Just like the mar ket which has its bulls and its bears, in vest ments has its fun da men tal ists crowd and its tech ni cians crowd. The aca demic fi nance pro fes sion must wake up and re alize that in vest ing is no longer driven solely by fun da men tal and sta tis ti cal analy sis. While as a pro fes sion we be lieve in and teach the fun da men tal in vest ment sub jects such as CAPM or EMH, we also re al ize the need to ex am ine ways to ex plain the 80% of the variabil ity of stock re turns not ex plained by the fun da men tals. In ad di tion to the fun da men tal in vest ment sub jects an in creased ex po sure to both be hav ioral fi nance and the psy chol ogy of fi nan cial mar kets is ab so lutely nec es sary to in crease the un der stand ing of how and why stocks move. Just as the bulls need the bears, fun da men tal ists need tech ni cians. be hav ioral fi nance, crowd psy chol ogy, and the psy chol ogy of fi nan cial mar kets are the un der pinnings of tech ni cal analy sis. West ern tech ni cal analy sis pre dates CAPM and EMH by decades, if not more, trac ing its roots back to Char les Dow founder of Dow Jones.

The concepts of automated e-procurement, or electronic B2B (business-to-business) trade, are grounded in the strategic leveraging of both tangible/intangible assets for successful implementation and execution of electronic trade, resulting in significant financial benefits for firms. Some of the major reasons for this growth include significant process savings from automation, compliance, and purchasing advantage; and reduced costs that organisations can experience by conducting transactions electronically. Although these are the basic benefits associated with generic e-commerce strategies, a majority of these B2B transactions have focused on the purchase of indirect materials (especially office products and travel services). In fact, more than 93% of medical supplies on hospital shelves appear to have universal product numbers on them--at least while still in their boxes and there is a great potential for huge savings in e-procurement in the healthcare field. However, other types of supply chain-related purchases, including maintenance, repair, and operating and replacement parts, and direct material purchases, are becoming more important operational management considerations. In addition, several other key considerations are: existing procurement strategy, the vendor, technology, suppliers, and total costs of ownership. Companies need to analyse their current procurement strategy before developing an e-procurement plan.

In many hospitality and tourism programs, students are usually required to take only the most basic finance course. This can leave them drastically underprepared for real-world situations. Hospitality and tourism is the world's single largest industry and probably one of the industries most affected by foreign exchange movements. This exposure to foreign exchange movements is magnified by the discretionary nature of hospitality and tourism spending, making the profitability of hospitality providers very sensitive to changes in the exchange rate. This paper explores the effect, if any, of a change in the dollar value of five currencies-UK pound, euro, Canadian dollar, Japanese yen, and Mexican pesoon the hotel occupancy in seven major U.S. tourist destinations-Orlando, Los

Time management and the need for management to relinquish control to the technical team members are important complements of the project management process. However, how do firmstrackthe time spentbytheir project team members on the different tasks and assignments? In addition, how do these project characteristics associated with innovative product development impact the firm's financial success factors in the manufacturing process? An empirically based study of project managers of NOVA Chemicals, located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA, was executed to determine which selected project characteristics positively impacted the firm's ability to enhance its financial success of its various manufacturing projects. Exploratory research via principal components and factor analyses resulted in four major independent factor score constructs of time management, cross-functional teams, management relinquishing authority, and co-location of project team members, with the varimax rotation method and eigenvalue greater than one criterion. The factor scores were used to test the hypothesis that proper management of these constructs would result in greater financial success of the manufacturing projects. The overall relationship was found to be statistically significant at the 0.05 levels of a one-tailed test (F = 3.508, p = 0.029). More importantly, the factor scores of time management and cross-functional teams, few manufacturing problems were found as the most important constructs to positively impact financial success of innovative product development projects.

In the former planned economies, a major result of the economic reform programs has been the resurgence of private sector. As recent research has been unable to explain what leads to substantive growth performance in family businesses in Central and Eastern Europe, this study seeks to increase our understanding of the growth process in small businesses in the region. The paper attempts to identify the types of problems and impediments Polish small family businesses confront. The paper investigates the association of various problems with a firm's stage of growth and development using a sample of one hundred family businesses that operate in the southern region of Poland. [Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-HAWORTH.