landscape architecture. The historical perspective emphasizes the importance of water as a condition for the emergence of gardens and in a wider perspective the importance of water in early cultures. Also, I describe a picture of how water has been used throughout the history of gardens from early Egypt to the baroque era. The garden history analyzed from an art historical perspective gives a picture of human associations to water, and the history behind these associations is presented. As a compliment to the art history approach, I have chosen to highlight our associations with water from the perspectives of environmental psychology and evolutionary science.

Hyresbostadsfonder är en ny placeringsform i Sverige som erbjuder privatpersoner, företag och institutioner att äga hyresfastigheter och erhålla avkastning från förvaltningsöverskott och värdeökning. I denna studie jämförs aktie- och obligationsfonder med en simulerad hyresbostadsfond ur ett risk kontra avkastningsperspektiv. Fonden baseras på data över den svenska fastighetsmarknaden från Svenskt Fastighetsindex och Investment Property Database, därför att placeringsformen är ny och det råder brist på historisk data från verkliga aktörer.Målet med studien är att besvara om hyresbostadsfonder är ett konkurrenskraftigt alternativ till aktie- och obligationsfonder. Utöver finansiella jämförelser redogör författarna eventuella dolda risker och nackdelar med placeringsformen.Resultatet från studien visar att hyresbostadsfonden har presterat bättre än både aktie- och obligationsfonderna under perioden 1988-2008. Bidragande faktorer till denna utveckling har identifierats och redovisats.

The purpose of the following essay is to analyze how the Swedish regional policy has been influenced by the regional policy in the EU. The study builds on the theoretical framework that is Europeanization, the top-down approach, which stipulates where you can find evidence of this influence. To obtain the information that I needed to answer my question formulations, which main question formulation are; in which way has the EU regional policy influenced the Swedish regional policy? I used the method of literature analysis. Both the theoretical framework alongside the chosen method pointed me to analyze the public debate in Sweden in the regional question.

Bakgrund: Det rådande pensionssystemet i Sverige består av sex så kallade AP-fonder. Genom åren har pensionssystemet flertalet gånger kritiserats för dess låga avkastning.Problem: Vår huvudfråga är att jämföra AP-fondernas risk och avkastning med aktiemarknaden som helhet, detta ska ske med hjälp av två jämförelseindex: MSCI World och SIXRX.Syfte: Syftet med uppsatsen är att jämföra de fyra första AP-fondernas risk och avkastning med aktiemarknaden som helhet under åren 2002-2010.Metod: Vi har använt oss av en kvantitativ metod, genom att samla in information från AP-fondernas årsredovisningar och hemsidor. Vi har samlat in historisk data, som vi sedan har bearbetat och analyserat.Slutsats: De studerade AP-fonderna har presterat sämre än aktiemarknaden..

The Swedish energy company Vattenfall is currently the owner of the district heatingsystems in Nyköping and Motala. To be able to also offer cooling solutions tocustomers are becoming more and more important. This report describes the resultsof an investigation of the cooling market in the two cities and the potential needs forcooling today and in the coming 20 years. The total potential for the coming 20 yearsis estimated to be roughly 17 MW for Nyköping and 9 MW for Motala.Two possible district cooling systems for each of the two city centers was modeledand a comparison was made between different cooling techniques namely absorptionand compressor chillers.Absorption chillers driven with district heating during the summer is one way ofincreasing the load in a combined heat and power plant and thereby the possibleelectricity generation. The cost of heat production must be low for absorption chillerto be able to compete as an alternative.

The purpose of this thesis is to investigate how theoretical investment appraisal techniques are applied in an investment driven company, regarding investments in fixed assets. The aim is also to investigate on what grounds the choices of techniques are justified, and what consequences these choices have on the overall investment appraisal. The study is designed as a case study of Divisionen, a production unit of a market leading company in Sweden, which is kept anonymous in this thesis. The empirical data consists of interviews with company employees and internal documents, including decision support for seven approved investment projects. The interviewees were chosen based on their role in the investment decision making process.

This essay is about how organizations reveal their employees in the annual report. The purpose of this paper is to examine the extent to which organizations reveals their employees in the annual report, and the purpose has three questions: How do the organizations present their employees in the annual report? What do they choose to report? What motives lies behind?The problem today is that organizations can´t account the employees as assets, they can only be accounted as an expense in the income statement. This can lead to that stakeholders can´t convey an organization's "true" value.With a combination study, we examined how organizations certified by Investors in People presents the employees in their annual reports. In the framework, we have, among other things dealt with personnel mandatory disclosure in the Annual Account Act, the difference between private- and public sectors accounting.

This paper analyzes the auditor choices for a sample of 300 predominantly small Swedish firms, all located in Umeå. Our hypothesis was based on the complexity of a firm, the need of external financing, leverage, and the need of extra consultance from the auditfirm. Our definition of auditor quality is based on prior studies, and is frequently used by authors in this area. The assumption is based on that the auditor quality increases with the size of the auditfirm and the degree of the auditor. The auditor quality is therefor depending on the choice between an auditor from the group ?Big 5? or not, and the choice of an auditor with an higher degree.