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In this paper, the authors study the phenomenon of price clustering in the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX), a market viewed as one of the best-performing stock markets in the world during 2014–2017. The authors study the effect of stock-level variables on price clustering and analyze the determinants of the cross-sectional patterns of price clustering in the PSX, in particular the causal link between price clustering and political instability.

The authors' dataset comprises daily observations on 100 PSX stocks spanning from January 1, 2009 to June 30, 2019. The authors use multivariate regression and spectral analysis to shed light on the dynamics of stock price clustering in PSX.

The authors document abnormally high levels of stock price clustering, particularly on integer increments, in PSX. The nature of stock price clustering in PSX is consistent with the negotiation hypothesis of Harris (1991). The levels of stock price clustering on PSX are persistent and contain a cyclical component. Furthermore, the authors find that political uncertainty in Pakistan is a significant contributor to the high levels of price clustering on PSX. The authors' conclusions are robust to alternative econometric specifications and different measures of price clustering and political uncertainty.

The authors' findings are of interest to investors and policymakers. Since price clustering decreases market quality and degrades the information content of stock prices, the authors' study shows that price efficiency in PSX has not improved despite major reforms over the last decade. One practical implication of the authors' results is that investors should be cautious while rebalancing portfolios around political events such as general elections because stock price clustering increases in the PSX during these periods. As a result, stock prices are likely to deviate from their intrinsic values.

Research on price clustering is limited to developed markets, and emerging/frontier markets have been largely overlooked. The phenomenon of price clustering in the PSX has yet to be studied, despite the relevance of the PSX for emerging/frontier market investors.

Throughout the 21st century, US households have experienced unprecedented levels of leverage. This dynamic has been exacerbated by income shortfalls during the COVID-19 crisis. Leveraging and deleveraging decisions affect household consumption. This study investigates the effect of the dynamics of household leverage and consumption on the stock market.

The authors explore the relation between household leverage and consumption in the context of the consumption capital asset pricing model (CCAPM). The authors test the model's implication that leverage has a negative risk premium by transforming the asset pricing restriction into an unconditional linear factor model and estimate the model using the general method of moments procedure. The authors run time-series regressions to estimate individual stocks' exposures to leverage, and cross-sectional regressions to investigate the leverage risk premium.

The authors show that shocks to household debt have strong and lasting effects on consumption growth. The authors extend the CCAPM to accommodate this effect and find, using various test assets, a negative risk premium associated with household deleveraging. Looking at individual stocks the authors show that the deleveraging risk premium is not explained by well-known risk factors.

This paper contributes to the literature on the role of leverage in economics and finance by establishing a relation between household leverage and spending decisions. The authors provide novel evidence that households' leveraging and deleveraging decisions can be a fundamental and influential force in determining asset prices. Further, this paper argues that household leverage might explain the small, persistent, and predictable component in consumption growth hypothesised in the long-run risk asset pricing literature.

This study aims to examine the herding behavior of socially responsible exchange traded funds (SR ETFs) in comparison to conventional ETFs during the COVID-19 pandemic.

To test for herding behavior, the authors use the cross-sectional absolute deviation and a quadratic market model.

During the pandemic, investments in socially responsible financial products grew rapidly. And investors in the popular SR ETFs herd during this special period, while holders of conventional ETFs did not.

Investors in socially responsible investments must do their own research and make their own financial decisions, rather than follow the crowd, especially during extreme events like the COVID-19 pandemic.

The evidence shows that, during the pandemic, socially responsible ETFs behaved in line with theoretical predictions of herding, that is, herding is more significant during extreme market conditions.

Food delivery robot service (FDRS) is a novel service using autonomous delivery robots that alters human delivery in mobile food ordering. Despite FDRS companies’ skyrocketing service expansions throughout the USA, there has been limited understanding of customer perceived value, customer satisfaction and loyalty which is imperative to promote repeat sales. Therefore, this study aims to examine customer perceived value of FDRS, identify antecedents of customer satisfaction with FDRS and investigate the additional impact of customer satisfaction and loyalty toward FDRS and the restaurant using FDRS.

As a sample population, this study targeted the US customers over 18 years old and have used FDRS within the past 12 months. With a total of 323 responses, descriptive statistics, confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling were conducted for data analysis.

The findings of this study demonstrate the positive impacts of functional, price and emotional value on customer satisfaction. The current study also shows that customer satisfaction positively influences customer loyalty toward FDRS and the restaurant.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, the current study is arguably the first to investigate customers’ post-purchase experience with FDRS, which enhances understanding of customer behavior toward the service. Moreover, with a multidimensional consumption value approach from the theory of consumption values, this study provides a single framework to explore the relations between customer perceived value, satisfaction and loyalty in the FDRS context.

食品配送机器人服务（FDRS）是一种使用自主配送机器人改变移动食品订购的新型服务。尽管FDRS公司在美国各地的服务扩张迅猛, 但对于顾客感知价值、顾客满意度和忠诚度的理解仍有限, 而这对于促进重复销售至关重要。因此, 本研究旨在考察顾客对FDRS的感知价值, 确定影响顾客对FDRS满意度的先决条件, 并调查顾客对FDRS及使用FDRS的餐厅的满意度和忠诚度的影响。

本研究以美国18岁以上并且在过去12个月内使用过FDRS的顾客为样本, 共收集到323份回答。采用描述性统计、确认性因素分析和结构方程模型进行数据分析。

本研究的结果显示功能性、价格和情感价值对顾客满意度有积极影响。当前研究还表明, 顾客满意度对FDRS及餐厅的忠诚度有积极影响。

本研究可以说是首次调查顾客对FDRS购买后的体验, 从而增进对顾客对该服务行为的理解。此外, 本研究采用了来自消费价值理论的多维消费价值方法, 为探索FDRS背景下顾客感知价值、满意度和忠诚度之间的关系提供了一个单一的框架。

The study examines how the liquid assets holdings among non-financial Indian firms vary due to tightening monetary policy and increasing macroeconomic uncertainty.

The authors analyze 5,640 firms for the period 2011–2021. The authors first estimate India’s monetary policy shocks by decomposing the exogenous shocks from the systematic component of monetary policy changes. The authors then examine the effects of the estimated monetary policy shocks and a range of macroeconomic and policy uncertainty indicators on companies’ cash and bank balances to asset ratios using two-step system generalized method of moments (GMM) estimators.

The authors find that monetary policy shocks cause the cross-sectional variances for the firms’ liquidity holdings to increase. In anticipation of macroeconomic volatility, companies respond to these shocks after taking into account all the firm-level information to minimize the opportunity costs of holding extra cash or too few cash balances that can hamper firms’ operations. Furthermore, compared to other shocks, the contribution of inflation-induced shocks is predicted to be the largest in the cross-sectional deviation of the firm’s cash holdings. The authors also find that low-growth, older and financially constrained firms observe lesser heterogeneity in their cash holdings as they tend to hold cash as a precautionary buffer.

The authors’ approach to the analysis is unique in many ways. To address potential transmission bias, the authors use nowcasts and forecasts of real gross domestic product (GDP) growth and inflation to generate a series of exogenous monetary policy shocks for identifying unanticipated changes in short-term interest rates. Subsequently, the authors estimate how these shocks affect the cross-sectional deviation of liquid assets. For estimating the effects of macroeconomic uncertainty on corporate cash demand, the authors utilize a range of proxies for uncertainty. Unlike previous attempts, the authors offer evidence for a developing and fast-emerging economy.

The purpose of this study is to find out the effect of consumption tax on savings behavior especially on the people who are close to their retirement.

The authors analyze the response in spending and retirement saving using a difference-in-differences regression methodology. The authors use the year since the Public Provident Fund (PPF) enrollment date for each individual as a random assignment to identify the service tax policy's causal impact. Therefore, this variable is a continuous variable defined as an individual's age until the end of the restrictions when people can withdraw money from their retirement savings account PPF without any penalty. The treatment variable is the service tax shock (increase in service tax) that happened effective 1st April 2015.

The authors find a significant effect of a change in the service tax rate on individuals' spending and PPF saving behavior. On average, individuals lower their consumption by about 14% and increase their PPF savings by 16% in response to the increase in the service tax rate. The authors find substantial heterogeneity in effect across different types of individuals. The effect is more pronounced for people closer to their retirement and needy people (defined as individuals with low traditional savings account balances).

The authors studied the effect of consumption tax on one category of savings (PPF) only. There are other savings instruments available in India. The data for those were not available to us.

This paper not only throws light on the consumption and savings behaviour of the individuals, but will also help the policy maker for framing appropriate fiscal policy.

Using a unique and proprietary data from a large bank in India, the authors analyze the effect of a tax policy change on households' consumption and retirement savings behavior. The authors find that households reduce their consumption by 14% and increase their voluntary retirement savings (Public Provident Fund aka PPF) by 16% in response to an increase in the service tax policy. Individuals close to their retirement age (55 years of age and above) and without any withdrawal restrictions from their PPF account tend to reduce their expenditures more and save more. Individuals with financial constraints and withdrawal restrictions do not reduce their expenditures significantly. To the best of the authors’ knowledge no study was done on this.

This paper explores the empirical relationship between population age structure and bilateral trade.

The author includes age structure in both log and Poisson pseudo-maximum likelihood (PPML) formulations of the gravity equation of trade. The author studies relative age effects, using differences in the demographic structure of each country-pair.

The author finds that a relatively larger share of population in working age increases bilateral exports. This is robust to various estimation models, as well as to changes in the method of specifying the demographic controls. Old-age shares have a negative, but less robustly estimated impact on trade. Estimating instead the balance of trade between trading partners produces similar results, with positive effects of age structure peaking later in working life.

Global populations are poised to undergo a massive transition. Trade a crucial way that the demographic deficits of one country may be offset by the dividends of another as comparative advantages shift along with the size and strength of their underlying workforce.

The author’s work is among the first to quantify the effect of relative age structure between two countries and their bilateral trade flows. Focusing on the aggregate flows, relative age shares and PPML estimates of the trade relationship, this paper provides the most comprehensive picture to date on how age structure affects trade.

Responsible management has become a business imperative in an era of growing governmental and public scrutiny of managerial practices and accountability. Top-down attempts at developing transparent codes of practice or agenda statements have been ineffective, especially given the difficulties of aligning responsibility needs with traditional performance indicators. Thus, we argue, there is a pertinent need to foster a sustainable sense of moral responsibility at the organizational frontline. We posit that stewardship offers a foundation for developing sustainable solutions based on aligning the interests of stakeholders and balancing longer-term and shorter-term benefits. Three principal stakeholders are involved at the organisational frontline; frontline management (FLM), frontline employees (FLE) and customers. Accordingly, we identify three key areas requiring development: stewardship-based control systems, climate and customers on the organizational frontline. We illustrate these areas with pertinent research and, hence, collate a research agenda across these areas to facilitate the development and embedding of responsible management based on a stewardship foundation.

Subcontracting is a crucial cause behind the simultaneous existence of formal and informal entrepreneurship in India. This article aims to provide an over-time comparative analysis between the subcontracted and the non-subcontracted enterprises within the informal sector. Further, it also brings to fore the contribution of subcontracting towards ensuring sustainability of the informal enterprises.

By constructing a panel data from two rounds of NSS Unincorporated Enterprise Survey Data (2010 and 2015), and employing a PSM-DID method, considering labour productivity and net retained earnings as two critical indicators of growth and development of the informal sector firms, this study has made some broad claims regarding the differences in immediate and long run performances between the subcontracted and non-subcontracted informal sector enterprises in India.

This study finds that subcontracted enterprises have not only been performing at a much lower level than the non-subcontracted enterprises, they are also growing much slowly than their counterparts. However, it has been observed that for the establishments, who are capital abundant and also have a larger production capacity, subcontracting is showing the prospect for deriving sustainable gains.

This article contributes to the existing literature in the following two ways. Firstly, it provides an over-time comparative analysis between the subcontracted and the non-subcontracted enterprises within the informal sector. Secondly, it brings to fore the contribution of subcontracting towards ensuring sustainability of the informal enterprises.

This study aims to investigate the role of negative media coverage of environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues in deterring tax avoidance. Inspired by media agenda-setting theory and legitimacy theory, this study hypothesises that an increase in ESG negative media coverage should cause a reputational drawback, leading companies to reduce tax avoidance to regain their legitimacy. Hence, this study examines a novel channel that links ESG and taxation.

This study uses panel regression analysis to examine the relationship between negative media coverage of ESG issues and tax avoidance among the largest European entities. This study considers different measures of tax avoidance and negative media coverage.

The results show that negative media coverage of ESG issues is negatively associated with tax avoidance, suggesting that media can act as an external monitor for corporate taxation.

The findings have implications for policymakers and regulators, which should consider tax transparency when dealing with ESG disclosure requirements. Tax disclosure should be integrated into ESG reporting.

The study has social implications related to the media, which act as watchdogs for firms’ irresponsible practices. According to this study’s findings, increased media pressure has the power to induce a better alignment between declared ESG policies and tax strategies.

This study contributes to the literature on the mechanisms that discourage tax avoidance and the literature on the relationship between ESG and taxation by shedding light on the role of media coverage.