This study investigates the performance of 50 global, one star (based on Morningstar rankings), ETFs during the US QE-tapering period starting in October 2014 up to September 2018, using the S&P500 as the market index. The methodology employed is based on the CAPM model. We adopt the Jensen’s Alpha, Beta, a / b, Sharpe and Treynor ratios measures in order to examine whether those ETFs have achieved abnormal returns. We conclude that managers of most ETFs do not exhibit selectivity skills and only six of these ETFs achieve higher returns than the market by showing bullish behavior. At the same time, most ETFs have positive Sharpe and Treynor ratios due to high expected returns during the period under scrutiny.

Landslides can provoke lifeline’s performance malfunction, injuries or fatalities and may diminish accessibility to critical facilities and surrounding properties. The scope of this research is to describe and to identify the triggering factors for three landslides along the road from Drosopigi village to the top of Vitsi Mountain at Florina territory using all the available data. Several information were collected for this area, such as the annual rate of the rainfall/ snowfall, the rainfall intensity/day, the seismicity, the geomorphology, the geology, the lithology and the hydrologic conditions. Moreover, in-situ investigations of the landslides, geotechnical and laboratory tests were carried out in three geotechnical boreholes to indentify the soil formations nearby the landslides. Taking into account that the landslides are located 18km, 22km and 25km,away from the epicenters of two historical earthquakes with magnitudes Mw= 6.0 και 6.5 and also that last winter heavy rainfalls/snowfalls were observed in the area with very low temperatures (-15OC), slope’s failure may have been triggered by an earthquake, by snowfalls/rainfalls or by human activities?