Title: Separating successful and unsuccessful firms using multiple attribute decision-making methods

Authors: Masumeh Danesh Shakib; Safar Fazli

Addresses: Department of Industrial Management, Imam Khomeini International University (IKIU), Noruzian Street, Qazvin, 34149-16818, Iran. ' Department of Industrial Management, Imam Khomeini International University (IKIU), Noruzian Street, Qazvin, 34149-16818, Iran

Abstract: Due to less efficiency in Tehran Stock Market, the common methods employed for ranking firms are not reliable enough. In this paper, combined decision-making models are presented which can evaluate the companies' financial performance by means of financial ratios. One of the considered approaches is based on 'analytical hierarchy process (AHP)' and 'technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS)' and the other one, which is proposed similarly in this paper, is based on 'fuzzy analytical hierarchy process (FAHP)' and 'TOPSIS'. Comparisons of these methods would specify the similarities or differences between them and also examine the superiority of FAHP over AHP which is widely accepted as the result of using fuzzy numbers. These methods were applied for ranking and evaluating financial performances of cement firms in Tehran Stock Exchange using their financial tables from 2002 to 2008. Eventually through statistical tests, the results obtained from these methods and their powers were compared.

Keywords: firms ranking; financial ratio; multiple attribute decision making; MADM; analytical hierarchy process; fuzzy AHP; FAHP; technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution; TOPSIS; financial performance; cement firms; Tehran Stock Exchange; Iran; successful firms; unsuccessful firms.

DOI: 10.1504/IJIDS.2012.045126

International Journal of Information and Decision Sciences, 2012 Vol.4 No.1, pp.19 - 47

Published online: 09 Aug 2014 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article