Articles in this issue:

• Sporting Performances and the Volatility of Listed Football Clubs, pp. 283-297

  Ramzi Benkraiem

  Frédéric Le Roy

  Waël Louhichi

  This study investigates the effect of sporting performances on the volatility of listed football clubs. The theoretical background is based on the importance of intangible assets in the football industry and the difficulty in evaluating them. The empirical analysis is based on the family of autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity (ARCH) models and relates to a sample of football clubs listed on the Alternative Investment Market (AIM) and included in the Dow Jones STOXX Football Index. The findings show that sporting performances have a significant impact on the volatility of listed...Read more

• Did the 2005 Collective Bargaining Agreement Really Improve Team Efficiency in the NHL?, pp. 298-306

  Arne Büschemann

  Christian Deutscher

  After the lockout season in 2004, the 2005 collective bargaining agreement (CBA) introduced salary regulations, as well as revenue sharing, to the teams of the National Hockey League (NHL) with the aim to restore financial competitiveness. Given these objectives, the question arises if efficiencies improved under the new CBA. Using team values as the dependent variable, we performed a stochastic frontier analysis. Our paper suggests that efficiencies immediately improved after the agreement, in particular for low performing teams.Read more

• An Analysis of the Last Hour of Betting in the NFL, pp. 307-316

  Rodney J. Paul

  Andrew P. Weinbach

  The last hour of betting for the wagering market in the National Football League (NFL) was examined. In a sample of offshore sportsbooks, nearly a quarter of all bets on NFL games occured in the last hour before kickoff. Bets were shown not to be balanced between each side of the betting proposition. When the betting percentage on the favorite increases in the last hour of betting, there is a simple strategy that has shown to earn statistically significant profits: betting against the public by wagering on the underdog. Unlike horse racing, in which informed bettors are assumed to wager...Read more

• Match Rigging and the Favorite Long-Shot Bias in the Italian Football Betting Market, pp. 317-334

  Marco Rossi

  In this empirical study, I compared the results of matches played in the Italian football league Serie A with the odds offered by bookmakers. I found that the market odds were good predictors of the actual game results, but I also found that the distribution of returns for odds’ subgroups displayed the so-called favorite long shot (F/L) bias. Given the evidence of match-rigging in Italian football, I investigated if this bias was caused by a strategic behavior of bookmakers who were expecting to deal with insiders. My results support that match-rigging was associated with a larger F/L bias...Read more

• An Analysis of the Olympic Sponsorship Effect on Consumer Brand Choice in the Carbonated Soft Drink Market Using Household Scanner Data, pp. 335-353

  Sungho Cho

  Minyong Lee

  Taeyeon Yoon

  Charles Rhodes

  Diverse notions on the effectiveness of sport sponsorship have been discussed to some degree in literature on consumer psychology and shareholder wealth. However, there is little investigation on a micro-level that provides empirical evidence for financial returns resulting from sponsorship. In fact, few studies have explored issues related to the evaluation of sponsorship return on investment (ROI), particularly regarding the scope of measurement. This study investigates the effects of a major Olympic sponsorship on consumers’ actual soft drink choices. It analyzes Nielsen Homescan...Read more