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Do financial services needs depend on the firm size? To highlight the impact of different categories of financial services on firm performance, we establish a correspondence between financial services and firms' performance classified according to their size, controlling with the determinants of firm performance and the obstacles that hinder the development of each category of firm.

We have mobilized microeconomic data on 78,629 firms stratified by size and covering 135 countries, extracted from the Enterprise Surveys database. A two-stage least squares (2SLS) regression analysis with instrumental variable modeling is used.

Our empirical results show that a firm's financing behavior differs according to its size. For micro and small firms, the availability of internal financing has a positive impact on their performance. For medium-size firms, the use of debt stimulates firm performance. For large firms, the positive effect of debt diminishes as the level of debt increases, which leads this category of firms to increase their capital. We complemented our study by exploring the issue of whether barriers to firm performance differ by size. Our results bring a support to the idea that medium-size firms suffer more than micro, small, and large firms. The size of this category of firms does not allow them to operate in the informal sector as micro and small firms do, and does not allow them to influence political authorities to operate in their favor as large firms do.

Previous studies have focused on investigating the effects of access to finance and/or financing constraints on firm's performance, neglecting the issue of identifying which financial services have the most impact on firm performance depending on firms' size. This study fills the gap in the literature in two main ways. First, we identify the financial services that have the most impact on firm performance using firm-level data covering 78,629 firms by size (micro, small, medium, and large). Second, we investigate the different barriers to firm performance by size.

Shortly after this series of articles started, we received from Novo Industries in Denmark a copy of their corporate report. Following correspondence with Kare B Dullum, Novo's Financial Executive, we received permission to reproduce part of that report. Management for Profitability and Interest Group Accounting, written by Kare Dullum, is a section of Novo's report which shows the flow of funds through a company to the various interest groups. The article demonstrates the basic decisions on financial management that are needed for integrated decision making on marketing, production, research development and administration. For this series of articles the figures used in earlier articles have been fitted in to the table presentations. The text of the article is self explanatory and readers of the previous articles in this series will recognise the different way of presenting the figures.

The purpose of this study is to understand the operations of interest-free microfinance institutions, find the issues and recommend possible solutions in the Indian context.

This paper is based on the case study of Sanghamam Multistate Cooperative Credit Society. This research uses both primary and secondary data. The institution is assessed in terms of two major performance aspects, namely, outreach indicators and financial performance indicators. A brief comparative study of Sanghamam with the aggregate performance of the Indian microfinance industry has also been included.

It is found that Sanghamam has been successfully providing interest-free microfinance services in India. The performance of Sanghamam on selected industry benchmarks is in line with the performance of the Indian microfinance industry. However, a few issues such as potential liquidity risk, lower penetration in the poorer sections of the population, Shariah issues in the method of determination of service charges on demand loans and in the structure of group deposit scheme and profit-sharing business loans have been highlighted.

Sanghamam is evaluated from only outreach and financial performance aspects and not from the aspect of the impacts of its services.

This study would help in documenting the operations of Sanghamam. Moreover, the recommendations provided, if implemented, would help Sanghamam in further growth.

This study would help create awareness in the society about the practices of interest-free microfinance.

This paper highlights the interest-free microfinance practices in India that have not received the needed attention. The authors have discussed the key issues related to the interest free microfinance and recommended the possible solutions.

This paper aims to investigate the impact of debt maturity on the relationship between financial leverage and future financing constraints. Moreover, it attempts to analyze the moderating role of short-term debt and the mediating role of future financing constraints in the relationship between financial leverage and future investment.

To test the moderating role of debt maturity, all the observations are divided into two groups based on short-term debt to total debt ratio. Moreover, Sobel, Aroian and Goodman tests are used to analyze the mediating role of future financing constraints. The sample used in this research includes firms listed on the Tehran Stock Exchange from 2006 to 2018.

It is shown that financial leverage is inversely (positively) related to future financing constraints for firms with higher (lower) use of short-term debt and, short-term debt moderates the relation between financial leverage and future investment. The findings also indicate that future financing constraints carry the influence of financial leverage to future investment.

In an imperfect market where financing is not independent of investment, it is highly required to carry out some studies on the role of different financing scenarios in firms and their impacts on future financing and investment; therefore, this paper is conducted to address one of the most important issues in the capital market, which is almost the pioneer study in this field.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate factors that determine rural households’ access to finance provided by Islamic microfinance institutions (MFIs) in Indonesia.

A two-year panel data set with logistic regression is used to identify the determinants of access to finance by rural households. The study sample comprises of 289 Islamic MFIs’ clients and 140 non-clients from East Java, Indonesia. The clients consist of 111 rural households with profit and loss sharing (PLS) schemes, 162 clients with non-profit and loss sharing (non-PLS) schemes and 16 clients with both schemes.

The empirical results show that age, gender and income influence rural households to access finance provided by Islamic MFIs. The results show an increase in age and income increase the respondents’ likelihood to access finance. Further, male respondents are more likely to access finance from Islamic MFIs than females.

The empirical analysis is limited to data obtained from East Java province in Indonesia, and other provinces may show different results. However, this study is among the few studies that investigate access to finance from Islamic MFIs based on PLS and non-PLS schemes.

The novelty of this study lies in the unique financing accessibility between PLS and non-PLS schemes in Islamic MFIs. This study will be an important addition to the emerging literature on Islamic microfinance.

The purpose of this paper is to understand women’s approaches to acquiring financial and other resources is essential for closing the entrepreneurship gender gap. In nearly 40% of economies, women’s early-stage entrepreneurial activity is half or less than half of that of men’s.

Even when there is extensive literature on female entrepreneurs, the authors review the findings through a Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-1)9 crisis lens, trying to find new perspectives and solutions. With the approach of a systematic review of 4,520 publications on financing topics related to female entrepreneurs, various sources of financing available to female entrepreneurs are considered: bootstrapping, banks, business angels, venture capital and crowdfunding.

Identifying potential gender bias both on the supply and the demand side of financing, this research highlights new directions in encouraging female entrepreneurship and gives guidelines to public organisations on how to foster advanced forms of financing for female entrepreneurs in COVID-19 times.

The COVID-19 pandemic has posed an unprecedented challenge for economies and companies. Female entrepreneurs are the ones who have been hit harder, as they overcome pre-existing barriers, such as lack of access to finance, lack of networks and mentors and gendered priorities, among others. Without ensuring gender policies to counter these incremental negative effects, the authors face the risk of widening the gender gap.

Regarding previous systematic reviews of literature, this paper focusses on a specific challenge, how women entrepreneurs finance their activity, with a double vision: supply and demand of money.

This paper aims to examine the status and implications of the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) and International Accounting Standards Board’s (IASB) forthcoming standard on leases. The proposal arose from concern that many lease obligations are unrecorded on the balance sheet and that current accounting for lease transactions does not represent fully the economics of many lease transactions.

On September 20, 2012 and September 25, 2012, the Boards decided to account for some lease contracts using an approach similar to their proposed 2010 leases exposure draft (interest and depreciation) and to account for some leases using an approach that results in a straight-line lease expense. On May 13, 2013, the Boards decided to continue to account for some lease contracts on a straight-line basis, and others on an amortization basis separate from interest expense. Identification of the type of lease requires a two-step process at lease commencement, and all leases are recorded identically at inception. The subsequent measurement gives rise to differences. Some concerns are that an increase in assets and liabilities may result in debt covenant breaches that will require renegotiation and adjustment.

While understanding that many financial users, preparers and auditors favor retaining the current and long-standing leasing standards, the FASB and IASB should recognize many unexpected consequences of its new proposals, including the changing of many long-held financial ratios and the resultant violations of many bank loan covenants.

The only limitation is that this manuscript is not based on primary empirical data. There are no implications for the study’s purpose is an update of a proposed FASB/IASB standard, an analysis of the empirical impact studies that have been done, a questionning of whether a new standard is really needed or that the current standard is not being implemented properly, and guidance for the implementation at transition and on-going for the proposed standard. This study gives a reader a compact update, implications, ramifications and guidance for preparation of a new standard if it is passed.

The new rules will alter many key financial metrics that investors use to determine company valuations and credit agencies use to determine credit worthiness. Some items will improve, such as gross margin, cash flow from operations and earnings before interest and taxes. Reported interest coverage and return on assets will be lower under the new rules. Industries that make extensive use of operating leases such as transportation, banking, telecommunications, retail and real estate will be most affected.

In the best case scenario, the new standard would destroy approximately 190,000 US jobs. US gross domestic product (GDP) would be reduced by $27.5 billion annually. In the best case, the household earnings would be reduced by $7.8 billion annually. In the worst case, this decrease is $135.2 billion a year. The apparent liabilities of US publicly traded companies would increase by $1.5-$2 trillion, the equivalent gross state product of 20 states. Approximately $1.1 trillion of this would be attributable to balance sheet recognition of real estate operating leases, while the remainder would come from recognizing equipment and other leases as liabilities.

The value of this research is the unique analysis of the proposed lease standard, and in looking at why the previous models did not work or did they? Is it the current requirements that are wrong or their implemenation? The reader is given a detailed overview of the proposed standard, its economic and social impacts, an update of the proposed standard, what companies must do now to get ready for the transition and on-going requirements, and a discussion of the tremendous opposition to any proposed changes in the current lease requirements from what they are.

The purpose of this paper is to provide quantitative analysis of the extant literature on farmer distress resulting from agricultural credit and identify research gaps.

The authors have used the citation analysis which is based on the citation graph. For the current study, the authors have used SCOPUS database.

The study reveals that the farmer distress is one of the social sustainability issues which have attracted major attentions from academia. Most of the studies in recent years are from South Asian perspectives and the extant literature focusing on some of the important issues like farmer challenges and pesticide poisoning. Most of the studies provide anecdotal evidences. Hence, the empirical research is scant.

The study is an attempt to provide an in-depth analysis, so that future research directions can be formulated.

The housing sector in Jordan suffers from a lack of balance between supply and demand, in general, and from the inability to meet the demands of low‐income households, in specific. The purpose of this paper is to explore the potentials and obstacles facing low‐income housing supply. It is shown that there is undersupply in low‐income housing.

The attributes of the supply–demand model are explored using qualitative and quantitative research methods. The first research step was archival. Findings indicated a presence of major obstacles facing developers and hindering them from supplying low‐income housing. The second research step included face‐to‐face interviews with the local developers in three major cities: Amman, Irbid and Zarqa. They were interviewed using a semi‐structured and open‐ended questionnaire.

Results indicated that most plausible causality of undersupply of low‐income housing is due to macro‐environment attributes: controllable – management (lack of human resources and capacity building), real estate (lack of marketing skills and sales advertising), technology and construction industry (inaccessible appropriate building technology and affordable construction), land ownership and site selection (limited to the developers geographical area); and uncontrollable – financing (small capital operation and difficulties in bank loans and lending), government policies (lack of incentives, tax exemptions, and rigid laws and regulations), and social and cultural (social needs requires certain spatial arrangements and rejection of borrowing from financial institutions for religious reasons).

The study recommends increasing supply of low‐income housing can be achieved by various means and not by single attribute. Attributes affecting this price reduction and increase homeownership include implementing real estate principles and processes, co‐operation of all key‐players through various forms of public/private partnership, facilitating procedures in commercial banks, increasing the number of units that share services and infrastructure, constructing multi‐use housing projects, defining gradual revenue rates for services and limiting revenue rates for the housing units, developing local construction material, using simple shapes and configurations, and reducing non‐used space like the formal reception and dining areas despite their cultural value.

Statistical inferences will be needed in a future study to complement the present study's investigation of low‐income housing production in Jordan.

As the first of its kind, the research help to identify policy implications for different partners (housing developers, local planning authorities, national housing and planning authorities and government policy makers) in order to increase homeownership for low‐income groups.

The authors provide firm-level evidence that external financing affects international trade in a way different from internal financing.

The authors separate new entrants from incumbent exporters and investigate the roles of external and internal financing in export market participation and export quantity.

The authors find that external financing is of particular importance, as well as internal financing, in helping a firm become a new exporter. By contrast, external financing, unlike internal financing, is not significantly important for an incumbent exporter to stay in the international market. Regarding export quantity, a firm's internal financing is positively associated with more export quantity, whereas external financing is not.

The authors’ findings are consistent with the existence of significant fixed cost for entering the export market and external financing is particularly needed to cover such cost. Meanwhile, the financial need for maintaining the export status is much less and can be satisfied via internal financing.