The Asset-Attitude Approach for Competitive Advantage and Value-Added Models

In the spirit of discussion of theoretical alternatives, we present the Asset-Attitude Approach that aims to bring new concepts to the study of competitive advantage. Although assets, as related to resources and capabilities, do not represent a new concept, the AAA introduces the importance of the individual's behavior in the firm performance. In this sense, a possible investigation could be explored to build a bridge between strategy and finance, since behavioral finance is challenging paradigms of the modern theory of finance. Particularly, two innovations can be emphasized in the Asset-Attitude Approach: (i) the analysis of the origin of assets from the transformation of other, more elemental, assets, through a chemical analogy, in which new substances originate from transformations or reactions of other substances and (ii) the suggestion of existence of an equivalence relationship between assets and attitudes, similar to the existence of a conversion equation between mass and energy, as proposed in Physics. Although the approach raises more questions than answers, one important aspect is the discussion of the relevance of opportunity costs in a context of heterogeneous assets and attitudes. Since the opportunity costs serve as basis for economic rents in strategy and for abnormal returns in finance, the challenge of the relevance of this concept can have great impact in both theories