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Tax havens are often connected to growth in tourism, as finance and tourism conveniently share infrastructural prerequisites. This paper addresses the detrimental impacts of a tax haven development strategy adopted by small open economies in relation to the development of their tourism industry. Utilizing the synthetic control method, we find that since the 2016 Panama Papers scandal, Panama's tourism exports have fallen relative to an estimated counterfactual level that would have otherwise been attained. Moreover, based on an analysis of panel data drawn from 20 small open economies, we find that in the long run, the growth of the financial industry crowds out the tourism industry. Our findings warn tourism practitioners, based in tax havens, that they face an additional risk linked to potential tax scandals. Furthermore, the tourism industry may suffer reputational harm due to tax haven blacklisting and the crowding out of productive resources by the financial industry. JEL classifications: F43, H26, O57, Z32 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2007, on the cusp of the economic crisis, a paper was published in Growth and Change (June 2007) entitled "Shadow Europe: alternative European financial geographies," which began to tackle the idea of shadow finance in Europe and the size and inseparability of what was regarded as "shadow" from "normal" financial flows. A number of the observations made have proved remarkably prescient and one particular phrase stands out in the light of the recent revelations about the so‐called Panama Papers in 2016: "Strategically important flows of capital derived from complex underground production systems that have seldom been analyzed in detail move through the European financial networks that connect to offshore tax havens (Christensen, 2003). These havens are not a separate and distinct entity from the financial networks that connect world cities but rather a vital counterpart on which the functioning of the cities connected via those networks depends" (2007, p. 319). The revelation of the Panama Papers constitutes a new critical juncture from which to re‐visit that 2007 paper and to re‐examine the state of knowledge on shadow and formal financial flows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the past 40 years of reform and opening-up, the implementation of an unbalanced enhancement strategy has led to severe resource misallocation, making the mitigation and rectification of this misallocation an urgent issue. This paper utilizes urban data from China between 2006 and 2020 to examine the impact of two-way foreign direct investment (FDI) on resource misallocation, as well as the pathways through which coordinated advancement of two-way FDI affects resource misallocation. After undergoing a series of robustness and endogeneity tests, the conclusion remains stable. Mechanism testing reveals that coordinated advancement of two-way FDI improves capital resource misallocation by enhancing the enhancement level of the financial industry, while exacerbating labor misallocation by increasing labor costs. This paper integrates the coordinated advancement of two-way FDI and resource misallocation into the same analytical framework, proposing policy recommendations to alleviate China's resource misallocation issue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a systematic review of the literature, the state of the art and a future research agenda on the relationship between FinTech and the financing of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Digitalization and technological evolution have transformed access to financial resources, challenging SMEs in obtaining adequate financing. The emergence of FinTech offers new perspectives and opportunities, potentially revolutionizing how SMEs access and use financial services. Against this backdrop, 26 papers were extensively examined to analyze the relationship between the FinTech industry and its relationship with SMEs financing, possibilities, difficulties, and expectations in the current market in different parts of the world. Exploratory Research was found to be the most applied perspective to analyze the relationship between FinTech and SMEs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Against the backdrop of digitization and global warming, fintech plays a crucial role in accelerating the growth of green finance, driving innovation in the financial industry, and catalyzing the low-carbon transformation of economic activities. This paper utilizes city panel data from 2007 to 2019 to examine the direct impact of fintech on carbon emission efficiency (CEE), the transmission channels of green technological innovation and green finance, and the spatial spillover effects, using dynamic panel models, mediation effect models, and dynamic spatial Durbin models (SDM). The study finds that: (i) Fintech significantly improves CEE, and this conclusion remains robust after accounting for potential endogeneity issues and conducting robustness tests. (ii) Mechanism analysis reveals that green finance and green technological innovation are the primary channels through which fintech influences CEE. (iii) Results from the dynamic SDM model indicate that fintech has a significant positive spatial spillover effect on CEE, with the long-term spillover effect being smaller than the short-term spillover effect. (iv) Heterogeneity analysis reveals that fintech's improvement effect on CEE is mainly evident in eastern regions, emerging first-tier and first-tier cities, and non-resource-based cities. Our research provides new insights for policymakers on achieving China's dual-carbon goals through the promotion of fintech development, green finance, and green technological innovation. It also aids in the coordinated development of fintech among cities and the formulation of differentiated policies, providing a theoretical foundation and empirical support for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is rapidly transforming the healthcare, finance and transportation industries. This paper presents a field-programmable gate array (FPGA)-based neural network accelerator (NNA) design for power allocation in downlink nonorthogonal multiple access (NOMA) networks. The proposed hardware accelerator effectively cuts computational costs while delivering performance on par with the highest sum capacity. Numerical results show that this NNA offers a remarkable computational speed increase of up to 99% compared to the conventional exhaustive search method. Furthermore, the deep learning (DL) model achieved high accuracy (0.92 training, 0.93 testing), and the hardware accelerator design for this DL inference model was implemented on the PYNQ-Z2 board-constrained edge device to predict power allocation coefficients in NOMA systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The soundness and healthy functioning of financial institutions that contribute to sustainable development by channeling savings into investments has a direct impact on the economy as a whole. The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) cannot be achieved without the strong support of the financial services industry. The novelty of this study is that it investigates the SDGs with ESG indicators through a double materiality perspective for 1888 companies from the OECD financial institutions. This study shows how commercial banks can identify and prioritize the SDGs and targets and how sustainable practices at the corporate level can contribute to achieving these global goals by adopting a sound methodological approach. The empirical results indicate a significant variation between three perspectives including financial materiality, double materiality, and double materiality with fuzzy logic and some of the SASB issues and GRI issues are more material to a particular SDG than others. There are few studies that focus on developing such a multi-perspective methodology, and this study further contributes to the existing knowledge by shedding light on the SDG Impact Index of commercial banks' with double materiality perspective. In this context, this paper aims to explore the impact of material issues for the OECD financial services industry to achieve the 2030 Agenda's goal of leaving no one behind. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the rapid development of Internet of Things (IoT) technology and the digital transformation of the financial industry, the financial IoT is becoming an important trend in the future financial field. In the era of financial IoT, a large amount of data information is recorded by sensors and devices, which poses new challenges and opportunities for user credit evaluation. In this context, conventional deep learning-based user credit evaluation methods often cannot meet privacy needs. The paper combines the privacy security ability of federated learning with deep learning, and proposes a deep federated learning-based user credit evaluation model under financial IoT scenarios. First, a particle swarm optimization-based backpropagation neural network algorithm is formulated to extract user credit evaluation features, in order to obtain user behavior patterns and credit features. Then, the XGBoost algorithm is employed to output credit evaluation results. As for the training process, the thought of federated learning is integrated to distribute the model to individual participants. In such mode, the model can be updated and trained without exposing user data to the central cloud. The experiments are conducted on real-world data to assess the proposal’s performance. The results show that the proposed credit evaluation framework can achieve better accuracy, under the guarantee of user privacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper contributes to the debate about Africa's financial stability by focusing on the prevalence of systemic risk in 40 listed derivatives user-banks over 2011–2017, employing the systemic risk index (SRI), and subsequently exploring how it links to the continent's financial market development. The systemic risk buildup within the industry is mainly depicted as an unstable, diluted, and possibly depleting process. Gloomy predictions persist in the subsequent attempts to uncover plausible causes of systemic risk formation. Mainly, conventional defining factors for risk exhibit irrelevance toward systemic risk development, as threats to financial stability remain confined within the industry, supported by a lack of diversification in financial services. The investigated markets may be individually subject to internal vulnerabilities that could be exacerbated by financial shocks, feedback effects, and the likelihood of contagion and failure among financial institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we present a hybrid Agent-Based Stock-Flow-Consistent (AB-SFC) model about the macroeconomic and distributional implications of central bank's decision to leave a "Low(-for-long) Interest Rate Environment" (LIRE). Our goal is to study the non-linear effects of monetary tightening when implemented under LIRE than in an alternative "Higher Interest Rate" setting (HIRE). This way, we shed light over the interaction between monetary policy, inequality, and macro-financial fragility in a financialized economy characterized by the presence of securitization and the production of complex financial products, i.e., Asset-Backed Securities (ABSs). We obtain three main findings. First, consistent with existing empirical literature, LIRE may be sources of vulnerabilities in the financial industry (i.e., lower banks' profitability and capital adequacy ratio). However, it may reduce systemic macro-financial risk by stimulating faster growth, lower unemployment and inequality records alongside with lower public and private indebtedness and lower-scale securitization. Second, central bank's decision to raise interest rates improves financial sector's performance indicators at the costs of harsh real-side consequences, i.e., permanently higher unemployment and inequality, when implemented under LIRE. Third, financialization structurally changes the functioning of the economy by feeding the creation of a debt-led economy in which monetary policy becomes less effective in its attempt of controlling inflation. Central bank's reaction in the form of a permanently tighter monetary policy stance eventually prompts a more unequal and unstable rentier-friendly economy. • We study central bank's decision to leave a Low Interest Rate Environment (LIRE). • We show how leaving LIRE causes permanent employment losses and higher inequality. • We show how securitization reduces the effectiveness of monetary policy. • We show how securitization may give rise to a rentier-friendly economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to critically examine the corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives of multinational oil companies (MOCs) in Nigeria. Its special focus is to investigate the impact of the global memorandum of understanding (GMoU) on enhancing rural women's financial inclusion in the areas of access to credit, insurance, propensity of women to save and the widening of economic opportunities in the Niger Delta. A total of 800 rural women were sampled across the Niger Delta region of Nigeria. Results from the use of a combined propensity score matching and logit model indicate that the GMoU model has made significant impact on closing the gaps in financial services, thereby removing women's constraints on their efforts to enhance their financial literacy. The results also confirm that innovative delivery channels and social networks of the GMoUs have reduced some costs in the areas of access to credit, insurance, propensity to save and the widening of economic opportunities of rural women in the oil host communities. However, a further look at the rural women's participation in the CSR activities using SCOTDI shows that even though the involvement of the women is appreciable, it is insignificant when compared with their male counterparts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Financial inclusion (that is, access by individuals to the services provided by financial institutions such as banks, insurance, and investment firms) is a key condition for economic development, and forms one of the principal policy instruments in China for the promotion of rural-urban integration. Using data from the China Household Financial Studies (2013), this paper investigates the determinants of financial inclusion at the household level in China. Focused on the role of the Chinese household registration system (hukou), this paper proposes a new hukou typology to investigate the composite index of financial inclusion as well as the six indicators. Multilevel estimates reveal substantial differences of financial inclusion among different hukou holders; significant cross-level associations between hukou and economic development is also found, revealing the complex and non-linear relationship between hukou and financial inclusion. These findings shed light on the potential for market failures and two types of discrimination based on hukou system, which deny access to financial services to groups of people. Research implications on how to increase financial inclusion are mentioned and discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Financial services are significantly impacted by digital transformation, which has been believed as one of the primary trends reshaping society and industry. A comprehensive understanding of digital transformation from an academic and management perspective is required, and it is crucial to close the knowledge gap using bibliometric and qualitative research techniques. Hence, the purpose of this paper is to identify the extensive research themes in digital transformation in financial services from 2000 to 2021, their significance and interdependencies, to determine which trending topics seem to be the most influential, to trace the evolution of digital transformation in the financial service, and to address new and under-researched field of research that is intriguing for future research. This study used a bibliometric analysis of 288 peer-reviewed research articles published over the last 22 years in digital transformation in financial services. The data were extracted from the Scopus database and used various bibliometric analyses such as conceptual structure analysis, co-citation network analysis, social structure, and keyword analysis using R software. The findings show an overall increasing trend in journal publications, author productivity, collaborative research by institutions, and countries' collaboration from the year 2019, as well as major insights from co-citation analysis. According to Lotka's law, most authors (769, or 95.77%) contributed only one article. In addition, the study assesses multiple research areas, such as the effects of digital transformation in financial services, applied technology and insights, and digitalization processes, comprising the latest trending topics in this research stream that extensively cover up in financial services. One of the limitations of this study is that it used only a single database. The author recommends that the findings of this research be reinforced with more targeted and extensive qualitative literature in this field of study. This study establishes a framework for policymakers, academics, and researchers to investigate the areas where digital technologies influence financial services. This study also highlighted several cutting-edge digital technologies used for different functions of the financial services of an organization. This study illustrates the bibliometric structure of the digital transformation literature in financial services and provides insights into the literature's growth year over year. It provides a comprehensive understanding of this evolving field, guiding future research and facilitating informed decision-making in the financial industry. Plain language summary: Purpose: Financial services are significantly impacted by digital transformation, which has been believed as one of the primary trends reshaping society and industry. A comprehensive understanding of digital transformation from an academic and management perspective is required, and it is crucial to close the knowledge gap using bibliometric and qualitative research techniques. Hence, the purpose of this paper is to identify the extensive research themes in digital transformation in financial services from 2000 to 2021, their significance and interdependencies, to determine which trending topics seem to be the most influential, to trace the evolution of digital transformation in the financial service, and to address new and under-researched field of research that is intriguing for future research. Design/methodology/approach: This study used a bibliometric analysis of 288 peer-reviewed research articles published over the last 22 years in digital transformation in financial services. The data were extracted from the Scopus database and used various bibliometric analyses such as conceptual structure analysis, co-citation network analysis, social structure, and keyword analysis using R software. Findings: The findings show an overall increasing trend in journal publications, author productivity, collaborative research by institutions, and countries' collaboration from the year 2019, as well as major insights from co-citation analysis. According to Lotka s law, most authors (769, or 95.77 %) contributed only one article. In addition, the study assesses multiple research areas, such as the effects of digital transformation in financial services, applied technology and insights, and digitalization processes, comprising the latest trending topics in this research stream that extensively cover up in financial services. Research limitations/implications: One of the limitations of this study is that it used only a single database. The author recommends that the findings of this research be reinforced with more targeted and extensive qualitative literature in this field of study. Practical Implications: This study establishes a framework for policymakers, academics, and researchers to investigate the areas where digital technologies influence financial services. This study also highlighted several cutting-edge digital technologies used for different functions of the financial services of an organization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Financial liberalization has noticeably reduced the role of the state in effectively influencing the economy in post-developmental states. Yet many studies have found that the legacies of the developmental model continue to influence the policies, institutions, and socioeconomic challenges that are faced by the states that previously adopted the model. These studies, however, do not clearly identify when and how such legacies may be manifested in state behavior. This paper contributes to filling this gap in the literature by arguing that financial crises can serve as a trigger to more clearly reveal the structural evidence of the legacy in institutions that were previously established and utilized for developmental objectives. By conducting a rigorous case analysis using historical and market data on the crisis responses of South Korea's public pension fund, this paper finds that South Korea's developmental legacy remains passively embedded in the governance structure of the pension fund in non-crisis times but manifests during financial crises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The widespread adoption of the tawarruq contract by Islamic banks in their deposit and financing offerings has spurred the emergence of mushārakah mutanāqisah as an alternative for Islamic property financing. Affin Islamic Bank Berhad is among the Islamic banks that offer mushārakah mutanāqisah as the core Shari‘ah contract in their Islamic property financing services. This type of financing is offered to customers for completed properties and those that are under construction. In the context of Islamic property financing, mushārakah mutanāqisah refers to a structure where the customer assumes the role of the registered property owner while the bank holds ownership shares in the form of beneficial ownership. Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) has released multiple Policy Documents regarding Shari‘ah contracts as guidelines to ensure uniformity in the application of Shari‘ah contracts across Islamic financial products and services. Islamic banks are required to adhere to these guidelines, including the mushārakah mutanāqisah. Thus, this paper intends to study the application of mushārakah mutanāqisah in property financing based on Affin Islamic Bank’s experience in adopting the related Policy Documents issued by BNM. The findings from this paper would shed light and provide valuable insights into implementing the related guidelines to mushārakah mutanāqisah and its impact on the Islamic finance industry in Malaysia. Document analysis approach was used to analyse library data gathered from previous studies and relevant policy documents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In California, wildfires caused by electrical infrastructure have left the state's investor-owned power utilities with major and growing liabilities. But even in such an incendiary environment, the financial industry has demonstrated that it can profit from disaster. This paper uses the 2019-2020 bankruptcy of Pacific Gas & Electric to explain how. In it, I show how "risk" in California's electricity industry is legally constituted, mediated, and allocated. First, I explain how financial perceptions of wildfire risk in California's electricity industry are shaped by the state's legal and regulatory environment, and how the law is used to manage this risk. I then turn to PG&E's bankruptcy to show how litigation functions as a financial strategy. In court, risk is endogenous to legal-financial practice. I develop the concepts of "legal arbitrage" and "leverage" to explain how law mediates the relationship between risk and finance. I adapt the concept of legal arbitrage to show how financial assets (like those in a utility with unprecedented wildfire liabilities) can possess both legal and market value, which can and often do diverge in circumstances of distress. I use the term leverage to refer to a particular kind of legal-financial power which enables actors to transfer risk away from themselves and onto others. In working through these concepts, I argue that that mainstream perceptions of risk in the financial industry are inadequate, especially in an era of increasing climate insecurity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the effect of financial sanctions at the most disaggregated level possible, individual bank accounts. Using data from the Eurosystem's real-time gross settlement system TARGET2, we provide empirical evidence that sanctions imposed by the European Union on Russian banks following Russia's aggression against Ukraine in 2014 and 2022 have sizably reduced financial transactions with sanctioned Russian bank accounts, both along the extensive and intensive margins. Among the various sanction measures taken, exclusion from SWIFT, a global provider of secure financial messaging services, turns out to have the largest effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on an analysis of 208 articles, this paper argues that while the fraud literature varies on the diagnosis of fraud, it is rooted in a common narrative as to its nature and causes. Specifically, this paper adopts an investigative approach to understand how fraud is often researched and shapes audit policies and practices. The findings reveal that fraud is generally looked at as an individual and/or organizational phenomenon, thereby allowing the meso-level of analysis to escape scrutiny. A gap, therefore, exists in being able to detect fraud at the meso-level, such as in financial services (i.e., LIBOR rigging). A meso-level analysis of fraud will allow researchers to highlight problems across the general field like the banks rigging the LIBOR or distorting the currency market as in the forex scandal. A meso-level analysis of fraud is important because it highlights the contagious behavior across the field and offers insights for fraud prevention and detection. Recognizing this unique epistemology will allow researchers to uncover new knowledge and not remain wedded to a reified understanding of fraud and fraud risks. Policymakers can derive insights and draft policies that reflect practitioners' needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines profit-seeking investments that US financial industry actors have made in the name of racial justice since the summer of 2020. This trend, which builds on the proposition of "sustainable" finance that private profits and social benefits can coexist, is known in the industry as racial justice investing. To understand how the industry frames racial justice as an object of financial intervention, I draw from theories of social reproduction, racial capitalism, and social finance to analyze the historical and contemporary processes through which racial in justice is conceived in economic terms as a "gap" between the wealth of white and racialized households. Then, I analyze the political economy of these investments, focusing on how solutions to the wealth gap are oriented around extending credit and economic inclusion to racialized households and business owners. Ultimately I illustrate how the financial industry's investments in closing the racial wealth gap largely sidestep questions of power and, paradoxically, justice that animate many contemporary racial justice movements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of the covid-19 pandemic, there was an acceleration in the use of digital financial services. This gave a glimpse of the associated risks and the important role played by financial supervisors and regulators (in its broad sense encompassing the financial and payment system) in the protection of the user. This paper analyzes the risk prevention measures adopted by the Uruguayan supervisor and examines the behavior of the digital financial user in the context of the covid-19 pandemic associated with the use of electronic instruments. For the research, the databases published by the Central Bank of Uruguay referring to the evolution of operations with electronic financial instruments and the complaints of financial users were considered. It is concluded that although the actions adopted by the financial supervisor to mitigate the risks associated with the use of digital financial instruments were effective, they must be continuously reviewed due to the dynamic and changing environment and must be adapted according to the new needs of the environment; addressing the situation from different angles, considering education and information on financial digitalization as a fundamental pillar for risk prevention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite being greatly progressive for more than 45 years covering even Muslim minority countries, the development of Islamic finance in some countries is not supported by well-established governance. This paper aims to empirically re-examine the effects of the governance components on Islamic finance in 45 Islamic finance-permitting countries. The study utilizes the dynamic panel GMM approach from the data spanning from 2012 to 2019. We find insignificant effect of regulation in Islamic finance in the region of developed countries, Muslim minority countries, and other Arab countries. We also find that corporate governance is not statistically significant in MENA and non-Asian countries. These results reinforce the need for a new type of regulation based on product requirements, policies, and procedures. Thus, the governance indicators can be understood by the wider world and assist in gaining more acceptance for the Islamic finance industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The structural transformation path in most developing economies follows an employment shift towards service activities, skipping an industrialisation phase. In this paper, we explore how this premature deindustrialisation trend affects the inclusive growth trajectory of middle-income economies. Considering the trends in manufacturing employment and value-added share, we identify premature deindustrialisation phases in economies. We apply panel fixed-effects and bootstrap-corrected dynamic fixed-effects models to empirically examine the relationship between premature deindustrialisation and income inequality. Our findings suggest that income inequality rises with premature deindustrialisation if the displaced workers are absorbed into market services (especially with employment movement towards non-business market services such as trade, transport, hotels, and accommodation). In contrast, if non-market services (such as education and health) or business services (such as banking and financial services) are the dominant employment provider, it helps to reduce income inequality even in the presence of premature deindustrialisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Islamic financial industry has witnessed remarkable developments at the global level, which indicates its important and effective role in economic activity. But does the Islamic financial industry need to develop concepts and tools like traditional finance or not? This paper attempts to shed light on the reality of the Islamic financial industry, while addressing the most prominent basic Islamic financing tools such as Mudaraba, Murabaha and other. The paper concludes that the financial innovation of Islamic financial products is necessary, not merely to emulate traditional financial products. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study aims to provide a holistic understanding of the multidimensional applications of blockchain in the global finance sector. This paper is an attempt to highlight the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats to blockchain technology in financial services. SWOT analysis has been conducted by critical investigation of relevant extant literature in the context of peerreviewed international journals and industry reports. The findings of the study reveal that limited contributions by blockchain technology have been made in the financial sector. It has untapped potential to contribute to the development of financial services. The risk of blockchain technology can be further minimized and trust can be built in the mindset of the government regulator by implementing strict regulation while adopting blockchain technology. The findings of the paper will stimulate future research in the multidimensional adoption of blockchain technology in the financial sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Blockchain and cryptocurrencies are transformative fintech breakthroughs that infiltrate the financial sector; however, they have many drawbacks and limits. Consumers have shown an insufficient level of acceptance of these innovations. This paper elucidates the main reasons for the effective growth of a cryptocurrency from user behavior. The objective is to determine what factors influence consumers' intentions to engage in blockchain-based cryptocurrency dealings. Considering the complexity of emerging technologies, this paper applied an integration model which assumes various external elements such as financial literacy, performance expectancy, facilitating conditions, effort expectancy, awareness, trust, design, and social influence. Smart PLS3 has been used. The most critical determinant of a cryptocurrency's growth is "design." On the other hand, "design" affects effort expectancy positively, and social influence affects trust. Awareness, performance expectancy, financial literacy, and effort expectancy significantly affect intentions to use cryptocurrency. It's worth mentioning that it is the first research to examine Pakistani customers' perceptions of Bitcoin and their ability to partake. As a result, it is intended to serve as a base for potential research in this area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Australian Hayne Royal Commission (2017–2019) inquired into misconduct within the banking, superannuation, and financial service sectors. Existing literature produced mixed results with regards to the effectiveness of the Hayne Royal Commission while focusing on the legislative angle. The first major contribution of this paper is it looks at the Hayne Royal Commission through the lens of a customer by creating indices which include the Retail Banking Perception Index, the Monthly Review Score, the Monthly Growth Score, and the Monthly Headline Score. The second major contribution of this paper is it adds to the field of perception analysis for banks by using novel data instead of point in time survey data. By creating these indices, we conclude that banks have been impacted idiosyncratically by the Hayne Royal Commission in terms of customer perception driven by increased transparency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Modeling heterogeneity on heavy-tailed distributions under a regression framework is challenging, yet classical statistical methodologies usually place conditions on the distribution models to facilitate the learning procedure. However, these conditions will likely overlook the complex dependence structure between the heaviness of tails and the covariates. Moreover, data sparsity on tail regions makes the inference method less stable, leading to biased estimates for extremerelated quantities. This paper proposes a gradient boosting algorithm to estimate a functional extreme value index with heterogeneous extremes. Our proposed algorithm is a data-driven procedure capturing complex and dynamic structures in tail distributions. We also conduct extensive simulation studies to show the prediction accuracy of the proposed algorithm. In addition, we apply our method to a real-world data set to illustrate the state-dependent and time-varying properties of heavy-tail phenomena in the financial industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: This document describes two qualitative programmatic case studies documenting experiences implementing digital financial services (DFS) for health with a focus on expanding access to universal health coverage (UHC). The CBHI 3MS system in Rwanda and the i-PUSH and Medical Credit Fund programs in Kenya were selected because they represent innovative use of digital financing technologies to support UHC programs at scale. Methods: These studies were conducted from April-August 2021 as part of a broader digital financial services landscape assessment that used a mixed methods process evaluation to answer three questions: 1) what was the experience implementing the program, 2) how was it perceived to influence health systems performance, and 3) what was the client/beneficiary experience? Qualitative interviews involved a range of engaged stakeholders, including implementers, developers, and clients/users from the examined programs in both countries. Secondary data were used to describe key program trends. Results: Respondents agreed that DFS contributed to health system performance by making systems more responsive, enabling programs to implement changes to digital services based on new laws or client-proposed features, and improving access to quality data for better management and improved quality of services. Key informants and secondary data confirmed that both implementations likely contributed to increasing health insurance coverage; however, other changes in market dynamics were also likely to influence these changes. Program managers and some beneficiaries praised the utility of digital functions, compared to paper-based systems, and noted their effect on individual savings behavior to contribute to household resilience. Discussion/Conclusions: Several implementation considerations emerged as facilitators or barriers to successful implementation of DFS for health, including the importance of multisectoral investments in general ICT infrastructure, the value of leveraging existing community resources (CHWs and mobile money agents) to boost enrollment and help overcome the digital divide, and the significance of developing trust across government and private sector organizations. The studies led to the development of five main recommendations for the design and implementation of health programs incorporating DFS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Value-at-risk is one of the most popular risk management tools in the financial industry. Over the past 20 years, several attempts to include VaR in the portfolio selection process have been proposed. However, using VaR as a risk measure in portfolio optimization models leads to problems that are computationally hard to solve. In view of this, few practical applications of VaR in portfolio selection have appeared in the literature up to now. In this paper, we propose to add the VaR criterion to the classical Mean-Variance approach in order to better address the typical regulatory constraints of the financial industry. We thus obtain a portfolio selection model characterized by three criteria: expected return, variance, and VaR at a specified confidence level. The resulting optimization problem consists in minimizing variance with parametric constraints on the levels of expected return and VaR. This model can be formulated as a mixed-integer quadratic programming (MIQP) problem. An extensive empirical analysis on seven real-world datasets demonstrates the practical applicability of the proposed approach. Furthermore, the out-of-sample performance of the more binding optimal Mean-Variance-VaR portfolios seems to be generally better than that of the Equally Weighted and of the Mean-Variance-CVaR portfolios. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In today's digital age, the financial industry, a cornerstone of the global economy, is undergoing monumental shifts. While business performance hinges on proficient leadership, the seismic wave of digital transformation poses new challenges and magnifies the need for specific leadership competencies. The urgency is clear: adapt or become obsolete. However, there is a lack of clarity regarding which competencies are essential during such transformations. To address this gap, the purpose of this study is to identify the leadership competencies that leaders in the financial industry should possess during the digital transformation process and to determine the influential relationships among these competencies and which ones are highly influential. This paper extensively investigates the criteria for evaluating leadership competencies and integrates expert judgments to construct an evaluation framework for leadership competencies during digital transformation. The Z-based decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory (Z-DEMATEL) technique was applied to identify the influential relationships among the criteria and generate influence weights for each criterion. In addition, based on the results of Z-DEMATEL, an Influence Classification Map (ICM) was plotted that categorized the criteria into four groups: core, driving, independent, and impact. Management implications and improvement suggestions are provided accordingly. Z-DEMATEL enhances the general form of fuzzy DEMATEL. By integrating the Z-fuzzy theory, Z-DEMATEL not only accounts for the uncertainty of the evaluation environment but also measures the confidence level of experts. Taking Taiwan's financial industry as a case study, this study revealed that "vision and imagination," "critical analysis," and "strategic perspective" were the top three criteria with higher weights, while "critical analysis" and "interpersonal sensitivity" were the core criteria. Business managers can use the results to design leadership training programs that meet the requirements of digital transformation and ultimately improve the performance of organizations during the transformation. Moreover, the concepts and methods presented in this study can be applied to other industries that are embarking on their digital transformation journeys. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent research on the restructuring of the financial industry from local banks to interstate conglomerates has raised questions about the impact on nonmetropolitan economies. In this paper, we develop two competing hypotheses and scrutinize the impact of local bank concentration (percent banks that are locally headquartered) on four measures of economic growth from 1980 to 2010 in metropolitan, micropolitan, and non‐core Commuting Zones (CZs). We employ fixed effects panel regression models for the 1980–2010 time frame. We find that local bank concentration is positively related to business births and establishment dynamics in non‐core and micropolitan CZs. The effects of local banking on measures of income and wages fail to show consistent effects. There are no positive local banking concentration effects on economic growth in metropolitan CZs during this time frame. Implications for theory, research, and policy are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The role objective of this paper is identified, from geographical forms of the city of Buenos Aires, the trails of money in the movement between urban economy dynamics. The banking businesses have been using geographical forms in Buenos Aires with particular functions: they offer financial services for payments of the most diverse items. In fact, we look at some situations in Buenos Aires, concerning street shops and banking activities. In this sense, the expansion of the upper circuit and the outsourcing of banking services in the activities of the marginal upper circuit was a simultaneous process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a product of digital technology, financial shared services can be deeply integrated into enterprise operation and management, which is significant to accelerate the financial transformation of real enterprises and achieve high-quality development. Based on this, this paper examines whether and how financial shared services empower the real economy, using data from listed companies in China from 2008 to 2017 as a sample. The research results show that financial shared services can significantly improve enterprise value and thus empower the real economy, and the optimization of operational efficiency is an important path for financial shared services to empower the real economy. Further research finds that the empowering effect of financial shared services on the real economy mainly exists in enterprises with many subsidiaries, large scale, and high labor intensity. This paper not only bridges the gap between financial shared services and micro-enterprise related research but also provides references and lessons for how to implement financial shared services in the real economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The fate of British finance following the Brexit referendum revolves around the 'resilience or relocation' debate: will the City of London continue to thrive as the world's leading financial centre or will the bulk of its activity move to rival hubs after departure from EU trading arrangements? Despite extensive commentary, there remains no systematic analysis of this question since the Leave vote. This paper addresses that lacuna by evaluating the empirical evidence concerning jobs, investments, and share of key trading markets. Contrary to widely-held expectations, the evidence suggests that the City has been remarkably resilient. Brexit has had no significant impact on jobs and London has consolidated its position as the chief location for financial FDI, FinTech funding, and attracting new firms. Most unexpectedly, the City has increased its dominance in major infrastructure markets such as over-the-counter clearing of (euro-denominated) derivatives and foreign exchange—although it has lost out in the handling of repurchase agreements and share trading. Based upon this evidence, the paper argues that London's resilience is mainly a function of its status as a crucial 'agglomeration peak' of global finance which shelters its unique ecosystem from the typical pressures of capital flight. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In view of the current problems in the visual aggregation of the financial service industry, the random forest graph model is applied to the spatial recognition of the financial service industry's scientific calculation visual aggregation in this paper. Based on the detailed analysis of the characteristics of the financial service industry in the past, combined with the characteristics of finance, this method is used to construct a random forest graph model, which mainly optimizes parameters from different aspects such as model structure, data characteristics, and dynamic changes of the model to obtain optimal parameter values of the random forest graph model. Finally, through the analysis of the experimental results, it can be seen that, according to the spatial state of the financial service industry, the method proposed in this paper can be used for visual aggregation analysis. This method can effectively improve the timeliness of the scientific calculation of spatial recognition in the financial service industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Blockchain (BC) maintains a continuously growing database in a "decentralized" way, and its impact on the financial auditing industry is becoming increasingly significant. This paper aims to study the research on financial automation auditing methods supported by blockchain technology and proposes the related concepts of blockchain technology, hash function, financial auditing analysis, and the impact of BP Neural Network (BPNN) and its algorithms on financial automation auditing methods. Simultaneously, this paper likewise disperses the poll overview to definite individuals, for example, endeavor, monetary work force, focus and ranking directors, university researchers, and specialists, who have pragmatic support in the execution and use of monetary review. The experimental results of this paper show that speculation based on the interconnected environment is the most basic natural factor for understanding this idea, and its score is also the largest at 4.36 points. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper introduces the concept of manihah and develops a conceptual framework to address Malaysia's abandoned lands and food security issues. Design/methodology/approach: This is a conceptual paper based on insights from the existing literature and secondary data on food security, abandoned lands and manihah. Based on the prevailing gaps, the study proposes a conceptual framework of the Manihah Agricultural Financing Model to address Malaysia's abandoned land and food security issues. Findings: The proposed model can address abandoned lands and food security issues due to the new incorporation of manihah within Malaysia's agricultural and Islamic financial industries' milieu. Research limitations/implications: This is a conceptual paper mainly intended to spark a discussion on the potentiality of manihah. Practical implications: The paper contends that Islamic banks have a crucial role in furthering the socio-economic development agenda under the value-based intermediation (VBI). The paper will also be an excellent introduction to Islamic bank practitioners in understanding manihah's relevance to their daily operation. Originality/value: This paper introduces manihah as the potential solution to food security issues by utilizing abandoned lands. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, commercial banks and rural financial institutions in and below the county area have developed rapidly, and the number of outlets has increased rapidly. But for the vast rural areas of the country, the number of outlets is still limited. At present, there are still a large number of areas with zero financial coverage in rural the country. The development of the financial industry in a region not only affects the level of local economic growth but also has a good effect on improving the income level of local residents and changing the way of local economic development. To better develop rural finance and county economy, this paper constructs an artificial neural network model and FA model to predict the rural finance industry, and four indicators are selected to test the performance measurement of the model. The hit rates of the five models are 54.65%, 53.75%, 59.78%, 65.1%, and 73.08%, respectively. The model proposed in this paper has the highest hit rate and can predict rural finance more accurately as well, allowing for clearer changes in county economic and industrial growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Supply chain finance solves the problem of financing difficulties for small- and medium-sized enterprises, reduces the risk of financial services of financial institutions, and brings new profit growth points to logistics enterprises. Therefore, supply chain financing has achieved rapid growth in a short period of time in China. This paper aims to study how to analyze and study the collaborative development of supply chain finance based on system dynamics. This paper puts forward the problem of system operation optimization, which is based on system dynamics, then elaborates on the concepts of SD and SCF, and designs and analyzes a case of a supply chain financial system based on system dynamics. The experimental results show that increasing the "bank input" from 0.1 to 2 can bring considerable economic benefits in the long run. As far as the simulation results are concerned, the promotion effect on the supply chain is the most significant. The output value of the supply chain can be increased from 2,963.04 billion yuan to 4,211.73 billion yuan, an increase of 42.14%. The simulation results showed that the financial industry has a significant positive effect on the factor of supply chain support, which provides evidence support for further guiding practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Big Data has become one of the most popular topics across several industries, with companies looking to leverage its capabilities to extract valuable insights regarding their business operations and boost their competitive advantage in the market. The term big data implies a considerable amount of structured and/or unstructured data. In the financial sector, hundreds of millions of transactions are executed daily, offering vast opportunities for extensive data applications. However, the sheer amount of data can be very challenging to process, and it is doubtful for an analyst to be able to review an entire raw data set. This compels analysts to narrow their scope, focusing on acquiring valuable and actionable business insights for critical decisionmaking and strategies. This paper will explore some critical metrics and the latest use cases of big data analytics within the broader financial services sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fair value's advantages, disadvantages and ideology have been debated thoroughly by academics and practitioners for decades. The few implementation papers which do exist are primarily concerned with developed economies. This gap is despite the prior literature acknowledging the likely difficulties of fair value use by less developed markets and economies. This paper contributes to addressing this gap by providing an analysis of the extent and use of fair value by Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) Top 40 companies for the period 2013–2017. This paper finds limited use of fair value by JSE Top 40 companies. On average, only 184 assets and liabilities make use of fair value each year and this has not changed significantly over time. Most fair value use is by the financial services industry (41%) and for financial instruments (80%). Critically, only 28% of all financial elements made use of Level 1 inputs, and only 15% were classified overall as Level 1 inputs. The findings suggest Level 1 inputs are not widely available for financial elements and are rarely available for non-financial assets. When fair values are used for non-financial assets, this is mainly for investment property, commodity-inventories and impairment tests. Because of the reliance on Level 2 and 3 inputs, the results suggest fair value is a costly measurement basis to implement in South Africa and frequently requires management judgement. The consequence is that many fair values are susceptible to bias and manipulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]