BACKGROUND Free ranging foraging animals can vary their searching intensity in response to the profitability of the environment by modifying their movements. Marine diving animals forage in a three dimensional space and searching intensity can be varied in both the horizontal and vertical planes. Therefore understanding the relationship between the allocation of searching effort in these two sp...

Customer value creation is allegedly at the centre of relationships between service recipients and service providers (such as financial service organisations in general, and commercial banks in particular). This research considers the role of customer value creation in the strategic response of banks to external changes in their growth opportunities. The analysis established that there had been...

Using data on listed and unlisted firms in the U.K., this study documents systematic changes of profitability with age. In their early years, firms realize substantial profitability increases, on average, while mature firms face slow declines in profitability. A model of endogenous profitability changes arising from product development captures this pattern. Investment in product development ge...

This article examines the effect of GDP growth on bank profitability in China over the period 2003-2009. The one-step system GMM estimator is used to test the persistence of profitability in Chinese banking industry. The empirical findings suggest that cost efficiency is positively related to bank profitability, while lower profitability can also be explained by higher taxes paid by banks. In a...

This article examines the effect of GDP growth on bank profitability in China over the period 2003-2009. The one-step system GMM estimator is used to test the persistence of profitability in Chinese banking industry. The empirical findings suggest that cost efficiency is positively related to bank profitability, while lower profitability can also be explained by higher taxes paid by banks. In a...

This article investigates the relationship between firm specific factors and macroeconomics on profitability in Taiwanese property-liability insurance industry using the panel data over the1999 through 2009 time period. Using operating ratio and return on assets (ROA) for the two kinds of profitability indicators to measure insurers’ profitability. The results show that underwriting risk, reins...

This study investigates the firm-specific factors affecting the profitability of non-life insurance companies operating in Turkey. For this purpose, data of 24 non-life insurance companies operating in Turkey from the period 2006–2013 were brought together to obtain 192 observed panel data sets. In this study, profitability is measured by two different variables: technical profitability ratio a...

Monte Carlo simulation is used to develop a flexible framework to measure the profitability, risk, and competitiveness of any insurance product. A genetic algorithm is then used to seek the optimum asset allocations that form the profitability-risk-competitiveness frontier and to examine the profitability, risk, and competitiveness trade-off's. We also show how to select the appropriate asset a...

In summary, I think the industry is doing the right things to return to profitability. Rates are increasing, underwriting and products are tightening, claim administration is becoming more proactive, and reserves are being strengthened. I think this will lead to future profitability, and future profitability will attract some new companies into the marketplace. The real long-term question is, o...

Using aggregate data from the Annual Survey of Industries, we analyze profitability in India’s organized manufacturing sector from 1982-83 to 2012-13. Over the whole period of analysis, the rate of profit grew at about 1 percent per annum, primarily driven by a rising share of profits. We use structural break tests to identify medium and short run regimes. We find two medium run regimes, one of...