Holding Operators in the Nigerian Petroleum Industry to a Higher Environmental Standard

The oil industry drives the Nigerian economy as oil can be credited for most of Nigeria's foreign earnings. The exploration and production activities by operators in the Nigerian oil industry have for numerous decades resulted massive pollution of land, water and air within the jurisdiction of Nigeria and consequently there have been bitter complaints about the degradation of the environment. Though there are scores of legislations, regulations and policies governing the oil industry, it is clear that the multinational oil companies operating in Nigeria do not conduct their operations on the high levels they do in developed countries. However, the problem does not basically lie with the issue of ‘sub-standard’ legislations, but with the fact that the legislations in place are not routinely and uniformly enforced by the regulatory authorities and are often not complied with by the oil companies. This paper examines the twin problems of enforcement and compliance and tries to find a path out of the regulatory quagmire in Nigeria.

1909–1913

Chapter Three charts Vitagraph's ascendency in becoming the world's leader in motion picture production, during which time the company earned one million dollars in annual net profit. This was derived exclusively from foreign earnings due to the mismanagement of the Patents Company's domestic distribution arm. Part of Vitagraph's popularity is attributed to the crediting and promotion of its actors via the creation of the first trade and fan magazines devoted exclusively to the movies. There are in-depth profiles of such leading players "Vitagraph Girl" Florence Turner, matinee idol Maurice Costello, and comedian John Bunny, who was widely regarded as the most recognizable man in the world. The significance of Vitagraph's Los Angeles studio in the production of popular Westerns is considered. The chapter also includes an analysis of the company's development of a sophisticated cinematography aesthetic to complement particular narratives, an approach that later came to be labeled "film noir".

The State Expropriation Risk and the Pricing of Foreign Earnings

We examine the pricing of U.S. multinational firms’ foreign earnings in regard to their risk of expropriation and unfair treatment by the governments of the countries in which their international subsidiaries are located. Using 8,891 firm-years observations during the 2001-2013 period, we find that the value relevance of foreign earnings increases with the improvement of the protection from state expropriation risk in the subsidiary host-countries. Our results are not driven by the earnings management practice, investor distraction, country informativeness, and political and trade relationship of a foreign country with the US. Furthermore, our results are robust to the confounding effects of country factors, measurement error in the variable of the risk of expropriation, influence of private contracting institutions, and endogeneity in the decision of location of subsidiaries.

The impact of migration on the competitiveness of the region and industry development

The impact of migration on Ukraine is multifaceted. It increases the threat of depopulation, leads to losing a part of the labour and intellectual potential, and thus, may become a factor inhibiting economic development. Today, there is a shortage of workers in almost all activities, especially in industry and construction. At the same time, according to scientists, in the absence of migration, unemployment in Ukraine would be 36.7% higher. Due to foreign earnings, the quality of life in migrant households is improving. Increasing consumer demand can contribute to the economic development of both individual regions and the country as a whole. This article aims to analyse the impact of migration processes on the regional competitiveness. Social, economic, and demographic factors should be taken into account when forming a comprehensive indicator of regional competitiveness. There is a need to evaluate the weight of individual factors and the mechanism of their impact on a comprehensive indicator of the regional competitiveness. Considering the findings of previous studies, the important role of industrial enterprises in assessing the level of regions' competitiveness is emphasized; it is necessary to study in more detail the relationship of migration processes and industrial potential of the region/country.

Challenges of poultry production in Nigeria: A review

This study provides a review on the challenges facing poultry production in Nigeria and the possible solution. The study considered the socio-economic roles of poultry to include; means of livelihood and a way of achieving a certain level of economic independence, meeting human needs for dietary animal protein supply, source of foreign earnings and opportunities for saving, investment and security against risks for small-scale poultry farmers. This paper reviewed the challenges of poultry production in Nigeria and how the rate of production in the industry has slowed down. These challenges included; high rate of disease and pest attack, lack of loan and credit procurement, lack of technical knowledge, high rate of mortality, high cost of poultry feed, supply of poor quality chicks, inadequate poultry extension services, and inadequate access to and high cost of veterinary services, as reported by Possible solutions to these challenges are not farfetched, which included; intervention of veterinary in order to cub losses due to diseases, technical know-how for improving production should be made available to poultry keepers through extension service, poultry farmers should be encouraged to form cooperative societies or join existing one to be able to access loan for their business and addressing these challenges will prove vital to increase production, increase animal protein availability and consumption, and reduce the rate of food insecurity.

Foreign Direct Investment in Japan: Growth, Trends, and Policy Efforts

For decades, Japanese outward foreign direct investment has exceeded the flow of foreign capital into the country. Policies and regulations restricted inward investment, while the foreign earnings of Japanese companies were recycled into investment abroad. Today, official policy has reversed to try to encourage greater inflows, but Japan does not attract much FDI. Following an overview of the trends of Japanese FDI, this chapter surveys the considerable official efforts to protect the interests of Japanese multinational firms abroad, particularly in the form of investment chapters in trade agreements and free-standing international investment agreements. It then analyzes recent attempts at reducing barriers to inward investment in Japan under Abenomics. Much suggests that these efforts do not spur on significant inflows. The conundrum of the Japanese government may be that the policy regime cannot by itself counter the diminishing economic attractiveness of Japan for foreign firms.

Feeling GILTI: Tax Strategies for U.S. Multinational Corporations to Navigate the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act made significant changes to the U.S. taxation of foreign earnings. The most significant change is the 100 percent dividends-received deduction that generally applies to income earned by foreign subsidiaries. This represents a shift from U.S. tax deferral to U.S. tax exemption of foreign profits, which increases the potential benefit to shifting U.S. income to low-tax foreign jurisdictions. To limit this potential income shifting, Congress enacted new rules, known as GILTI, to supplement the already existing Subpart F rules. In this article, we briefly review the history of U.S. international tax policy and analyze the technical aspects of GILTI. We then discuss some general tax planning strategies and propose four specific tax strategies for companies to consider for minimizing the increased tax burden associated with GILTI. Lastly, we consider whether GILTI is good tax policy and make recommendations to improve the legislation.

Repatriation Taxes, Internal Agency Conflicts, and Subsidiary-level Investment Efficiency

Using a global sample of multinational corporations (MNCs) and their foreign subsidiaries, we find that repatriation taxes impair subsidiary-level investment efficiency. Consistent with internal agency conflicts between the central management of the MNC and the manager of the foreign subsidiary being the driver, we show that this effect is concentrated in subsidiaries with high information asymmetry and in subsidiaries that are weakly monitored. Quasi-natural experiments in the UK and Japan establish a causal relationship for our findings and suggest that a repeal of repatriation taxes increases subsidiary-level investment efficiency while reducing the level of investment. Our paper provides timely empirical evidence to inform expectations for the effects of a recent change to the U.S. international tax law that eliminated repatriation taxes from most of the future foreign earnings of U.S. MNCs.