Saunah Zainon

Estimating the Yield Curve for the Malaysian Bond Market Using Parsimony Method

Abstract The yield curve is an indicative of the level element bonds in the world prices of fixed income securities investment. It is used to predict interest rate, estimating the price of a security and as an indicator of the balance between maturity and yield. This study focuses on the comparison level of accuracy and appropriateness of the yield curve by the time interval for selecting the best method for producing the bond market yield curve in Malaysia. There are three parsimonious models that were applied in this study, namely Nelson-Siegel (NS), Nelson-Siegel-Svensson (NSS) and Extended-Nelson-Siegel (NSE). This study applied the data from Malaysian Government Securities (MGS) for the three days which are 31 January 2015, 15 February 2015 and 28 February 2015. The yield curve generated by the price expectations derived from the three models were then analyzed by Statistical methods such as RMSYE, MSE, RMSE and R2.

The Web-Based Accountability Practices in Social Enterprises: Validating the Stakeholder Theory☆

Abstract In the absence of shareholders, accountability practices in social enterprises are determined by the strengths of stakeholders. The stakeholder theory postulates that accountability systems depend greatly on the power and number of stakeholders. With the advent of technologies, it is increasingly common to use internet-based technologies in addressing accountability in social enterprises as they pursue hybrid objectives which attempts to balance off both social and economic missions. In view of this, the present study aims to validate the stakeholder theory, focusing on the effect of web-based accountability practices in social enterprises. Based on the Social Enterprise Alliance (SEA) database, all the social enterprises in the database were selected after controlling the type of formation for each social enterprise. The three dimensions of web-based accountability practices showed a low disclosure level on the extent of web-based accountability practices incorporating the three dimensions of finance, performance and political accountability. The results also revealed that social enterprises have less interest in disclosing their financial accountability practices through web sites.