Underwriter Discourse, IPO Profit Distribution, and Audit Quality: An Entropy Study from the Perspective of an Underwriter-Auditor Network.

Underwriters play a pivotal role in the IPO process. Information entropy, a tool for measuring the uncertainty and complexity of information, has been widely applied to various issues in complex networks. Information entropy can quantify the uncertainty and complexity of nodes in the network, providing a unique analytical perspective and methodological support for this study. This paper employs a bipartite network analysis method to construct the relationship network between underwriters and accounting firms, using the centrality of underwriters in the network as a measure of their influence to explore the impact of underwriters' influence on the distribution of interests and audit outcomes. The findings indicate that a more pronounced influence of underwriters significantly increases the ratio of underwriting fees to audit fees. Higher influence often accompanies an increase in abnormal underwriting fees. Further research reveals that companies underwritten by more influential underwriters experience a decline in audit quality. Finally, the study reveals that a well-structured audit committee governance and the rationalization of market sentiments can mitigate the negative impacts of underwriters' influence. The innovation of this paper is that it enriches the content related to underwriters by constructing the relationship network between underwriters and accounting firms for the first time using a bipartite network through the lens of information entropy. This conclusion provides new directions for thinking about the motives and possibilities behind financial institutions' cooperation, offering insights for market regulation and policy formulation.

Taking Advantage of Waste Heat Resource from Vinasses for Anaerobic Co-digestion of Waste Activated Sludge under the Thermophilic Condition: Energy Balance and Kinetic Analysis.

Vinasses are not only an easily biodegradable substrate but also a heat energy resource. In this study, the energy balance and kinetic model of anaerobic co-digestion of waste activated sludge (WAS) with vinasses have been investigated in semicontinuous reactor experiments at 55 °C. Herein, the maximum energy balance value, the ratio of energy to mass, and the kinetic constants µmax and K of anaerobic digestion of WAS were -33.44 kJ·day-1, -5.72 kJ·VS-1·day-1, and 0.0894 day-1 and 0.7294, respectively, at an organic loading rate (OLR) of 1.17 VS·L-3·day-1; when the mixture ratio of WAS to vinasses was 2:1 (dry VS) for co-digestion, the maximum energy balance value, the maximum ratio of energy to mass, and the kinetic constants µmax and K of anaerobic co-digestion of WAS and vinasses were +39.73 kJ·day-1, 8.1 kJ·VS-1·day-1, and 0.2619 day-1 and 1.9583, respectively, at an OLR of 1.73 VS·L-3·day-1. The positive energy balance was obtained for two reasons: one is for making the best use of the high-temperature heat energy resource of vinasses and the other is for enhancing the amount of biogas yield. The bottleneck of the negative energy balance of thermophilic digestion of WAS can be broken by anaerobic co-digestion of WAS and vinasses. The results indicate a promising future in the application of anaerobic thermophilic co-digestion of WAS and vinasses. Methane production from digestion and co-digestion was also predicted by the Chen-Hashimoto kinetic model.