On November 1st 2010 the obligatory audit was removed in Sweden for small companies. What factors influence such companies to have their financial reports audited, and what factors exert the strongest influence. Purpose: The authors would like to investigate factors that affect companies with voluntary audits in Skåne län to continue with the audit. The authors also wish to examine the factors that have the strongest impact on the choice to adopt auditing. Method: A quantitative study has been conducted in which aquestionnaire was sent to companies in Skåne Län Conclusion: The factors that affect smaller companies to continue with audit are as follows: Accounting quality, cost, creditors (loans), suppliers / customers, the tax office and distort competition.

Öppenhet är en allt viktigare del av företagens årsredovisningar. I en mer och mer komplex värld har öppenheten blivit en större fråga för företagen vid upprättandet årsredovisningarna. Det ostabila förtroendet för företagen har resulterat i större press öppenhet. Därför är det inte konstigt att redovisningskvalité har blivit en viktig aspekt intressenter, problemet är att kvalité ses på olika vis.U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) har i sin senaste utgåva av International Accounting Standards (IAS) skrivit 50 sidor om redovisningskvalité.

The thesis main objective is to establish the determinants for granting executive stock options and to examine their impact on performance for firms listed on OMXS30. The analysis is based on accounting data gathered from annual reports and Thomson Datastream. The empirical results display that firms grant stock options to mitigate the principal-agent problem. Furthermore, risk proves to be positively significant with executive stock options, implying that either executives increase the level of risk after being granted stock options or influence the decision of the remuneration towards stock options when the firm increase the level of risk, in purpose to boost the expected value of their options. No relation between executive stock options and firm performance could be established..

There is an increased pressure for firms to provide the financial market with additional information. Such disclosure is attached with different kinds of costs. In spite of these costs, and in spite of increased mandatory disclosures, firms choose to voluntary disclosure financial information to analysts and others. This indicates that firms also benefit from providing additional information. The subjects of this study is 431 annual reports from firms listed at the Stockholm Stock Exchange for 2002 and 2005 and the objective is to survey factors that can explain variations in firms? voluntary disclosure.

In recent years, the Swedish railway track system has been neglected in terms of capacity and maintenance. To adapt the existing system to current traffic load there is a great need for extensive improvement and maintenance. Shortcomings are especially occurring on older embankments running over soft subgrades. To select the most suitable method for reinforcement of the embankment, it is important to evaluate different solutions from a life cycle cost perspective. In long-term perspective, it is often shown that a method with low investment cost causes a higher maintenance cost and a shorter technical lifetime.

In theory, the logic behind partnerships is simple: All organisations have strengths, but no organisation has all the strength required to do everything. Triggered by global perspectives and challenged by sustainability objectives, the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 pointed out needs for corporate responsibility. In this conference, Private-public partnership, PPP, was identified as a potential way to work towards sustainability, especially as a way to emphasize a corporate responsibility commitment. Nowadays, organizations exist to satisfy the needs and interests of all their stakeholders, such as customers, markets, shareholders, as well as secondary stakeholders such as media, NGOs, and society at large. Addressing all stakeholders and working towards a sustainable business development makes PPP a potential solution, but also a source of challenges.

This thesis is based on a case study of the City of Stockholm. The study aims to explore the effects on the city's large investments caused by the public reform. Furthermore, the question concerns the character of the impact and if it will affect what type of investments that will be prioritized. The theoretical background is based on Brunsson's ideas about political organizations shifting towards corporate nature, and Almqvist's interpretation of New Public Management (NPM). Moreover, models explaining public management reform, and the main components of corporate shifting, are used.

Denna studie syftar till, ur ett hållbarhetsperspektiv, att ge en djupare förståelse för hur turismen har påverkat destinationen Sharm el Sheikh i Egypten. Studiens resultat visar att destinationen Sharm el Sheikh har påverkats i stor omfattning av turismen, inom den socio- kulturella sektorn, den ekonomiska sektorn och miljösektorn, samtliga av de tre områden som enligt FN är definitionen av hållbar turism.Inom den socio- kulturella sektorn finns det flera problem; den bakomliggande orsaken till många av dessa problem är att ursprungsbefolkningen känner sig förbisedda och inte har getts möjlighet till att påverka utvecklingen av destinationen i en önskvärd omfattning. Den positiva påverkan turismen har haft på den socio- kulturella sektorn är en ökad förståelse för den lokala kulturen.Den största negativa effekten på den ekonomiska sektorn, av turismen på Sharm el Sheikh, har visat sig vara att 97 procent av intäkterna försvinner ut ur destinationen genom ett så kallat läckage. Detta beror främst på att det är utländska ägare av hotellen och all-inclusive anläggningarna. Den egyptiska staten har försökt att minska detta läckage genom att införa en lag som säger att en egyptier måste äga minst 49 procent av företaget, detta tycks dock inte ha gett önskat effekt utan istället har vissa egyptier agerat som målvakter mot en fast ersättning istället för ägandeskap i företagen.De miljömässiga problemen som turismen orsakat i Sharm el Sheikh är också flera.

On November 1st 2010 the obligatory audit was removed in Sweden for small companies. What factors influence such companies to have their financial reports audited, and what factors exert the strongest influence. Purpose: The authors would like to investigate factors that affect companies with voluntary audits in Skåne län to continue with the audit. The authors also wish to examine the factors that have the strongest impact on the choice to adopt auditing. Method: A quantitative study has been conducted in which aquestionnaire was sent to companies in Skåne Län Conclusion: The factors that affect smaller companies to continue with audit are as follows: Accounting quality, cost, creditors (loans), suppliers / customers, the tax office and distort competition.

The new Swedish Companies Act allows Swedish companies to issue two instruments that were previously prohibited: mandatory convertibles and participating debentures. The aim of the thesis is to conduct a cross sectional study of Swedish corporate hybrid securities, especially in the light of the new Companies Act. The cross sectional study also includes areas such as credit rating, accounting and tax. The thesis concludes that it is possible, under Swedish law, to issue corporate hybrid securities that qualify for both high equity credit and tax deductible interest payments. The use of certain hybrid provisions are, however, restrained by Swedish company law.

The awareness regarding environmental issues is increasing and as a result a large number of products are eco-labeled. This enables the consumers to make enlightened environmental decisions when purchasing products. Eco-labeling is no longer for products only, but also for services like hotels. It?s difficult to determine what it actually means to eco-label a hotel and what kind of benefits it includes.

The world is changing and the business context is no exception. One of the clearest tendencies is a tougher business climate with harder competition due to increased international trade and the expansion of the e-business. At the same time the customers are becoming more sophisticated and demanding. The last decades have also meant that tougher and more frequent demands are being aimed at the businesses from a wider variety of stakeholders; demands regarding how environmental issues, social responsibilities and business ethics should be dealt with. All of the above have driven companies towards implementation of different management systems to be able to cope with the demands as well as to ensure that these issues are being dealt with in an efficient and effective manner.

Projektet har haft som syfte att i samarbete med Örsjö Belysning AB ta fram en vägghängd armatur för hotell som ska ha funktion som ljus till att läsa vid sängen. Lampan har haft krav på hållbar utveckling. Lampan har en energieffektiv ljuskälla, vald med hänsyn till sitt syfte, och ingående material har valts med stark miljöhänsyn. Form och funktion har varit viktiga begrepp och har parallellt följts åt i projektet. Produkten har konstruerats för en okomplicerad isärtagning så att delarna enkelt kan sorteras och återvinnas vid armaturens avslutade användning..

Mergers and acquisitions are a phenomenon which can occur for a variety of reasons. It may for example be that the organizations want to gain larger market shares or to complement and learn from each other and thus become more competitive. After the completion of an acquisition or merger, a process is initiated to create an affiliation between the two companies' employees. The purpose of this paper is to examine whether there is something that management can do to make the integration process as efficient as possible. The empirical research in this paper consisted of interviews and surveys with respondents from two accounting firms that recently completed a merger.

The goal of this paper is to provide a model for a sustainable electricity system to an island, in the Pacific Ocean near the equator.The method which has been used is to model supply and demand of electricity in the computer program Stella, through the creation of a dynamic system that balances them against each other. The result from the model will then be used to calculate the electricity price per kWh for the island.The result of the work is that electricity from solar energy is comparable with electricity produced from oil, if the oil pays for all its external costs, and the potential for pumped hydro storage plants is located. It also requires that consumers of electricity can be their own producers to avoid the expenditure of tax and reducing the cost of distribution. But since oil is a finite resource and has had a rising cost in recent years, while solar energy has had a declining cost, perhaps this will be a more competitive solution in the future.