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This paper provides a comprehensive review of the influential and intellectual aspects of the literature on the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region's banking activities.

This study undertakes a bibliometric meta-analysis review of the GCC region banking literature, covering 199 articles published between 2004 and 2022, extracted from the Web of Science (WoS) database, followed by a content analysis of highly cited papers.

This paper identifies the influential aspects of the GCC region banking literature in terms of journals, articles, authors, universities and countries. The paper also identifies and discusses five major research clusters: (1) bank efficiency; (2) corporate governance (CG) and disclosure; (3) performance and risk-taking; (4) systemic risk, bank stability and risk spillovers and (5) intellectual capital (IC). Finally, it identifies gaps in the literature and highlights some important research issues that provide directions for future research.

This paper is limited to the articles indexed in the WoS database and written in English. Though the WoS database encompasses a wide range of multidisciplinary journals, there is a chance that some relevant articles are not included in the WoS database or written in another language.

This study provides regulators, practitioners and academics with valuable insight and an in-depth understanding of the banking system of the GCC region.

To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first review paper on GCC region banking literature. This study provides regulators, practitioners and academics with valuable insight and an in-depth understanding of the banking system of the GCC region.

Innovation has become a necessity for the information technology (IT) sector, especially during COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, this study aims to investigate how knowledge sharing affects employees’ innovative work behavior (IWB). Specifically, the study examined occupational self-efficacy (as mediating mechanism) and entrepreneurial leadership (as boundary condition) to encourage IWB.

The study used social media platforms to collect data from 270 employees working in the IT sector through “google forms” on convenience basis between March and August, 2021. The study applied structural equation modeling in two stages to examine the measurement model (for uni-dimensionality) and the structural model (for hypotheses testing).

The study noted that knowledge sharing positively affects employees’ IWB and occupational self-efficacy positively explains this association. In addition, employees’ perception of entrepreneurial leadership strengthens the association between knowledge sharing and IWB.

The study collected data from a developing country during COVID-19 by using a cross-sectional design that may restrict causality. However, the findings suggest the management not only encourages knowledge sharing environment but also engages employees in various training that motivate them to experiment with new ideas and techniques.

This study extends the existing literature on knowledge sharing and IWB by exploring occupational self-efficacy as mediating mechanism and entrepreneurial leadership as a boundary condition.

Financial technology (fintech) has emerged as a major player in the global financial system, providing a range of services such as payments, digital currencies, money transfers, loans, crowdsourcing, and insurance. Fintech startups in Arab countries have also gained traction due to economic openness and globalization. However, concerns remain about the safety, durability, and security of traditional financial services, especially with the increasing use of artificial intelligence (AI) and digitization. The Central Bank of Bahrain and other regulatory authorities need to balance risk avoidance with the global trend toward innovation in fintech, as well as ensure that these technologies are not used for fraud, money laundering, piracy, or terrorist financing. The Bahraini government and supervisory authorities must strike a balance between preserving the integrity and robustness of the financial and banking sector and developing innovation. This can be achieved by adjusting the rhythm of comparison, strengthening and enhancing the safety of banks, achieving financial stability, and ensuring compliance with laws and legislation. It is important to address gaps in regulatory rules, information security, and the business environment, and launch financial awareness at the community level before embracing the potential of fintech and its unseen future development at the level of cryptocurrencies and others. The current work examines the impact of Fintech on the Future of banking in Bahrain and the opportunities and challenges.

Keeping in view the robust growth of Islamic banking around the globe, this study aims to comparatively analyze the association between liquidity creation and liquidity risk for Islamic banks (IBANs) and conventional banks (CBANs) in Pakistan and Malaysia over a period of 2004–2021. The moderating role of bank loan concentration on the aforementioned relationship is also studied.

Regression estimation methods such as fixed effect, random effect and generalized least square are deployed for obtaining results. Liquidity creation Burger Bouwman measure (cat fat and noncat fat) and Basel-III liquidity risk measure (liquidity coverage ratio) are also used.

The results give us insight that liquidity creation is positively and significantly related to liquidity risk in both IBANs and CBANs of Pakistan and Malaysia. This relationship has been moderated negatively (reversed) and significantly by credit concentration showing the importance of risk management and loan portfolio concentration.

It is analyzed that during the process of liquidity creation, IBANs in Pakistan faced more liquidity risk for both on and off-balance sheet transactions in the presence of moderation of loan concentration than IBANs in Malaysia necessitating strategic policy-making for important aspects of liquidity risk management and loan concentration while creating liquidity.

Such studies comparing IBANs and CBANs comparison keeping in view liquidity creation, liquidity risk and loan concentration are either limited or nonexistent.

This study aims to empirically investigate the impact of oil prices, political instability and changes in stability on the bank diversification of the two types of banking systems in the Middle East and North African (MENA) countries.

The study uses bank diversification, stability measurement of probability of default and Zscore by adopting the generalised method of moment for the data between 2007 and 2021. The authors estimate short- and long-run dynamic panel analysis and a robustness test.

The findings reveal that Islamic banks are slightly lower in diversification and stability than conventional peers in the region. Diversification increases with a positive increase in GDP growth, law and order, political stability, bank size, asset quality, oil price, return on equity, profitability and change in banking asset-based stability. The authors found consistency in the two stability measurements in both short- and long-run situations.

Despite the change in banking stability and economic growth and oil prices improved diversification, banks in the region are not diversifying during the crisis period and political instability. Therefore, policymakers should improve mechanisms to monitor the crisis and political unrest to avoid the systemic risk that adversely affects the system through macro-financial linkages in the region.

This study uses change dual stability measurements and oil prices to predict MENA region bank diversification. The authors extended the banking literature by estimating the relationship between crisis periods, political and banking stability, oil prices and other institutional indicators of banking diversification. This study uncovers the effect of the global crisis period on banking diversification and the impact of banking stability changes and validates the models through robustness tests.

This study empirically aims to examine the relationship between Bangladesh’s pharmaceutical industry growth and macroeconomic indicators such as the inflation rate, gross domestic product (GDP) growth, foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows, exchange rate and export growth through the long- and short-run relationship.

Using the time series data from 1986 to 2020, this study was developed based on the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) framework for co-integration. In contrast, the Toda–Yamamoto Granger Causality approach was also used for finding the direction of causality.

This study used the ARDL bounds test, which found strong co-integration among the variables, indicating a long-term relationship between them. In the long run, inflation, exchange rate and export growth significantly positively influence the pharmaceutical industry’s growth. Surprisingly, an FDI inflow has a negative impact. In the short term, the exchange rate and GDP growth were found to influence the growth of the pharmaceutical industry positively. Bidirectional causality between the growth of the pharmaceutical industry and the exchange rate was also identified using the Granger causality approach.

This paper emphasizes developing the policy as well as making concrete decisions regarding the development of the pharmaceutical industry and economic development in Bangladesh. The results also highlight the necessity for strategic macroeconomic management to support this sector’s long-term development and global competitiveness.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is conducted to identify the short- and long-run relationship of pharmaceutical industry development with the economic indicators and progress, where no study has been found on this dimension.

This paper aims to investigate the efficiency and performance of the Islamic banking industry amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

The authors used a two-stage data envelopment analysis to first estimate the efficiency of 78 Islamic banks (IBs) across 15 countries for the 2005–2020 period (a total of 782 bank-year observations) and then to examine their determinants, including the COVID-19 pandemic.

The authors found that the Islamic banking industry performed at a moderate level during the 2005–2020 period, providing evidence that IBs are resilient to the financial shocks created by COVID-19. The authors also found that bank-level characteristics (such as bank size) and country-level characteristics (such as inflation) can contribute to the bank’s operational efficiency.

The results of this study suggested that banking management and government macroeconomic policy, especially in terms of precautions and continuous support, are important for IBs to improve their performance.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to examine the efficiency and performance of IBs amid COVID-19.

This study aims to empirically investigate the impact of political instability on the banking stability of the dual banking system in the Middle East and North African (MENA) countries.

The study measures banking stability with probability of default (PD) and Zscore by employing the generalised method of moment (GMM) between 2007 and 2021 on the dual banking system in the region. The authors further estimate short-long-run situations coupled with a robustness test using a generalised least square (GLS) model.

The authors' findings indicate that institutional factors of political stability, crisis period, high-crisis countries, law and order and macroeconomic indicators influence the two types of banking stability in the region. The authors found the consistency of the factors explaining stability in the region in both short-and long-run situations. Consequently, the study also reveals the adverse effects of crisis periods and high-crisis countries on banking stability.

The results of this study explicitly identify the critical need for sustaining political stability and abiding by laws and order to achieve dual banking stability in the region. Therefore, policymakers may consider allowing the region's banks to operate beyond retail banking since diversification enhances banking stability.

The authors' study balances by employing dual stability measurement in predicting the impact of political instability, law and order and other indicators on the MENA region's two banking models. This study uncovers the effect of the global crisis period on banking stability and high-crisis countries in the region and verifies the models' robustness.

The global financial crisis of 2008 has put greater doubt on the bank risk-management effectiveness around the world. As a part of the response to such doubt, the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region is formulating some feasible approaches to manage bank risk. In this regard, an understanding of the role of the region’s culture and economic freedom will provide immense input into this risk management approach. This study examines the impact of national culture and economic freedom on bank risk-taking behavior.

Data on bank risk measures, culture and economic freedom are obtained from the FitchConnect, World Bank database, Hofstede’s insights and Heritage Foundation. Generalized least squares and two step-system generalized method of moments are then used to examine the risk-taking behavior of the region.

Banks of the GCC region operating in the low power distance, high collectivism, masculine and low uncertainty avoidance cultures are susceptible to assuming more operational and insolvency risks. Furthermore, banks’ overall risk-taking inclination is positively increased once the region has considerable business and monetary freedom.

The governments and bank regulatory bodies may benefit from the study findings by developing the best economic freedom index and national culture that enriches risk management practices and curves excessive risk-taking inclination.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first attempt to address the interplay among culture, economic freedom and bank risk to ensure constructive risk-taking behavior for the GCC banking industry.

A perusal of extant literature suggests asymmetric devotions in empirical research that overlooks unique social and industrial dynamics of married working women in highly competitive male-dominated industries. Drawing on the social role theory, the study addressed this asymmetry by proposing a multivariate regression model that examined performance drivers of married female real estate brokers, as mediated by organizational, cognitive and social influences.

The study employed a descriptive design. A structured electronic questionnaire was used to collect data from a sample of 256 married female brokers who are active on online messaging platforms. Snowball sampling was used to reach the research participants. Collected data were subjected to multivariate regression analysis.

The results infer that social influences were the most significant drivers of married female brokers in the real estate industry (r = 0.932, p < 0.05, F = 556.581). Significant interventions of diversity management, work-life balance, family support and access to economic opportunities were found.

In acknowledging the societal stereotype and culturally imposed burdens married women face in emerging economies, the study advanced theoretical, practical and policy initiatives for a more inclusive, supportive and learning-oriented work environment.

The novelty of the paper lies in its exposition of the unregulated real estate brokerage market in an emerging economy and the dynamic organizational, cognitive and societal influences of married female brokers.