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We study the potential effects of pension underfunding on corporate investment, financial constraints and improved employee bonding using 10 Pacific-Basin countries (including the United States, Australia, and eight Asian countries) at heterogeneous economic development stages and different regulatory environments. We document that corporate pensions are significantly underfunded in most countries of our sample in the period of 2001–2017, when interest rates were ultralow in most countries. In addition, firms from countries with stronger employee protection and more generous retirement benefits tend to show higher levels of underfunding in their defined benefit (DB) pension plans. To the extent of pension underfunding imposing constraints on corporate investment, we find that firms in these countries can face more constraints on investment when their pension is underfunded.

Introduction: Commercial banks play a vital role in the global economy, facilitating economic growth and providing essential financial services. As key intermediaries between savers and borrowers, these institutions operate in a dynamic and complex environment characterised by various risk factors that can significantly impact their profitability and overall stability. Understanding the interconnected relationships between credit risk, interest rate risk, liquidity risk, and profitability is crucial for effective risk management strategies and the development of appropriate regulatory frameworks.

Purpose: Commercial banks play a critical role in the global economy by facilitating economic growth and providing financial services. This study examines the interconnected relationships between credit risk, interest rate risk, liquidity risk, and profitability in commercial banking.

Methodology: The sample consists of licenced scheduled commercial banks on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) from 2015 to 2022. Using the Smart PLS-SEM 3.0 path analysis technique, the study evaluates the combined influence of these risk factors on profitability and provides evidence-based recommendations for risk management strategies.

Findings: The findings can assist banks in enhancing their risk management practices, and regulators in developing appropriate regulatory frameworks. By understanding the key risk factors and their impact on profitability, banks and regulators can mitigate risks, enhance transparency, and promote stability within the banking sector.

Significance/value: The value of this study lies in its focus on the interconnectedness of risk factors, profitability, and the potential implications for decision-making, risk management strategies, regulatory frameworks, and the overall stability of the commercial banking sector.

This paper aims to investigate technological innovations within the crypto space that have engendered novel financial crime risks and their potential utilization amidst geopolitical conflicts.

The theoretical paper uses an analysis of recent geopolitical events, with a key focus on using cryptocurrencies to undertake illicit activities.

The study found that cryptocurrencies and the innovations made within the crypto domain are used for both legitimate and illicit purposes, including money laundering, terrorism financing and sanction evasion.

This research contributes to understanding the critical role cryptocurrencies play amidst geopolitical conflicts and emphasizes the need for regulatory considerations to prevent their misuse. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is the first scholarly contribution that considers the evolving mechanisms afforded by cryptocurrencies amidst geopolitical conflicts in undertaking illicit activities.

This study aims to focus on the impact of multi-level knowledge sharing between and within organizations on the risk control of rural inclusive finance. The paper presents a synergistic risk control system integrating external and internal factors for rural inclusive finance by constructing different knowledge-sharing platforms in an environment, which is full of many uncertainties.

This study is based on survey methods. To achieve the research objectives, the authors adopt a single case study approach. For data collection, the authors apply a wide variety of methods such as semi-structured interviews, field visits, second-hand databases and official websites.

The results emphasize that using multi-level knowledge sharing such as the inter- and intra-organizational level, can facilitate the risk control of rural inclusive finance during the post-COVID-19 era. Furthermore, it is also noted that achieving knowledge sharing at different levels by building diverse knowledge-sharing platforms can promote the risk control of rural inclusive finance from the individual-organization level to the chain level of multi-organization collaboration, which contributes to the formation of symbiotic risk control ecology.

The authors have formed the “Chinese wisdom” to deal with inclusive financial risks and to promote in-depth development in relation to the “last mile” practice of inclusive finance, which means the final and the most important phase of a project. The conclusions contribute to enriching the outcomes regarding the risk control of rural inclusive finance, provide experiences to its sustainable development and offer a reference to other countries with their risk control of rural inclusive finance.

Drawing on the knowledge-sharing approach, this study creatively resolves the persistent problems in the risk control of rural inclusive finance, which forms a powerful supplement to the extant literature. Meanwhile, the paper combines the two contextual factors of the post-COVID-19 era and emerging economies, which can be deemed as a novel attempt.

Introduction: Small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) play a vital role in the economic development of economies by generating job opportunities. Considering their significance, understanding the challenges and skills required in these enterprises becomes essential and timely.

Purpose: This study aims to discuss the limitations and skill gaps faced by SMEs in emerging economies, such as India, Indonesia, Brazil, China, Malaysia, Ghana, Hungary, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Türkiye, UAE, Iran, Kazakhstan, Türkiye, Zambia, Romania, and Vietnam.

Methodology: The study adopts a systematic review and meta-synthesis approach, utilising a literature review to comprehensively analyse, synthesise, and map the existing literature by identifying overarching themes.

Findings: The study examines the challenges SMEs encounter in emerging economies, including resource scarcity, limited access to credit, inadequate infrastructure, low technology adoption, restricted global market access, and ineffective marketing strategies. There is a notable shortage of skilled labour and development initiatives within SMEs in India even though the country has a sizeable pool of qualified workers. There is a pressing need for additional technical and managerial skills to remain competitive in the market. The findings of this study will assist HR managers in addressing skill shortages among employees in SMEs operating within emerging economies

This study aims to establish the factors affecting the financial investment decision-making of an investor, with specific reference to investors’ emotions and how various events such as festivals, the pandemic and sports matches affect their investors’ investment decision-making. The authors further intend to understand the role of these investor emotions in creating stock market anomalies.

Twenty-nine semistructured exploratory interviews with fund managers from the top 10 asset management companies in India, who deal with individual investors regularly, were taken. The interviews were conducted to identify and describe the underlying ideas and sentiments that influence an individual’s investment behavior.

Although risk and return are the primary motivators of investment decisions, fund managers’ daily interactions with individual investors are affected by unpredictability and technical ambiguity, and investing is an inherently emotionally arousing process, according to the findings of the in-depth interviews.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is one of the first studies in Indian market to report the views of financial professionals about the emotional aspect of investors in making an investment decision. With most of the research conducted using quantitative methods, the current study brings in the perspective of financial professionals using primary data.

Conventional wisdom suggests that war in the host country makes it unattractive for foreign firms to invest. To see if this is true for US firms on the aggregate, this paper aims to examine the veracity of a “permanent war economy” hypothesis, that foreign direct investment (FDI) may, in fact, increase in the host country not despite, but because of, war, i.e. one that lends credence to the idea that, in the USA, “defense [has] become one of constant preparation for future wars and foreign interventions rather than an exercise in response to one-off threats.”

The authors test the hypotheses using Generalized Method of Moments estimation, with Heckman Selection, on US FDI data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis and war data from the Correlates of War2 Project, the Uppsala Conflict Data Program/International Peace Research Institute data set, the International Crisis Behavior Project and the Center for Systemic Peace Major Episodes of Political Violence data set. The final sample consists of 351 country-year observations in 55 host countries from 1982 to 2006.

The findings indicate that overall US FDI in a host country in a given year decreases if the host country is engaged in wars with multiple countries and if the US Government is involved in the war. Most notably, the results show that US involvement in multiple host country wars is actually correlated with increased US FDI into the host country, providing empirical support for the “permanent war economy” hypothesis.

While other studies have focused on war and FDI, the authors have sought to show the impact of the involvement of arguably the most influential country, i.e. the USA, in the sovereign matters of a focal host country. By studying FDI from the USA as a function of US involvement in wars overseas, over the years with the greatest use of private military companies by the USA and the largest portion of global FDI accounted for by the USA, this work motivates a research agenda on home-host-"other” relations in the context of war and FDI, with the “other” being the supranational “elephant in the room.”

This study empirically investigates the relationship between goodwill assets and capital structure (i.e. debt ratio) of firms and the moderating effect of financial market development on the relationship between goodwill assets and capital structure.

This research applied a quantitative method. The article collects large samples of listed firms from 23 developing and nine developed countries and applied the panel data techniques. This research used firm-level data from the DataStream database for both developed and developing countries. The study uses 4,912 firm-level data from 23 developing countries and 4,303 firm-level data from nine developed countries.

The findings reveal a significant positive relationship between goodwill assets and capital structure in developing countries, but goodwill assets have a significant negative relationship with capital structure in developed countries. Moreover, financial market development positively moderates the relationship between goodwill assets and the capital structure of firms in developing countries. The results inform firm managers that goodwill assets serve as additional collateral to secure debt financing. Moreover, policymakers should formulate a debt market policy that recognizes goodwill assets as additional collateral for the purpose of obtaining debt capital.

The study has several implications. First, goodwill assets are identified as a factor of capital structure in this study. Fixed assets have been identified as one of the drivers of capital structure in previous research, although goodwill assets are seldom included. Second, this article shows that along with demand-side determinants, supply-side determinants also play an important role in terms of the firms' choice about the capital structure. Therefore, firms should take both the demand-side and supply-side factors into consideration when sourcing for external financing (i.e. debt capital).

The study considered goodwill as a component of capital structure. The study analysis includes a large sample of enterprises, including 4,912 big firms from 23 developing countries and 4,303 large firms from nine industrialized or developed countries, which adds to the current capital structure information. Furthermore, a large sample size increases the results' robustness and generalizability.

This article provides the first empirical study on the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on sustainability reporting in US financial institutions using institutional, stakeholder and legitimacy theories.

The study used the independent sample t-test and Mann–Whitney U test throughout as well as OLS, random effects, fixed effects and heteroskedasticity corrected model to test the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on sustainability reporting in the US financial sector. A sample from all listed US financial firms was used after controlling for both the Refinitiv Eikon sector classification and the NAICS sector classification.

Using U Mann–Whitney test and independent sample t-test the study revealed that the average ESG score for the pre-COVID19 period is 53% compared with 62.3% for the COVID-19 period, indicating that the sustainability reporting during COVID-19 is much higher compared with the pre-pandemic period. The findings of regression analysis also confirm that the US financial companies increased their sustainability reporting during the COVID-19 pandemic.

This study is an early attempt to look at how the COVID-19 epidemic has affected financial reporting procedures, although it is focused only on one area and other entity-related factors like stock market implications, company governance, internal audit practice, etc could have been considered.

This research offers useful recommendations for policymakers to create standards for regulators on the significance of raising sustainability awareness. The findings are crucial for accounting regulators as they work to implement COVID-19 and enforce required integrated reporting rules and regulations.

The study provides the first empirical evidence on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on sustainability reporting, by examining how US financial institutions approach the topic of sustainability during the COVID-19 pandemic and assessing the pandemic's current consequences on sustainability.

Charitable giving in China has moved from being subjected to government attention and public skepticism to receiving government encouragement and public support. The role played by political connections in philanthropy is indisputable, although very few studies have explored their association from the perspective of the country’s first Charity Law of 2016. This study aims to contribute to the ongoing debate about the 2016 Charity Law and offers an understanding of the future trends in corporate charitable giving.

Using empirical analysis of data collected from listed companies in China, this study analyzes the impact of political connections on corporate charitable giving before and after the 2016 Charity Law. The study adopts three leading theories from previous research into corporate charitable giving and political connections: corporate social responsibility, resource dependence theory and stakeholder theory. A conceptual framework is outlined, and hypotheses are formulated accordingly.

The results show that political connections have a substantial positive impact on corporate charitable giving, both before and after the implementation of the 2016 Charity Law, which has significantly promoted and increased the amount and proportion of charitable giving. Although the 2016 Charity Law attempted to weaken the political connections of enterprises, the influence of political connections on corporate charitable giving has proved difficult to diminish or eliminate, as charity is dominated by the state.

This study explores the association between political connections and corporate charitable giving from the perspective of China’s Charity Law of 2016.