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This study examines the roles of cross-sectional dependence, asymmetric structure and country-to-country policy variations in the inflation-poverty reduction causal nexus in selected sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries from 1981 to 2019.

To account for cross-sectional dependence, heterogeneity and policy variations across countries in the inflation-poverty reduction causal nexus, this study uses robust Hatemi-J data decomposition procedures and a battery of second-generation techniques. These techniques include cross-sectional dependency tests, panel unit root tests, slope homogeneity tests and the Dumitrescu-Hurlin panel Granger non-causality approach.

Unlike existing studies, the panel and country-specific findings exhibit several dimensions of asymmetric causality in the inflation-poverty nexus. Positive inflationary shocks Granger-causes poverty reduction through investment and employment opportunities that benefit the impoverished in SSA. These findings align with country-specific analyses of Botswana, Cameroon, Gabon, Mauritania, South Africa and Togo. Also, a decline in poverty causes inflation to increase in the Congo Republic, Madagascar, Nigeria, Senegal and Togo. All panel and country-specific analyses reveal at least one dimension of asymmetric causality or another.

All stakeholders and policymakers must pay adequate attention to issues of asymmetric structures, nonlinearities and country-to-country policy variations to address country-specific issues and the socioeconomic problems in the probable causal nexus between the high incidence of extreme poverty and double-digit inflation rates in most SSA countries.

Studies on the inflation-poverty nexus are not uncommon in economic literature. Most existing studies focus on inflation’s effect on poverty. Existing studies that examine the inflation-poverty causal relationship covertly assume no asymmetric structure and nonlinearity. Also, the issues of cross-sectional dependence and heterogeneity are unexplored in the causal link in existing studies. All panel studies covertly impose homogeneous policies on countries in the causality. This study relaxes this supposition by allowing policies to vary across countries in the panel framework. Thus, this study makes three-dimensional contributions to increasing understanding of the inflation-poverty nexus.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the asymmetric behavior between CEO pay and firm performance in Nigeria.

The study adopts a two-step dynamic panel generalized method of moments (GMM) to reveal asymmetric responses of CEO pay to positive and negative shocks in firm performance.

The research outcomes of a two-step dynamic panel GMM) adopted reveal asymmetric responses of CEO pay to positive and negative shocks in firm performance. This implies that CEOs are handsomely compensated for good performance, but not punished for poor performance.

The study, therefore, suggests that CEO pay fails to serve as an internal corporate governance mechanism to alleviate agency problem in Nigeria’s listed firms.

This study examines the moderating effect of institutional quality on the finance-growth nexus in South Africa from 1986 to 2015.

This study adopts unit root tests, cointegration test and autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) model.

The findings reveal that institutional quality constitutes a drain to the growth benefits of financial development (FD) in South Africa in the short-run while FD and institutional quality converge to enhance growth process of the country in the long-run. Also, the threshold of institutional quality beyond which institution stimulates strong positive impact of finance on growth is estimated to be 6.42 on a 10-point scale.

This study, therefore, suggests that institutional quality matters in the way FD influences economic growth in South Africa. Hence, stakeholders are encouraged to trace and block lapses and loopholes in the institutional framework guiding financial system in South Africa so as to maximize growth benefits of FD.

This study contributes to the extant studies by introducing a country-specific analysis into the empirical examination of how institutional quality influences the impact of FD on economic growth. Also, this study deviates from other studies by determining the threshold of institutional quality beyond which FD stimulates strong positive effect on economic growth in South Africa

The purpose of this paper is to re-examine the determinants of bank profitability in Nigeria. Specifically, the study investigates the effect of managerial cost efficiency on bank profitability. Also, since there exist mixed results and controversies in the literature, in both developed and developing countries, regarding the effect of efficiency on bank profitability, this study employs the standard measure of efficiency. In addition, the work incorporates the role of persistence, which is often neglected in the literature in developing countries.

This study employs system generalized method of moments.

The findings, using the case of Nigeria, show that cost efficiency is a strong determinant of bank profitability in developing countries. In addition, the profitability of banks in Nigeria persists over time; hence, the industry is fairly competitive.

The recent policies of banking industry recapitalization meant to increase profitability and stability in Nigeria and other African countries’ banking industry will not be effective if the issue of managerial efficiency is not properly addressed.

Improving the banking managerial efficiency will positively reduce bad loans, hence leading to the stability in the banking system.

The authors introduce efficiency using standard measure of stochastic frontier analysis for its measurement. Also, this study introduces the role of persistence in the literature in developing countries.

This paper explores the social-behavioral aspects of financial markets. The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of social relations and networks which contributed to the market crash in the US telecommunications sector in the late 1990s.

A network theoretic approach is used to examine historical qualitative data. The authors suggest that the network characteristics of financial intermediaries allowed security analysts to control and manipulate information that was disclosed to the investing public.

The authors find evidence that brokerage locations in the network of actors within the telecommunications market allowed select individuals opportunities to engage in unethical behavior and malfeasance. The authors further highlight the harmful effects of over-embeddedness by illustrating that strong and dense network ties within the financial sector were exploited to distort the flow and reliability of information. The paper concludes with a note on the generalizability of this study and an examination of the current economic-legal structure of Wall Street.

Recently, some economists and network scholars have begun examining social relations more thoroughly in the financial sector. This paper is one of the first that focuses specifically on the role and network location of research analysts prior to a market collapse.

Energy poverty is a global phenomenon, but its prevalence is enormous in most African countries, with a potential impact on quality of life. This study aims to investigate the impact of energy poverty on the shadow economy.

The study uses panel data from 45 countries in Africa over a period of 1996–2018. Using panel cointegrating regression and panel vector auto-regression model in the generalized method of moments technique.

This study provides that energy poverty deepens the size of the shadow economy in Africa. It also documents that there is a bidirectional causality between shadow economy and energy poverty. Therefore, the two variables can predict each other.

The study suggests that lack of access to clean and modern energy services contributes to the depth of the shadow economy in Africa. African authorities are advised to strengthen rural and urban electrification initiatives by providing adequate energy infrastructure so as to reduce the level of energy poverty in the region. To ensure energy sustainability delivery, the study proposes that the creation of national and local capacities would be the most effective manner to guarantee energy accessibility and affordability. Also, priorities should be given to the local capital mobilization and energy subsidies for the energy poor. Energy literacy may also contribute to the sustainability and the usage of modern energy sources in Africa.

Previous studies reveal that income inequality contributes to the large size of shadow economy in developing economies. However, none of these studies analyzed the role of energy poverty and its implications for underground economic operations. Inadequate access to modern energy sources is likely to deepen the prevalence of informality in developing nations. Based on this, this study provides fresh evidence on the implications of energy deprivation on the shadow economy in Africa using a heterogeneous panel econometric framework. The study contributes to the literature by advocating that the provision of affordable modern energy sources for rural and urban settlements, and the creation of good energy infrastructure for the firms in the formal economy would not only improve the quality of life but also important to discourage underground economic operations in developing economies.

This paper aims to identify the appropriate model to address the financial challenges in agricultural sector in Zanzibar. Since the middle of 1960, clove production has continually and significantly decreased because of some problems and challenges that include financial ones. The financial intermediaries such as banks, cooperatives and micro-enterprises provide micro-financing to the farmers with high interest rates along with collateral requirements. The numerous programmes, measures and policies adopted by the relevant parties to find out the solutions to the dwindling clove production have failed.

The authors will review and examine several existing financial models, identify the issues and challenges of the current financial models and propose an appropriate Islamic financing model.

The numerous programmes, measures and policies adopted by the relevant parties to find out the solutions to the dwindling clove production have failed. This study, therefore, proposed a Waqf-Muzara’ah-supply chain model to address the financial challenge. Partnership arrangement is also suggested in the model to mitigate the issues of high interest rates and collateral that constrains the financial ability of the farmers and their agricultural output.

The contribution of the agricultural sector to the economic development of Zanzibar Islands is considerable. As one of the important agricultural sectors, the clove industry was the economic backbone of the government of Zanzibar. This study is believed to be a pioneering work; hence, it is the first study that investigates empirically the challenges facing the clove industry in Zanzibar.