We study the disposition effect across market states in the context of mutual fund investors in Taiwan. Using mutual fund data at the fund and individual levels during July 2001 to October 2008, we find that the disposition effect varies across market states. Our results suggest that investors redeem their mutual fund units more under a bear market than a bull market when they have extreme capital losses. When investors have moderate capital gains, they are less active in redeeming their mutual fund units under a bull market relative to a bear market. Under a neutral market, investors actively redeem mutual fund units in both winner and loser mutual funds except when they have extreme capital losses. Thus, disposition effect is not uniform; it varies by market condition. In addition, the disposition effect phenomenon also exists for Taiwan mutual fund investors as well. Our findings are robust to aggregate and individual investor levels.

The mandate of doing good with earnings management has been a subject of inconclusive findings from the past literature and leave issues on the benefits of socially responsible activities and financial reporting of the company. This study investigates the effects of corporate social responsibility (CSR) on accrual-based (AEM) and real-activities earnings management (REM). This study hypothesized that the trade-off exists between these two earnings management strategies, in light of increasing attention of CSR among Asian firms. In addition, this study examines whether the performance of firms in socially responsible activities exhibit different patterns of effect across the two measures of earnings management under the market economy, country, and business sector contexts. This study contemplates on 3906 firm-year observations from 2011 to 2017 of eleven countries in Asia. Our findings show that CSR conceals AEM while it constrains REM. These effects vary according to the market economy classifications, country, and business sector types. Each market, country and business sector has different standpoints in implementing CSR activities and earnings management relevant to the culture, macroeconomic considerations and demands from the stakeholders. Lastly, the discernment on the relevance of building corporate citizenship on financial reporting transparency is elaborated.

Incidence rates of healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) depend upon infection control policy and practices, and the effectiveness of the implementation of antibiotic stewardship. Amongst intensive care unit (ICU) patients with HAIs, a substantial number of pathogens were reported to be multidrug-resistant bacteria (MDRB). However, impacts of ICU HAIs due to MDRB (MDRB-HAIs) remain understudied. Our study aimed to evaluate the negative impacts of MRDB-HAIs versus HAIs due to non-MDRB (non-MRDB-HAIs). Among 60,317 adult patients admitted at ICUs of a 2680-bed medical centre in Taiwan between January 2010 and December 2017, 279 pairs of propensity-score matched MRDB-HAI and non-MRDB-HAI were analyzed. Between the MDRB-HAI group and the non-MDRB-HAI group, significant differences were found in overall hospital costs, costs of medical and nursing services, medication, and rooms/beds, and in ICU length-of-stay (LOS). As compared with the non-MDRB-HAI group, the mean of the overall hospital costs of patients in the MDRB-HAI group was increased by 26%; for categorized expenditures, the mean of costs of medical and nursing services of patients in the MDRB-HAI group was increased by 8%, of medication by 26.9%, of rooms/beds by 10.3%. The mean ICU LOS in the MDRB-HAI group was increased by 13%. Mortality rates in both groups did not significantly differ. These data clearly demonstrate more negative impacts of MDRB-HAIs in ICUs. The quantified financial burdens will be helpful for hospital/government policymakers in allocating resources to mitigate MDRB-HAIs in ICUs; in case of need for clarification/verification of the medico-economic burdens of MDRB-HAIs in different healthcare systems, this study provides a model to facilitate the evaluations.

This paper investigates the different affecting patterns of the determinants of initial returns under different market states for Taiwanese IPOs. Contrary to the prior literature, this paper estimates the sample separated from different market states, including bullish, bearish, and range-bound markets, and finds that the affecting patterns of the determinants of initial returns indeed exhibit some significant differences under different market states. For instance, the stronger the auditor reputation effect, the lower are the initial returns under a range-bound market, and the market momentum effect is stronger under a bullish market. In addition, the risk perception effect is stronger under a bearish market. These findings show that the empirical result of dividing market states will provide more insights and a greater variety of information as investors make decisions.