The insurance industryis challengedby major changesthrough internationalizationand thusgrowingcompetitionwithmore optionsand greater availabilityfor customers.Solvency II, a new regulatoryframework and anew standard forinsurance companies,is therefore implemented in a steptowardsa more competitive Europeaninsurancemarket. Solvency II will result in extensive structural changes for many insurance companies. Newstandards andinternal models must also be implemented by the companies. Solvency IIhasa tightening effect on thesolvency capital requirements forinsurance companies. At the same time it also leads tomajor changesandincreased demandon risk management andinternal control, alongside with demands fordisclosure of informationto the market.

This thesis was carried out to give some background information to a report of SLU (Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences) for the Swedish National Rail Administration (Banverket). The requested information was to provide basic data for an environmental impact assessment of the construction of the tunnel through Hallandsås. The aim with the thesis work was to discuss and quantify the leaching of nitrate and the emission of nitrous oxide from the soil at the groundwater level established through the tunnel project. The nitrogen related processes that could be affected were described and discussed. The different areas where a decreased groundwater level can cause changes in the nitrogen processes are the wet and moist areas.

In order for companies to be competetive on the market, there?s a need of capital. If a company is in a need of capital to make major investments and isn?t able to prioritize internal funding, the priority will be external financing with safe securities; loans. How companies should prioritize the allocation between equity and debt, which together form value, leads us to the subject of capital structure.

Shock absorber units play a key role in establishing the driving dynamics and performance of automobiles. Öhlins Racing has manufactured high-tech automotive shock absorbers for over 30 years. Öhlins Racing?s advanced technology has contributed to over 200 world championships in automobile racing. Öhlin?s manufacturing process has long utilized automated fluid filling equipment during the final shock absorber unit assembly stage. The filling process consists of vacuum pumping the shock absorber unit and subsequent transfer of fluid. Vacuum pumping is necessary to remove residual air from the shock absorber unit prior to initiating the liquid filling stage. The presence of undesirable gases drastically compromises the performance of a shock absorber. The filling degree, defined as the final ratio of air to oil, is determined by the specific filling protocol as well as the specific equipment utilized.The current investigation aims to develop a viable technique to accurately determine residual air content in shock absorber units. If the filling degree can be appropriately quantified for a specific manufacturing process, then the air/oil ratio may be quantitatively related to shock absorber performance. The utilized measurement method must be completely integrated into the manufacturing process to guarantee shock absorber performance specifications according to the manufacturer?s standards. By utilizing the measurement method developed in this work, the manufacturing process, manufacturing equipment and product specifications can all be tailored to provide improved filling conditions.The developed measurement method provides accurate quantification of the filling degree under a wide range of processing conditions. The method establishes the relative quantity of air in the shock absorber unit by performing in-situ compressibility tests. The fill ratio can be controlled and varied by manipulating the vacuum pressure exerted during the filling process. Performance tests, however, indicate no correlation between filling degree and unit performance..

I dagens premiepensionssystem finns det två typer av aktiefonder, dels indexfonder och dels aktivt förvaltade fonder. Denna studie undersöker om aktivt förvaltade Sverigefonder och tillväxtmarknadsfonder lyckas uppnå en högre riskjusterad avkastning än valt jämförelseindex, om de aktivt förvaltade fonderna uppvisar persistens i sina prestationer och om det föreligger ett samband mellan graden av aktiv förvaltning och fondernas riskjusterade avkastning. Studien undersöker 38 Sverigefonder och 43 tillväxtmarknadsfonder under åren 2007-2013. Som mått på den riskjusterade avkastningen används i denna studie Jensens alpha, Sharpe-kvot och Treynor-kvot. För att undersöka persistensen har två olika varianter av contingency tables använts för att mäta persistensen både på kort och lång sikt.

In this paper the effect of capital structure on profitability has been investigated among Swedish companies. The essay intends to examine how the relationship between debt and profitability appear among Swedish companies and if the relationship differs between industries. The purpose is to find out how debt affects the profitability of Swedish companies.A quantitative approach has been applied. The selection was made among companies listed on Nasdaq OMX Stockholm, which resulted in a sample of 207 companies. Several regression analyzes has been formed, based on the independent variable debt-ratio and the dependent variables profit margin, pre-tax profit margin, operating margin, return on assets and return on equity.

Harmonics are a well-known problem that has to be dealt with in the design of thegenerator. Internationally accepted standards limits the amount of harmonics allowedin the no-load voltage. These limits can be difficult to fulfill with integral slot winding,where the number of slots per pole and phase is an integer. The presence of thedamper winding often makes the problem with harmonics even worse and harmonicswith frequencies of order 6q±1 arise with significant amplitude. How the damperwinding is designed affect the content of harmonics in the no-load voltage and the aimwith these ? has been to investigate in which extent design of the damper windingaffects the contents of harmonics.Simulations with the 2-D finite element method have showed that if the damper barsis centered in the pole shoe, the amplitude of the harmonics of order 6q±1dependsboth on the ratio between the stator slot pitch and damper bars slot pitch and if thedamper bars are connected between the poles or not.If the damper bars is displaced with ¼ stator slot pitch alternately, the amplitude ofthe harmonics of order 6q±1 is reduced and the influence of the ratio between thestator slot pitch and the damper bars slot pitch will vanish.

Housing cooperatives in Sweden practice very long depreciation times for their buildings and assets, subsequently depreciation costs are very low. This study aims at addressing issues relating to potential upward revisions of these costs and the revenue levels needed by housing cooperatives to address these changes, while also providing a detailed summary of some chosen financial ratios under different circumstances. This study's results are based upon recent (2015) market data within the Stockholm region, collected through a manual process and analyzed quantitatively. On average, housing cooperatives EBIT do not cover their financial costs and have low profit margins. The average depreciation time is considerably above what a technical evaluation by other sources may state.

Detta arbete syftar till att ta reda på om svenska fondförvaltare har förmågan att prognostisera aktiemarknadens framtida rörelser samt utvärdera vilken betydelse tidsperioden för avkastningsdata har i en sådan undersökning. En empirisk analys av 30 Sverigefonder med två statistiska modeller med dagliga och månatliga avkastningsdata ger dock inga stöd till att svenska fondförvaltare som grupp har denna förmåga. Från analysen visas det även att valet av statistisk modell och tidsperiod för dataobservationerna påverkar resultatet. För den svenska marknaden ger månatlig data mer trovärdiga resultat än daglig data, vilket avviker från tidigare amerikanska studier..

One of Sweden?s sixteen national environmental objectives strives to decrease the impact on the climate. By 2020, green house gas emissions should be 40 % less compared to the levels of 1990 and a minimum of 50 % of the energy consumption should come from renewable energy sources. Because of this there is a great need of increasing the production of renewable energy. This is where biogas comes in as a competitive alternative.

The global financial crisis hit hard on banking operations worldwide and the sector fell under considerable scrutiny, with particular criticism directed against the banks' own trading practices. A bank owned by the Swedish financial corporation HQ seemed to go without serious financial damage duringthe crisis.In 2008 Finansinspektionen began a review of HQ's activities and a number of shortcomings were identified. Among other things, HQ's risk management was questioned by Finansinspektionen and further how this potentially affected the valuation of complex financial products.In our paper we have chosen to highlight both national and international laws and guidelines that HQ used for their operations and study if HQ followed those laws and guidelines. We also want topresent the theoretical model used by HQ for the valuation of its European options and how HQ calculated their capital requirements ratio. Our purpose is to show how the valuation affected the capitalrequirement ratio and whether HQ followed the necessary laws and guidelines for the valuation of complex financial products.We have chosen to carry out a case study from a deductive approach.

SAMMANFATTNING Denna litteraturstudie syftar till att utvärdera hjärtfrekvens och hjärtfrekvensvariabilitet som fysiologiska mått på mental stress hos häst. För att utvärdera detta har olika artiklar studerats. Artiklarna redovisar studier där hästar utsätts för framför allt mentala stressmoment. Under stressmomenten har antingen hjärtfrekvens (HR) eller hjärtfrekvens och hjärtfrekvensvariabilitet (HRV) registrerats. Hjärtfrekvensvariabiliteten kan omvandlas till ett antal parametrar, bland annat lågfrekvensband (LF) och högfrekvensband (HF).

In this essay, a search strategy for citation index is studied. The strategy, which is essentially a citation cycle, starts with documents retrieved by a subject search, wherefrom new documents are identified following the network of citations backwards and forwards in time. Based on the theory of polyrepresentation, the strategy exploits overlaps between cognitively different interpretations of the same documents in order to automatically select references seed documents used as a starting point for the forward chaining. The purpose of the investigation is to evaluate the retrieval effectiveness of the search strategy and to find out whether the strategy can be used to expand a subject search with the help of the network of references in order to retrieve new relevant documents. Two questions are formulated: 1a.

Due to traditional beliefs about biological differences between the sexes, the sex ratio is abnormally uneven in northern parts of India. There is a combination of old methods like female infanticide and new technologies, which make selective abortion possible. The strong practices of dowry transform daughters to economical burdens to their parents. They face mortal danger before, at and after birth. With rapid economical progress and advanced technology, India is a country in progress.

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.