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The Financial Stability Board (FSB) determined that entities classified as shadow banking are of a credit nature because they are capable of affecting the financial system through the entry and exit of capital. This study aims at measuring the impact of shadow banking in the systemic risk in Chile. A sample of 91 institutions (Run) belonging to the mutual funds was used, with a series showing a continuous behaviour between 2004 and 2018.

The measurement is carried out using the conditional value at risk (CoVaR) methodology, which analyses the behaviour of an institution in a regular state against the same institution in a state of stress.

The results obtained reflect that liquidity mismatches do not have a relevant effect on the systemic risk, while the 2008 crisis does contribute to its decline.

There are less number of literature studies that apply statistical models regarding shadow banking, at least at a quantitative level, so this research is a beginning for other studies, supporting future authors in their new research as a basis.

El Consejo de Estabilidad Financiera determinó que las entidades clasificadas como Shadow Banking son de carácter crediticio debido a que son capaces de afectar al sistema financiero mediante la entrada y salida de capitales. Este estudio tiene como objetivo medir el impacto del Shadow Banking en el Riesgo Sistémico de Chile. Para esto se utilizó una muestra de 91 instituciones (Run) pertenecientes a los Fondos Mutuos, con series que muestran un comportamiento continuo entre 2004 y 2018.

La medición se lleva a cabo mediante la metodología CoVaR, la cual analiza la conducta de una institución en estado normal versus la misma institución en estado de estrés.

Los resultados obtenidos reflejan que los desajustes de liquidez no tienen un efecto relevante en el Riesgo Sistémico, mientras que la crisis del 2008 si contribuye a la disminución de este.

Existe muy poca literatura que aplica modelos estadísticos respecto al Shadow Banking, al menos a nivel cuantitativo, por lo que esta investigación es un inicio para otros estudios, apoyando como base a futuros autores en sus nuevas investigaciones.

With its impact already felt, the construction industry worldwide is gradually reviving following the lifting up of lockdowns amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Though some articles have been written regarding its impact on the construction industry in other countries, much is yet to be known concerning the current impact in Ghana. This study aims to examine the impact of COVID-19 on Ghana’s construction industry and assess how construction companies are contributing to the fight against COVID-19.

Semi-structured interviews with nine key professionals working with D1K1 firms currently working on projects of almost similar sizes within the confines of a reputable tertiary institution in Ghana were conducted over a span of three weeks. Thematic analysis was conducted with Nvivo 12 Pro Application software.

From the findings, the major impact includes: a decrease in work rate, delays in payments and an increase in the cost of materials arising from border closure. On the measures by construction companies in contributing to the fight against the pandemic, findings indicated: educating the workforce on the virus, the provision of PPEs, regular and effective checks on entry and exit from the site.

The study is significant, as knowledge of the impact posed by the pandemic will provide some idea of the measures to put in place to ensure the gradual to full recovery of the industry.

The originality of this study lies in the fact that it is a pioneering study on the impact of COVID-19 on the Ghanaian construction industry.

The correlation between work and life satisfaction varies substantially across studies, suggesting that the strength of the relationship may depend on the studied population and its circumstances. The purpose of this paper is to assess the strength of the relationship in the context of Chile and the moderator effect of self-employment (SE), whether a worker is self-employed or on a salary.

Based on the idea that work plays a more central role in the life of a self-employed person than in that of a salaried worker, the authors hypothesized that the strength of the relationship between work and life satisfaction will be stronger for the former. The measures used in this study were part of a large questionnaire administered to investigate several characteristics of the Chilean population. The authors used multiple regression analysis to test the moderator effect of SE on the strength of the relationship between work satisfaction and life satisfaction.

The results from a national sample of 658 Chilean workers indicate that the relationship between work satisfaction and life satisfaction is positive. Furthermore, the relationship is stronger for self-employed workers than for salaried workers. The authors also found a small negative direct effect of SE on life satisfaction, which suggests that the self-employed might be, on average, less satisfied with their lives than their salaried counterparts.

The sample used in the current study was not only substantially larger in size but also more representative of the current workforce because it included both genders. Consequently, the results are more robust and generalizable.

La correlación entre trabajo y satisfacción con la vida varía considerablemente entre estudios, lo cual sugiere que la fortaleza de la relación puede depender de la población estudiada y sus circunstancias. Dado lo anterior, evaluamos la fuerza de la relación en el contexto de Chile y el efecto moderador del trabajo por cuenta propia – si un empleado trabaja por cuenta propia o es asalariado.

Basándonos en la premisa de que el trabajo juega un rol más importante en la vida de un trabajador por cuenta propia que en la de un trabajador asalariado, se evalúa la hipótesis de que la relación entre el trabajo y la satisfacción con la vida será más fuerte para el primero. Las medidas utilizadas en este trabajo fueron parte de un estudio mayor destinado a investigar distintas características de la población chilena. Se utilizó análisis de regresión múltiple para probar el efecto moderador del trabajo por cuenta propia en la fuerza de la relación entre la satisfacción laboral y satisfacción con la vida.

Los resultados obtenidos a partir de una muestra nacional de 658 trabajadores chilenos indican que la relación entre la satisfacción laboral y la satisfacción con la vida es positiva. Además, esta relación es más fuerte para trabajadores autónomos que para trabajadores asalariados. De igual manera, también se determinó un leve efecto negativo directo del trabajo por cuenta propia en la satisfacción con la vida, lo cual sugiere que los trabajadores por cuenta propia podrían estar, en promedio, menos satisfechos con sus vidas que sus homólogos asalariados.

La muestra utilizada en este estudio no sólo es sustancialmente grande en tamaño, sino que es también altamente representativa de la fuerza laboral actual porque incluye ambos géneros. En consecuencia, los resultados son más robustos y generalizables.

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has negatively affected project management organisations especially those conducting large construction projects that involve a large number of people, complex supply chains, and lack of experience and preliminary arrangements in managing remote work. This study aims to analyse the impact of COVID-19 on the construction sector and how to minimise the effect of pandemic disruptions.

This study is based on the reviews of relevant reports, articles and semi-structured interviews of the construction experts working in the Pakistan construction industry during the current COVID-19 pandemic. The primary data for this study were collected through semi-structured interviews with the construction experts and analysed them using thematic analysis. A total of 15 semi-structured interviews were conducted in this study.

Through thematic analysis, this study identified approximately 55 initial raw data themes, 15 first-order themes, 11 second-order themes and 4 general dimensions of the impact of COVID-19 on the construction sector. The authors identified working style and behavioural changes, challenges and risks, stakeholders and new directions for the construction sector in the post-pandemic world as the four main dimensions of the effect of the pandemic on the construction sector. Further, least digitalisation, complex cash flow, abundance of labour-intensive methods, diverse stakeholders, and dependencies on foreign expertise, imported material and machineries were identified as the most important reasons for poor resiliency of the construction sector during COVID-19 pandemic in Pakistan.

This study major contributions are: (1) analysing the impact of COVID-19 on the construction sector in relation to Pakistan, (2) discussing new directions for the construction sector and (3) putting in place a set of mitigation measures that will help minimise disruptions in construction-related projects to ensure that set objectives are achieved.

The COVID-19 health crisis has brought about a set of extra health and safety regulations, and procedures to the construction industry which could influence projects' economic performance (EP). The aim of this paper is to examine the effect of adopting COVID-19 safety protocols on construction sites on the economic performance (EP) of construction projects.

Employing the survey method using a structured questionnaire, data were collected from small- and large-sized construction projects in Nigeria and analysed using partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) technique.

The findings reveal that job re-organization and sanitization have negative significant effects on EP, while social distancing and specific training have no effect on EP. Furthermore, project size moderates the relationship between job re-organization, sanitization, specific training and EP with the stronger effect on the relationships observed in big projects, except for the relationship between sanitization and EP where the moderating relationship is stronger in small projects. However, there is no significant moderating effect of project size on the relationship between social distancing and EP.

As construction project sites continue to operate amidst strict safety protocols, this study offers theoretical and practical insights on how construction projects can adhere to the safety protocols while performing economically.

The originality of this study's findings stems from the fact that it is among the first to provide greater insight on how construction projects have fared economically considering the impact of the various COVID-19 protocols.

The construction industry is a crucial industry for national development worldwide. Because the construction industry is tied to national and international economic activities, the COVID-19 outbreak has limited construction projects. Therefore, this study investigates the most influential factors regarding COVID-19 and their effects on the construction industry.

The potential impacts of COVID-19 on the construction industry were identified through a realistic literature review and interviews with professionals. A questionnaire was distributed via e-mail to architects, civil engineers and contractors who play vital roles during the construction processes. The data were analysed using SPSS 22 and LISREL 8.7 software to quantify the most influential pandemic-related factors faced by the construction industry.

Ten influential pandemic factors affecting the construction industry in Turkey were identified. Among them, “increased costs and price escalations due to shortage of raw materials and supply chain disruption” and “challenges with payment and cash flows” were determined as the most influential pandemic factors.

This research aims to advance comprehension of pandemic impacts and contributes an incipient assessment framework based on 10 determined pandemic factors. Therefore, contractors, architects and civil engineers may analyse their weaknesses and organise precise priorities so that their firms may remain competitive, thus minimising the adverse impact of COVID-19 and possible forthcoming waves.

Few studies have identified the effect of pandemics on the construction industry qualitatively, forcing management to make projections to the current situation. Moreover, no study has provided insights into the influential factors of pandemics using quantitative methods. Therefore, this study comprehensively and quantitatively determines the relevant COVID-19 pandemic factors using exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and utilises confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and structural equation modelling to present a structural model of how pandemic factors affect the Turkish construction industry.

The aim of the study is to show that merging two areas of mathematics – topology and discrete optimization – could result in a viable option to solve classical or specialized integer problems.

In the paper, discrete topology concepts are applied to propose a metaheuristic algorithm that is capable to solve binary programming problems. Particularly, some of the homotopy for paths principles are used to explore the solution space associated with four well-known NP-hard problems herein considered as follows: knapsack, set covering, bi-level single plant location with order and one-max.

Computational experimentation confirms that the proposed algorithm performs in an effective manner, and it is able to efficiently solve the sets of instances used for the benchmark. Moreover, the performance of the proposed algorithm is compared with a standard genetic algorithm (GA), a scatter search (SS) method and a memetic algorithm (MA). Acceptable results are obtained for all four implemented metaheuristics, but the path homotopy algorithm stands out.

A novel metaheuristic is proposed for the first time. It uses topology concepts to design an algorithmic framework to solve binary programming problems in an effective and efficient manner.

COVID-19 came as a surprise to the global economy and devastated many sectors worldwide, including the construction sector. Small construction firms are believed to be an engine of growth in many developing countries, including Ghana; thus, their survival cannot be trivialized. This study explored the impact of the COVID-19 on the businesses of the small confirms in Ghana.

A qualitative research approach was adopted for this study. Open-ended interview questions were distributed via email to 45 small construction firms (D3K3 and D4K4) purposefully selected. Thematic contents analysis was used to analyze 30 interview questions received.

This study has revealed that the COVID-19 has severely affected small construction firms in Ghana. Small construction firms are struggling in their finances; their cash flow/payments for work done are severely affected; they cannot secure contracts and management site efficiently. Their worker's productivity level has dwindled, which has subsequently escalated their project cost and completion time. These effects identified are significantly affecting the survival of these small construction firms.

The study included small construction operating in the Central, Western and Greater Accra regions of Ghana during the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the findings may be applicable to construction sites outside these regions.

The implication is the COVID-19 pandemic hugely impacts the small construction firm's business operations. Therefore, they must be mindful of the new norm (COVID-19) and institute strategies to help them overcome the challenges and sustain their businesses.

The study gives insight into the effects of the COVID-19 on the businesses of small construction firms in Ghana and proposes strategies that they must implement to overcome their challenges and sustain their businesses.