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Speculation on oil markets and its impact on commodity's price
Melcher, Ota ; Taušer, Josef (advisor) ; Baláž, Peter (referee) ; Müller, Štěpán (referee)
This study aims to analyse the precrisis period on the oil markets with a primary objective of assessing the role of speculation in the commodity's price development and its volatility. First it depicts the rapidly increasing speculative activity on the futures market together with the parallel oil price surge. The speculation is initially proxied by non-commercial traders' positions and subsequently quantified by Working's T-index. The paper then uses speculative traders' positions and both spot and futures prices to test for Granger causality within the framework of VAR models. For the sake of consistency it also evaluates causal links between speculation and inventories level. Further the study investigates the speculation impact on volatility of oil prices by employing various approaches in volatility quantification including GARCH models. Contrary to expectations we find that the speculatio's impact on both prices and their volatility is rather insignificant. In the last chapter we therefore seek for an explanation of the oil price developments by examining the market fundamentals. The interaction of supply and demand finally gives substantial evidence for understanding the price developments in the precrisis period.
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Differences between men and women in the Czech labour market
Stroukal, Dominik ; Kadeřábková, Božena (advisor) ; Pavelka, Tomáš (referee) ; Němec, Otakar (referee)
This thesis consists of five articles that apply current world research on labor economics at the Czech Republic and confirms the significant differences between men and women in this market. It shows that gender has a significant influence on the preference on the labor market and, consequently, on employment and health. First, the thesis shows that preferences are relevant determinant of career and then we study the difference in preference of salary for men and women. Subsequently it shows that gender plays a significant role in explaining the relationship between homeownership, and unemployment, as well as unemployment and health. The first chapter was able to demonstrate that the preference for a career has a positive influence on the choice of career. The influence of higher education on prioritizing career proved to be positive and significant. Probability of a career choice is reduced by the presence of children, however, is not dependent on their number, which is contrary to the theory of preferences. The second chapter shows that Czech women prefer more non-monetary rewards than men. It has also been shown that people with university education are same in the preferences of non-monetary rewards regardless of the gender of the respondents, however, compared to the world's research, the Czech higher education increases this preference. It turned out that women prefer risk less than men. The third chapter demonstrates that although the housing market undermines labor mobility and employment in the Czech Republic at the regional level, therefore, that in regions with a higher rate of home ownership is higher unemployment, at the individual level, the owners of housing are unemployed are less likely. The estimates are significantly different for men and women. Men living in owner-occupied housing have a higher likelihood of employment than women. At regional level, however, this thesis shows that the high rate of home ownership increases unemployment for both men and women, in the long run only to women. The fourth chapter showed that men transition to homeownership reduces the likelihood of unemployment next year. For women, this relationship has proved to be insignificant. In addition, as insignificant showed the opposite relationship, the transition from unemployment to the newly acquired home ownership. The last chapter shows that the change in the working status to unemployment will increase in the future probability of worse health. Influence in less than two years, however, proved to be significant. An important conclusion is that men have a significantly stronger relationship between health and unemployment than women.
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The theory of redistribution and its application
Mihalčinová, Hana ; Dlouhý, Martin (advisor) ; Valenčík, Radim (referee) ; Peško, Štefan (referee)
The theory of redistribution systems is a practical extension of a game theory, which deals with a redistribution within a social system of more than two players with di?erent performances and ability to create coalitions. This thesis is divided into three chapters. The ?rst chapter describes the known knowledge of a game theory. The second chapter deals with the theory of redistribution systems. Using an elementary redistribution system and its generalization group behaviour when dividing a payment, achieved by a collective performance, is described. This part introduces the extension of the redistribution system to a compound redistribution system with a fractal structure. Furthermore the theory of discriminatory equilibrium and the theory of commonly acceptable equilibrium are veri?ed using the elementary redistribution system and utility theory. The third chapter deals with an application to the allocation of funds among faculty departments. A game theory approach was used to reduce the game to a non-cooperative game of two players by using the forming of coalitions. Also the theory of redistribution systems was applied when a reduction was used to create a non-cooperative two-player game. This reduced non-cooperative game between two players was converted to a cooperative play of more than two players by changing the rules of the game and allowing a formation of coalitions. In the practical part both of these approaches are compared with real data and a current state.
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Proposing the financial performance prediction index for decision support of the hospital management
Hajdíková, Taťána ; Černá, Anna (advisor) ; Lieskovská, Vanda (referee) ; Lazar, Jaromír (referee)
Dissertation thesis deals with the managerial needs in the area of financial health. Managers need a tool to reveal the impending financial failure or to assess the financial quality of the organization. They link their decisions to performance, ability to pay, employee productivity, financial resources and financial risk. In the theoretical part of the thesis it is necessary to explain the non-profit sector and its connection with the hospital environment. It is also necessary to introduce models used both in the Czech Republic and abroad, which share common elements. The basic aim of this thesis is to propose a financial performance prediction index for decision support of the hospital management, the owners of hospitals and insurance companies. To achieve the basic goal, three sub-goals must be accomplished. The first goal is to divide the hospitals into healthy and unhealthy by using the multi-criteria methods. The second goal is, based on an expert approach with the support of statistical methods, the selection of indicators appropriate for the hospital environment and the third goal is to find a suitable method for the determination of weighted representation of individual indicators in the proposed index and to assemble the final form of the new financial index for the hospital environment.
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Tax burden of chosen type of non-profit organization
HOSTIČKOVÁ, Jitka
Nonprofit organizations are governed by the same tax rules as business organizations. There are different tax benefits and exemptions, but there are higher demands on accounting and tax records. The interpretation of tax law seems confusing and complicated, therefore it was suggested how to reduce the administrative burden of non-profit organization.
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The capacity of the European Union to form a common foreign policy: The approach towards Russia during the crisis in Ukraine
Grycová, Adéla ; Rolenc, Jan Martin (advisor) ; Cibulková, Petra (referee)
The thesis deals with the issues of framing and europeanization of the foreign policy of the European Union in the context of an actorness of the EU. These two theoretical concepts are applied on the case of an approach of the Czech Republic and European Union towards Russian Federation during the crisis in Ukraine. The aim of this thesis is to find out if the European Union is capabble of affecting the behaviour of a member state in order to create unified and operational foreign policy. The first chapter deals with teoretical definition of the two concepts and detailed description of the stances of Czech Republic and European Union follows in the second one. On the basis of these chapters the assessment is conducted. The last part firstly concludes if any attempt of influecing is present and secondly the success rate of the attempt is evaluated.
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Application of Monte Carlo simulations in banking
Boruta, Matěj ; Teplý, Petr (advisor) ; Fučík, Vojtěch (referee)
Currently, banking is exposed to huge market risks. One of those risks is occurrence of negative interest rates in the EU. Nowadays, it is important to use sophisticated and modern measurement tools and approaches to measure and manage banking risks. One of those methods is Monte Carlo simulation. This bachelor thesis is aimed at analysis and prediction of 3-month maturity Prague Interest Offer Rate (PRIBOR) for 3, 6 and 12 months with using Monte Carlo simulations. It was found that this method is suitable for prediction market variables with low volatility. If anybody uses this method, it is necessity to have in mind all pitfalls and assumptions, that this method includes, as an adequate random generated number of scenarios, approximation of correct probability distribution, independence of dataset and not least, as far as possible, to focus on factors generating randomness of market variable and not the prices, that express rather consequences of randomness than its cause. Further, the Monte Carlo prediction was compared with prognosis of the Czech Nation Bank and it was found that Monte Carlo prediction is more accurate for short term predictions. 12-month prediction of Monte Carlo simulation discovered also possible occurrence of negative interest rate at 0,05% level of probability in compare to the Czech National Bank prognosis, where was no negative interest rate predicted.
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Optimalization of material flow in automotive industry
Kolář, Tomáš ; Jirsák, Petr (advisor) ; Vinš, Marek (referee)
This master thesis is focussed on optimalization of material flow in an automotive company. First part introduce theoretical background. Automotive industry and its actual trends on global markets. Follows short introduction of the company where project of this thesis was executed. Main theoretical part describes concept of lean management, its tools in practical examples, but it is also focussed on philosophical approach to the work and mindset of the company. Follows the aplication part based on theoretical background. The whole project of this master thesis is focussed on specific area called PC store. At first this area is showed in context of overall material flow. Shortly there are introduced processes and areas where full material packaging flows. Follows deeper analysis and optimalization of PC store itself. There are three approaches of stock and lead time reduction applied. Last part shows the comparison of initial and future state including performed changes.
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Developing open approach to mathematics in future primary school teachers
Samková, L. ; Tichá, Marie
In our contribution we focus on the possibility to develop open approach to mathematics in future primary school teachers during a university course on mathematics conducted in inquiry-based manner. We analyse data obtained in the beginning and in the end of the course with respect to two main aspects related to open approach to mathematics: searching for all solutions of a task, and acceptance of different forms of notation of a given solution. Data analysis revealed in the participants three different shifts towards open approach to mathematics, and showed that after the active participation in the course each of the participants improved at least in one of the monitored aspects, and that none of the participants got worse in any of the aspects.
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A Comparison of Preconditioning Methods for Saddle Point Problems with an Application to Porous Media Flow Problems
Axelsson, Owe ; Blaheta, Radim ; Hasal, Martin
The paper overviews and compares some block preconditioners for the solution of saddle point systems, especially systems arising from the Brinkman model of porous media flow. The considered preconditioners involve different Schur complements as inverse free Schur complement in HSS (Hermitian - Skew Hermitian Splitting preconditioner), Schur complement to the velocity matrix and finally Schur complement to a regularization block in the augmented matrix preconditioner. The inverses appearing in most of the considered Schur complements are approximated by simple sparse approximation techniques as element-by-element and Frobenius norm minimization approaches. A special interest is devoted to problems involving various Darcy, Stokes and Brinkman flow regions, the efficiency of preconditioners in this case is demonstrated by some numerical experiments.
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