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The disposition effect is the tendency of investors to sell stocks early when the price increases and hold stocks longer when this price decreases. As a consequence, investors may lose opportunities to gain greater profits from a stock winner whose price continues to rise; in contrast, they can suffer greater loss when the stocks continue to decline. The disposition effect is a phenomenon widely studied in behavioral finance. There are two main competing theories attempting to explain this phenomenon: the prospect theory and the regret theory. Although both theories give a fairly comprehensive explanation, they fail to take into account the motivation of investors in making investment decisions. This paper seeks to make a critical review of both of the main theories as well as provide a new explanation related to the motivation of investors from the perspective of the regulatory-focus theory. Regulatory-focus theory explains that individuals can be categorized into two groups, i.e. the prevention group and the promotion group. Regulatory-focus theory adds a more specific explanation that the disposition effect is more likely to occur in the prevention rather than the promotion group. The explanation of the disposition effect based on regulatory-focus -is a novelty in this paper.

It is important for every country that its territory develops evenly and in a balanced way. In the European Union (EU), a special focus is placed on the development of rural territories, as predominantly rural regions in the EU represent 57% of the territory and 24% of the population. In Latvia, the development of rural territories depends on economic growth in the key industries for the rural areas-agriculture and forestry, and logging that contributed to 4.3% of GDP and employed 9.5% of the labour force in 2011. Therefore, the research aim is to perform an assessment of the administrative territories of Latvia. The research analysed the municipalities of Latvia in terms of population and change in the population as well as in terms of revenue and income and change in the revenue and income. The research found that in Latvia the best economic performance was demonstrated by the municipalities with a population in the range of 8-12 thousand. In the period 2004-2014, the number of residents decreased by more than 20% in 49 municipalities of Latvia. Such municipalities are located far away from the capital city, and poor economic performance indicators with a prevailing primary sector were typical of the municipalities. The municipalities with higher tax revenue had larger populations, which increased in the period of analysis, and such municipalities are located in the vicinity of Riga and high economic performance indicators were characteristic of them.

Smart specialisation strategy (RIS3) is topical for each European Union member state -including the Baltic States. It is a smart tool for the European Union (EU) Structural Funds absorption from 2014 to 2020. Each EU member state has set their own priorities based on the country specialisation and economy strengths and weaknesses. For RIS3 development evaluation, there is RIS3 Assessment Wheel developed -a tool for assessing the RIS3 in a chosen region and positioning it between other regions. The aim of research is to find main differences between RIS3 development in the Baltic states. The tasks of research are 1) to compare existing RIS3 Assessment Wheel of Latvia and create authors version of RIS3 Assessment Wheel of Latvia; 2) to create RIS3 Assessment Wheel of Lithuania and Estonia; 3) to make comparisons between created RIS3 Assessment Wheels. The research performed is mainly based on the desk research by using content analysis and the monographic method. In all three Baltic States, there is a lack of information available about revision of priorities in connection with RIS3 development. In order to achieve the aims set in RIS3, it is essential to finish work on RIS3 legislation in Latvia, and introduce the systematic approach to RIS3 target evaluation in all Baltic States.

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