This study examines the interaction between digital financial transactions (DFT) and financial development (FD) across 121 countries over the period 2003–2022, focusing upon the moderating role of global financial integration (GFI). Using two-step system generalised method of moments (GMM), Bootstrap Quantile-on-Quantile Regression, Nonlinear multilevel Mixed-Effects and D-K Fixed Effects models, this study explores the variations in this relationship across high-, upper-middle-, and low-income countries. The findings indicate that DFT and economic development positively influence FD, while bank risk demonstrates a negative influence. Governance quality positively influences FD, and while GFI also positively influences FD, it weakens the positive impact of DFT on FD globally. Interestingly, GFI strengthens the DFT-FD relationship in middle- and low-income economies, suggesting region-specific dynamics and the potential of GFI to counter structural barriers in these economies. This distinct interaction emphasises the need for customised policies that promote both digital financial inclusion and global financial integration that are aligned with country-specific economic contexts. Our study provides actionable insights for policymakers to foster sustainable financial development through customised digital and financial integration strategies.

ABSTRACT In statistics, samples are drawn from a population in a data‐generating process (DGP). Standard errors measure the uncertainty in estimates of population parameters. In science, evidence is generated to test hypotheses in an evidence‐generating process (EGP). We claim that EGP variation across researchers adds uncertainty—nonstandard errors (NSEs). We study NSEs by letting 164 teams test the same hypotheses on the same data. NSEs turn out to be sizable, but smaller for more reproducible or higher rated research. Adding peer‐review stages reduces NSEs. We further find that this type of uncertainty is underestimated by participants.

This research analyses how a firm’s age moderates the link between emerging market firm characteristics such as their profitability, firm size, asset tangibility, and their financing decisions (i.e., the level of leverage undertaken by these firms). Our empirical analysis reveals more evidence that firm age, as a firm-specific factor, not only amplifies the negative influence of profitability on leverage but also reinforces the adverse relationship between firm size and leverage. In addition, we also found that firm age weakens the positive relationship between asset tangibility and leverage. This research contributes to the corporate finance, corporate governance and emerging market finance literature by analysing how firm age influences the effects of emerging market firm characteristics. Additionally, this study contributes to the growing literature on the determinants of the gearing of firms, particularly on the role of firm-specific factors in explaining the variation in firms’ leverage.

Prior studies have shown that innovation has a mediating effect on the relationship between corporate governance and firm performance. This study compares this mediating effect in developed and developing countries using agency theory and signaling theory. A panel sample of 2,688 firms in developing and developed countries is analysed for the period of 2002–2017. The empirical findings demonstrate that corporate innovation fully mediates the relationship between corporate governance and firm performance in developed countries. However, innovation partially mediates the relationship between corporate governance and firm performance in developing countries. This could be because of different socioeconomic factors and capabilities of innovators involved in corporate governance structure. The study has both theoretical and policy implications and provides insights for policy makers for identifying the influence of innovation on firm value and evaluating the importance of corporate governance.

PurposeUnder the concept of sustainable development guided by 'carbon peak' and 'carbon neutral', corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance has become the focus of attention in all sectors of society. With the gradual deepening of China's 'new economic normal' development, firms face increasing environmental uncertainty in the market. This study aims to embed CSR, financial flexibility (FF), institutional investors (INST), and corporate value into the same theoretical framework and conduct heterogeneity analysis on the nature of property rights, heavily polluting industries, and marketisation level.Design/Methodology/ApproachBased upon the observation data of listed firms in Shanghai and Shenzhen A-shares in China from 2011 to 2021, this study uses Stata software for data processing, analysis, and two-stage least-squares (2SLS) models to solve endogenous problems.FindingsThe research results show that improving CSR performance increases corporate value, while INST and FF moderate the relationship between them. Further heterogeneity analysis found that the nature of property rights, heavily polluting industries, and marketisation level have different impacts on these moderating effects. This result provides ideas for clarifying the economic impact of enhancing the firms' CSR performance in the current era.Originality/ValueFirst, from the standpoint of CSR performance, it enhances the literature on the key corporate values in China. Second, from the perspective of corporate value, it has enriched the CSR literature and provided a new perspective for further clarifying the significance of improving the CSR performance of firms at this stage. Third, from the perspective of INST and FF, this research examines the moderating mechanism of CSR performance on corporate value. Hence, it provides a reference for further improving the efficiency of resource allocation in the capital markets.

This study intends to investigate the relationship between the different corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices of firms and their corporate sustainable development (CSD) as well as whether venture capital (VC) and corporate governance (CG) moderate this relationship and capital allocation efficiency (CAE) mediates the relationship. The sample of this study consist of Chinese A-share public-listed firms as well as the Growth Enterprise Market (GEM) listed firms in China. The duration covered is from 2013 to 2020. There are significant positive relationships between CSR and CSD among Chinese A-shares listed firms and GEM listed firms. In addition, there is a significant positive moderating effect of CG and no significant moderating effect of VC on the relationship between CSR and CSD among Chinese A-shares listed firms. However, for GEM listed firms, there is no significant moderating effect of both VC and CG on the relationship between CSR and CSD. Finally, there is a significant positive mediating effect of CAE on the relationship between CSR and CSD among Chinese A-shares listed firms and GEM listed firms.

Generally, research on the effects of Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) information disclosure on listed companies is primarily limited to developed countries. By contrast, the current study is located in China and analyses whether ESG reduces the downside risk of listed companies in China, and whether political connections and institutional investors moderate this relationship. This study uses Chinese A-share listed companies from the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock markets from 2010 to 2021 as research samples. Results demonstrated that the inhibitory effect of enhancing ESG performance on enterprise risk is more significant in non-heavy polluting industries, non-state-owned enterprises, and enterprises in areas with low levels of marketisation. This study explores the economic implications of ESG performance from a Value-at-Risk (VaR) perspective, enriching the relevant research on ESG rating in China and providing a fresh perspective to better elucidate the economic significance of companies improving their ESG performance. This study introduces institutional investors and political connections as two moderating variables to analyse their effect on the relationship between ESG performance and VaR. In addition, heterogeneity analysis is carried out in combination with the industry, region, and ownership nature of listed companies to test the “insurance” and “information” effects of ESG performance, to provide decision-making references for investors, enterprise managers, and regulators.

This review summarizes the most recent literature on land title administration challenges worldwide. It focuses discussion on five main challenges in land title administration and highlights the significance of blockchain technology in resolving these issues globally, particularly how such technology can improve the efficiency, transparency and security of land records systems, thus making it easier to verify land ownership and transfer of title. Articles that explored the land title phenomena, blockchain technology and discussed the implementation of blockchain in land titles were extracted from the Scopus database between 2015 and 2023. Despite the three main challenges of this technology, adopting blockchain in land title administration can enhance its efficiency, resolve its issues, strengthen regulators’ position and promote investments in land property. Henceforth, this review provides distinct practical contributions in a few ways. Implementing blockchain technology in land title administration can support regulators worldwide through increased transparency and accountability, improved efficiency and cost savings, enhanced security and trust, better data management and analysis and facilitation of cross-border transactions. It can also encourage land property investments worldwide by creating a secure, efficient and transparent land title system that reduces the risk of fraud, errors and corruption.

The goal of this study is to present a thorough analysis of the ways that organisational culture (OC) and risk assessment competencies of leaders affect the creation of strategic frameworks, especially about high-quality crisis decision-making. A self-administered questionnaire was distributed to 436 organisational personnel; 304 valid responses were received, and these were analysed using variance-based structural equation modelling. The findings show that OC, leadership risk assessment and a strategic management plan (SMP) are favourable predictors of high-quality crisis decision-making. According to this research, every variable strengthens the link between SMP quality and crisis decisions. The study is supported by an integrated method for understanding complex organisational facts. Practical ramifications for leadership development include strengthening leaders' capacity to appraise risk, considering OC and employing an SMP to guarantee that, when making sound crisis judgements, they are both innovative and compliant with organisational ethics.

Purpose This study aims to examine the relationship between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and job pursuit intention (JPI), and the role of job seekers’ perception on employer prosocial orientation, value congruence and employer attractiveness in this relationship. CSR is measured based on internal and external CSR. Design/methodology/approach By adopting quantitative approach, data was obtained through survey questionnaire from 420 bachelor’s degree university fresh graduates from five universities in Malaysia who are actively seeking for jobs. Data was analysed using structural equation modelling technique. Findings Research findings show that internal and external CSR positively impact job seekers’ perception of employer prosocial orientation. Job seekers’ perception towards employer prosocial orientation has a significant positive impact on value congruence. Value congruence has a significant positive influence on employer attractiveness. Finally, employer attractiveness has a significant positive impact on JPI. Practical implications The findings are useful for human resources management. Organisations (employers) should focus on effective internal and external CSR practices through a prosocial orientation approach to attract the best talents and create a strong position in the job market. Originality/value This study extends the Signalling Theory and P-O Fit theory by applying them to an entirely different context of CSR and JPI, by incorporated the holistic job seekers’ psychological processes of the recruitment signals (internal and external CSR), signalling process and person-organisation fit (perception on employer prosocial orientation, value congruence and employer attractiveness) thoroughly.

This research analyses the nexus between financial inclusion, digital inclusion and health outcomes in developing countries. In comparison with earlier studies, this study demonstrates an important research gap in addressing the combined impact of these factors. Basically, this research analyses the role of traditional banking and fintech in increasing financial inclusion and ultimately, enhancing health indices in emerging markets. By developing an index based upon the Entropy Weight Method, we show unique insights into bank and fintech-based financial inclusion, health outcomes and digital inclusion in these countries. Our results also show that digital inclusion plays a moderating role on the influence of financial inclusion on health outcomes. We evidenced that well-designed policies emphasising improvement in traditional and digital financial inclusion could potentially improve health outcomes in emerging markets. We also evidenced that improvement in digital inclusion (i.e., adoption of ICT) can facilitate improvement in both digital financial inclusion and health outcomes. Based upon our study, policymakers can utilise the index that we developed to compare health outcomes between different countries as well as to develop effective strategies for improvement in financial and digital inclusion. Our study emphasises the significance of understanding the multifaceted advantages of financial and digital inclusion in the development of health policies particularly in emerging markets.

In this paper we empirically test the factors which affect investors’ intention to adopt robo-advisory services in Malaysia. Multiple regression method is used. We found significant relationship between transparency, relative advantage, social influence, and perceived usefulness and the intention to adopt of robo-advisory services in Malaysia. However, there is no significant relationship between effort expectancy and intention to adopt robo-advisory services in Malaysia. Our results are consistent with previous similar research which showed a positive relationship between social influence and relative advantage with the intention to adopt of new technologies. In addition, our results could provide some insights into the robo-advisory services’ market in Malaysia in order to further understand what encourages Malaysian investors’ intention to adopt this new technology as well as how this technology can be adjusted to improve the adoption rate among Malaysian investors.

Purpose The paper examines the ‘Intention to Receive the COVID-19 Vaccines’ or IRV from three perspectives: the health belief model, behavioural economics, and institutional quality. Design/methodology/approach This study provides quantitative analysis by applying Chi-squared test of contingencies, paired sample t-tests, exploratory factor analysis, and multiple linear regression (stepwise method) on the data collected from 591 respondents mainly from Malaysia. Findings The results show that Perceived Benefits, Perceived Barriers, Perceived Susceptibility, Herding, and Institutional Quality play roles as predictors of IRV. Perceived Benefits play the most crucial role among the predictors and Perceived Barriers is the least important predictor. People have the herding mentality after being exposed to information encouraging such behaviour. Originality/value This study reveals that the respondents changed their behaviour in different circumstances when exposed to information that incorporates the effect of herding. Herding mentality, the effectiveness of government authorities, and regulatory quality have become important factors in enriching public health policies and the effectiveness of interventions.

Business decisions influence the level of idiosyncratic risk. Several factors that contribute to idiosyncratic risk must be explored. Therefore, we examine the impact of innovation and insti-tutional ownership on idiosyncratic risk for NYSE-and NASDAQ-listed firms. The sample contains 30,888 firm-year observations based on annual data from 2003 to 2016. We use a dynamic panel approach to address potential endogeneity difficulties when analyzing the results. Large-scale innovation activity, institutional investors, and innovation reduce idiosyncratic risk. Further-more, the interactions between institutional investors and high-level ownership stakeholders considerably minimize idiosyncratic risk. Our study demonstrates that the degree to which firms adopt innovation and institutional ownership may affect firm-specific hazards.

Purpose Research on financial inclusion (FI) in Islamic countries has evolved and gained prominence. This study aims to construct an extensive multidimensional FI index to ascertain the level of inclusion and trends in the Middle East/North Africa (MENA) countries. Additionally, this study examines the potential role of Islamic finance in improving access to financial services. Design/methodology/approach Data for the study were collected from databases covering MENA countries for the period 2010–2020. An inclusion index has been constructed using the entropy method. Findings Key findings indicate that the overall FI has improved in Islamic countries. However, it should be noted that all MENA countries fall within the low or medium levels of the inclusion index. It was observed that insurance access and penetration savings were poor in the Islamic MENA countries. Social implications The authors recommend that policymakers focus on insurance access and saving behaviour in their respective countries. Based upon these observations, policymakers should promote the economic benefits of Islamic finance, which will help improve FI and economic development in Islamic countries. This study emphasises the necessity of policy framework reform to provide Islamic financial services to the poorest in society at low or no cost for better economic benefits. Originality/value Most studies tend to overlook important indicators such as insurance, savings and credit penetration while calculating the index. These indicators add value to the existing literature. The majority of prior studies used United Nation Development Programme methodology or principal component analysis for Inclusion Index measurements. The adoption of the entropy weighting method is the novelty of this study.

In recent years, academics have paid more attention to green finance, and public companies have reached a broad consensus on the concept of timely environmental, social, and governance (ESG) disclosure. Due to the close relationship between green finance and ESG, this presents an opportunity to determine whether green finance compels companies to actively disclose ESG. The sample for this study consists of China's non-financial A-share listed companies from 2010 to 2021, and the empirical findings demonstrate that green finance can positively influence the ESG performance of listed companies. Through an analysis of heterogeneity, this study reaches the following conclusions: state-owned enterprises, heavy pollution companies, and companies in low-carbon pilot cities perform better in terms of green finance's role in promoting ESG scoring. This study also introduces market concentration and social trust as the moderating variables, enriching the green finance research framework. Through the analysis of moderating variables, the 'black box' effect of green finance on ESG is disclosed, providing theoretical support for the government and companies to better comprehend the policy effect as well as a reference for reform and experimental promotion of green finance.

Purpose Social media engagement is widely used by the higher education institutions (HEIs) to improve brand performance through brand image and brand loyalty. This study focusses on the effect of social media engagement on relationship quality and brand performance in the higher education marketing (HEM) context. Social media engagement dimensions comprising social interaction, sharing of information, surveillance and information quantity are tested as antecedents to relationship quality. Relationship quality is examined as antecedents to brand image and brand loyalty. Design/methodology/approach Data are obtained through survey questionnaire from 410 undergraduate and postgraduate students from six HEIs in Malaysia. Structural equation modelling was applied for data analysis. Findings The findings of this study reveal that social interaction, sharing of information, surveillance and information quantity have positive effect on relationship quality. Relationship quality has significant positive influence on brand image and brand loyalty, respectively. Originality/value The study contributes to the extension of social exchange theory through the development of an integrative framework of social media engagement (exchange) needed for improving relationship quality (relational responses) and brand performance (behavioural outcomes) in the HEM.

Finance Technology (Fintech) has emerged as the current trend in the financial world. Fintech services gain popularity from the increasing adoption by organizations and consumers. By applying empirical research, this chapter aims to explore the important factors influencing consumer satisfaction and continuance intention to adopt Fintech services. As previous studies on customers' behavioral intention to adopt Fintech were mostly conducted in the context of developed countries, there is a paucity of research in the developing countries' perspective. To address the research gap, this study focused on five selected developing countries, namely Malaysia, Indonesia, India, Nigeria and Philippines. Drawing on the extended Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) for the proposed research model, customer innovativeness, hedonic motivation, perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, system quality and technology self-efficacy have positive effect on customer satisfaction and subsequently, continuance intention to adopt Fintech. The findings recommend that Fintech service providers to develop effective strategic frameworks to build consumer satisfaction and encourage their continuance intention to adopt Fintech.

Economic Policy Uncertainty (EPU) research has grown in importance in today's highly volatile and interconnected economy. This work investigates the relationship between EPU and Financial Stability (FS) (i.e., Z-scores and non-performing loans (NPL)) with the mediating variable of governance quality through a 23-country panel data from 2005 to 2019. The System Generalized Method of Moment (SYS-GMM) is adopted to address the issue of endogeneity, which is common in panel data regression. The two-stage Sequential of the Linear Panel Data Model (SELPDM) was also used to test the robustness of the results. According to the findings, EPU has a significant negative effect on financial stability (measured by the Z-score) and a significant positive effect on financial stability in the banking industry of most developed economies (proxied by NPL). We also discovered that good governance can be used to mitigate the negative effects of EPU on financial stability; however, this influence varies depending on region, bank, and market structure, and it was significantly greater during the global financial crisis. Finally, this study can help financial managers and policymakers develop appropriate policies to understand how banks respond to EPU.