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Development of interest rates in the mortgage market in the Czech Republic between 2006-2016
Ditrichová, Gabriela ; Strejček, Ivo (advisor) ; Klement, Josef (referee)
This bachelor's thesis is focused on the development of interest rates in the mortgage market in the Czech Republic in the decade between 2006 and 2016. A strong economic growth between 2006 and 2007, which had positive effects in the mortgage loan market, was followed by a deep slump in the form of global financial crisis unleashed by speculations in the real estate market in the U.S. The main aim of the work is based on the development of mortgage interest rates and the significant factors that affect their amount - to verify or disprove the hypothesis that interest rates respond to changes of these factors. The results confirm the hypothesis only in certain areas. The influence of changes of interest rates has been proven in the case of inflation and discount rates by usage of the econometric model. Factors that have not shown a significant direct influence of interest rates may have an indirect influence on their change.
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Marketing communication of commercial insurance companies on social media
Havránek, Jiří ; Gála, Libor (advisor) ; Molnár, Zdeněk (referee)
The diploma thesis deals with marketing communication of commercial insurance companies on social media. The aim of the thesis is to analyze the current state of the communication activities of commercial insurance companies on selected social media. Based on the identified state and detected interest in these communication activities by customers, recommendations are suggested for improvement of communication online commercial insurance companies to support the sales of insurance products. The first section defines the areas of insurance, marketing communication and social media. After that there is identification of activities that companies can perform on social media to increase brand awareness. These activities can be monitored, evaluated and after that optimized. In the second section there is identified the current state of commercial insurance activities on social media and detected interest in these activities from customers by using qualitative research. Based on these findings, draft recommendations are formulated on possible improvements to the current situation. The benefit of this thesis is the identification of the current state of commercial insurance activities on social media.
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The American Foreign Policy with the Middle East : from the earliest days to the Obama’s mandate
Petraud, Jean-Félix ; Eichler, Jan (advisor) ; Dubský, Zbyněk (referee)
The following dissertation is an attempt of analysis and understanding of the foreign policy of the United States in the Middle East region and its evolution through time. Considering the fact that the Middle East region is or at least used to be a vital region for the United States national interests, the dissertation presents an exhaustive list of major events that have been major shifts in the US foreign policy in the region. The more or less chronological timeline allows the reader to have a better understanding of the evolution of the US foreign policy. The result of the dissertation is the identification of different patterns of foreign policy and to put the spot on the reasons of the changes of these patterns. Nevertheless, the history of the Middle East region and the incredible number of major events through the 2Oth century and the early 21st century make impossible to deal with all of them. Moreover, analysis and comments are based on academic research, but the dissertation remains subjective and may lead to discussions and debates.
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Use of Interest Rate Models for Interest Rate Risk Management in the Czech Financial Market Environment
Cíchová Králová, Dana ; Arlt, Josef (advisor) ; Cipra, Tomáš (referee) ; Witzany, Jiří (referee)
The main goal of this thesis is to suggest an appropriate approach to interest rate risk modeling in the Czech financial market environment in various situations. Three distinct periods are analyzed. These periods, which are the period before the global financial crisis, period during the financial crisis and in the aftermath of the global financial crisis and calming subsequent debt crisis in the eurozone, are characterized by different evaluation of liquidity and credit risk, different relationship between financial variables and market participants and different degree of market regulations. Within this goal, an application of the BGM model in the Czech financial market environment is crucial. Use of the BGM model for the purpose of predicting a dynamics of a yield curve is not very common. This is firstly due to the fact that primary use of this model is a valuation of interest rate derivatives while ensuring the absence of arbitrage and secondly its application is relatively difficult. Nevertheless, I apply the BGM model to obtain predictions of the probability distributions of interest rates in the Czech and eurozone market environment, because its complexity, direct modeling of a yield curve based on market rates and especially a possibility of parameter estimation based on current swaptions volatilities quotations may lead to a significant improvement of predictions. This improvement was also confirmed in this thesis. Use of swaptions volatilities market quotations is especially useful in the period of unprecedented mone- tary easing and increased number of central banks and other regulators interventions into financial markets that occur after the financial crisis, because it reflects current market expectations which also include future interventions. As a consequence of underdevelopment of the Czech financial market there are no market quotations of Czech koruna denominated swaptions volatilities. I suggest their approximations based on quotations of euro denominated swaptions volatilities and also using volatilities of koruna and euro forward rates. Use of this approach ensures that predictions of the Czech yield curve dynamics contain current market expectations. To my knowledge, any other author has not presented similar application of the BGM model in the Czech financial market environment. In this thesis I further predict a Czech and Euro area money market yield curve dynamics using the CIR and the GP models as representatives of various types of interest rates models to compare these predictions with BGM predictions. I suggest a comprehensive system of three criteria, based on comparison of predicti- ons with reality, to describe a predictive power of selected models and an appropria- teness of their use in the Czech market environment during different situations in the market. This analysis shows that predictions of the Czech money market yield curve dynamics based on the BGM model demonstrate high predictive power and the best 8 quality in comparison with other models. GP model also produces relatively good qua- lity predictions. Conversely, predictions based on the CIR model as a representative of short rate model family completely failed when describing reality. In a situation when the economy allows negative rates and there is simultaneously a significant likelihood of their implementation, I recommend to obtain predictions of Czech money market yield curve dynamics using GP model which allows existence of negative interest rates. This analysis also contains a statistical test for validating the predictive power of each model and information on other tests. Berkowitz test rejects a hypothesis of accurate predictions for each model. However, this fact is common in real data testing even when using relatively good model. This fact is especially caused by difficult fulfilment of test conditions in real world. To my knowledge, such an analysis of the predictive power of selected interest rate models moreover in the Czech financial market environment has not been published yet. The last goal of this thesis is to suggest an appropriate approach to obtaining pre- dictions of Czech government bonds risk premium dynamics. I define this risk premium as a difference between government bond yields and fixed rate of CZK IRS with the same length. I apply the GP model to describe the dynamics of this indicator of the Czech Republic credit risk. In order to obtain a time series of the risk premium which are necessary for estimation of GP model parameters I firstly estimate yield curves of Czech government bonds using Svensson model for each trading day since 2005. Resulting si- mulations of risk premium show that the GP model predicts the real development of risk premiums of all maturities relatively well. Hence, the proposed approach is suitable for modeling of Czech Republic credit risk based on the use of information extracted from financial markets. I have not registered proposed approach to risk premium modeling moreover in the Czech financial market environment in other publications.
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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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Managerial skills
Červinková, Barbora ; Kříž, Josef (advisor) ; Zdeněk, Zdeněk (referee)
The theoretical basis of this thesis explains the terms closely associated with the management and managerial skills. Introductory part relates to approach the concept itself and the executive management, we are further broken down managerial functions, which are continuously illuminates to describe other skills, such as communication, goal setting, skills and coaching. The main point is to approach the concepts of soft and hard skills that managers should possess, or which should in the course of his practice to learn. Only by careful control of both of these groups of skills can lead to good organization. For a clearer explanation of the managerial skills included graphic view, which approximates the distribution of skills. In the second part, a practical part, described the situation with the existing skills of managers in the selected company. Thanks to the questionnaire, it is possible to measure the current level of acquired skills of managers at three levels and can be evaluated, what is the interest of improving individual skills, or whether managers feel sufficiently qualified for their job positions.
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Design and implementation of e-learning in the area of interest
Marešová, Nikola ; Husa, Jiří (advisor) ; Marek, Marek (referee)
The bachelor's thesis entitled "Design and implementation of e-learning in the area of interest" deals with buying used cars. The essential part of this work is a creation of e-learning course for buyers and other people interested in this area which aims to improve their knowledge. The participants will get an overview of the most common situations and problems they can meet when buying a used car. The theoretical part presents an overview of the topics of the issue of purchase of used cars. It may serve as a theoretical guidance to the e-course, it brings its content. The topics are based on the analysis of information from printed and electronic sources, supplemented by experiences of the author and experts in the field. The practical part deals with the creation of an e-learning course. It contains an analysis of the needs of buyers, the reasons for the creation of the course and the requirements of it, its objectives, a description of the used authoring tool eXe and graphic creation process from the creation of the course after its publication in steps. All this is complemented by the feedback from six volunteers who have expressed an interest in testing the course and then doing a review. Before the creation of the course it was necessary to analyze the situation and find out why such a course is needed. The acquired knowledge was then processed in the course by the synthesis method. For the evaluation method it was used a short personal interview where the author examined satisfaction with the course, its possible shortcomings and suggestions for improvements or enhancements.
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Acceleration Methods for Evolutionary Design of Digital Circuits
Vašíček, Zdeněk ; Miller, Julian (referee) ; Zelinka,, Ivan (referee) ; Sekanina, Lukáš (advisor)
Ačkoliv můžeme v literatuře nalézt řadu příkladů prezentujících evoluční návrh jakožto zajímavou a slibnou alternativu k tradičním návrhovým technikám používaným v oblasti číslicových obvodů, praktické nasazení je často problematické zejména v důsledku tzv. problému škálovatelnosti, který se projevuje např. tak, že evoluční algoritmus je schopen poskytovat uspokojivé výsledky pouze pro malé instance řešeného problému. Vážný problém představuje tzv. problém škálovatelnosti evaluace fitness funkce, který je markantní zejména v oblasti syntézy kombinačních obvodů, kde doba potřebná pro ohodnocení kandidátního řešení typicky roste exponenciálně se zvyšujícím se počtem primárních vstupů. Tato disertační práce se zabývá návrhem několika metod umožňujících redukovat problem škálovatelnosti evaluace v oblasti evolučního návrhu a optimalizace číslicových systémů. Cílem je pomocí několika případových studií ukázat, že s využitím vhodných akceleračních technik jsou evoluční techniky schopny automaticky navrhovat inovativní/kompetitivní řešení praktických problémů. Aby bylo možné redukovat problém škálovatelnosti v oblasti evolučního návrhu číslicových filtrů, byl navržen doménově specifický akcelerátor na bázi FPGA. Tato problematika reprezentuje případ, kdy je nutné ohodnotit velké množství trénovacích dat a současně provést mnoho generací. Pomocí navrženého akcelerátoru se podařilo objevit efektivní implementace různých nelineárních obrazových filtrů. S využitím evolučně navržených filtrů byl vytvořen robustní nelineární filtr implusního šumu, který je chráněn užitným vzorem. Navržený filtr vykazuje v porovnání s konvenčními řešeními vysokou kvalitu filtrace a nízkou implementační cenu. Spojením evolučního návrhu a technik známých z oblasti formální verifikace se podařilo vytvořit systém umožňující výrazně redukovat problém škálovatelnosti evoluční syntézy kombinačních obvodů na úrovni hradel. Navržená metoda dovoluje produkovat komplexní a přesto kvalitní řešení, která jsou schopna konkurovat komerčním nástrojům pro logickou syntézu. Navržený algoritmus byl experimentálně ověřen na sadě několika benchmarkových obvodů včetně tzv. obtížně syntetizovatelných obvodů, kde dosahoval v průměru o 25% lepších výsledků než dostupné akademické i komerční nástroje. Poslední doménou, kterou se práce zabývá, je akcelerace evolučního návrhu lineárních systémů. Na příkladu evolučního návrhu násobiček s vícenásobnými konstantními koeficienty bylo ukázáno, že čas potřebný k evaluaci kandidátního řešení lze výrazně redukovat (defacto na ohodocení jediného testovacího vektoru), je-li brán v potaz charakter řešeného problému (v tomto případě linearita).
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