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This paper examines the relationship between sovereign credit default swaps (CDS) and several macroeconomic factors in an asymmetric setting and distinguishes between short-run and long-run impacts. Country-specific factors (e.g. equity index, international reserves, interest rate and industrial production) and global factors (e.g. US stock volatility [VIX], geopolitical risk and oil price) are the main explanatory variables.

This analysis uses a nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag approach that enables us to study both long-run and short-run dynamics.

This study results show that two country-specific factors (equity index and international reserves) and two global factors (VIX and oil price) are the most important factors and affect CDS asymmetrically.

The asymmetric relationships between sovereign CDS and variables in bull and bear markets can also be studied. Consideration of asymmetries in the variance could also be a fruitful step taken for further research.

The findings imply that investors and portfolio managers should design their investment and hedging decisions related to government bonds by taking into account the existence of an asymmetric relationship.

Moreover, policymakers can benefit from this asymmetric information in the timing of debt issuance.

This paper examines the relationship between sovereign CDS and several macroeconomic factors in an asymmetric setting and distinguishes between short-run and long-run impacts.

This paper explores whether the Euro-area sovereign credit default swap market is prone to contagion effects. It investigates whether the sharp increase in sovereign CDS spread of a given country is due to a deterioration of the macroeconomic variables or some form of contagion.

For this purpose, the authors use an innovative approach, i.e. spatial econometrics. Although modeling spatial dependence is an attractive challenge, its application in the field of finance remains limited.

The empirical findings show strong evidence of spatial dependence highlighting the presence of pure contagion. Furthermore, evidence of wake-up call contagion-increased sensitivity of investors to fundamentals of neighboring countries and shift contagion-increased sensitivity to common factors are well recorded.

This study aims to study a crucial financial issue that gained increased research interest, i.e. financial contagion. A methodological contribution is made by extending the standard spatial Durbin model (SDM) to analyze and differentiate between several forms of contagion. The results can be used to understand how shocks are spreading through countries.

This study is the first that aims to investigate international transmission channels of sovereign risk among G20 and explore its influential factors by applying the multidimensional SAR model.

Multiple spatial weight matrices can capture the contiguity of spatial units from various dimensions, which could be exploited to improve the precision of inference as well as prediction accuracy. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to investigate international transmission channels of sovereign risk among G20 and explore its influential factors by applying the multidimensional SAR model.

With network structure analysis, this study finds that they contain different information content from the perspective of graphical display, node strength and correlation. Developed and emerging countries all play major roles in trade connection, while only developed countries play major roles in financial linkage. Second, by applying the multidimensional SAR model, only the spatial autocorrelation coefficients for trade and financial linkages are significant during the full sample period, which is in sharp contrast to published studies using the SAR model with a single matrix. Third, the spillover channels that play major roles in various periods are different. Only trade channel plays a role during crisis periods and it is the most important. Fourth, the spatial correlation among countries greatly amplifies the shock’s impacts on one market. And spatial effect for developed countries is larger than those for emerging countries, while the mean spatial effect of a unit shock in the USA on emerging countries is slightly greater than that on developed countries.

Multiple spatial weight matrices can capture the contiguity of spatial units from various dimensions, which could be exploited to improve the precision of inference as well as prediction accuracy. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to investigate international transmission channels of sovereign risk among G20 and explore its influential factors by applying the multidimensional SAR model.

Life insurance is bought with a prior belief that promise stipulated in policy will be honored when due. Discernibly, this belief is backed by the confidence that financial markets and economy will demonstrate satisfactory performance. However, individuals' confidence levels may get shaken through naïve reinforcement learning if they witness negative market or economic condition. Considering this the authors investigate the relationship between investor confidence and life insurance demand.

The authors used bias corrected bootstrapped sample of OECD economies to examine the link between investor confidence and life insurance demand when two possible economic conditions were witnessed: 1) normal/economic expansion and 2) economic/debt impairment. The findings are robust to alternate estimation techniques and endogeneity.

The authors found that lower investor confidence, sovereign debt impairment and negative market condition will have negative repercussion on life insurance demand. On the other hand, investor confidence-life insurance demand nexus is merely influenced by market and economic condition.

This is a premier research explaining the nexus between investor confidence and life insurance demand in the context of life-cycle hypothesis, sovereign ratings channel and experience-confidence-belief framework. The finding will help economic policy-makers in developing pre-emptive measures to protect life insurance businesses from negative repercussions of lower confidence and negative market conditions.

This study aims to systematically review the literature in the fields of liquidity, informational efficiency and default risk. The authors outline the key research streams and provide possible pathways for future research.

The study adopts bibliographic mapping to identify the most influential studies in the research fields of liquidity, informational efficiency and default risk from 1984 to 2021.

The study identifies four key research themes that include efficiency and transparency of markets; corporate yield spreads; market interactions: bonds, stocks and cryptocurrencies; and corporate governance. By assessing publications published from 2018 to 2021, the authors also document seven key emerging research trends: cross markets, managerial learning and corporate governance, state ownership and government subsidies, international evidence, machine learning (FinTech approaches), environmental themes and financial crisis. Drawing on these emerging trends, the authors highlight the opportunities for future research.

Keyword searches have limitations since some studies might be overlooked if they do not match the specified search criteria, even though their relevance to the topic is under investigation. Adopt the R project to expand this review by incorporating more literature from other databases, such as the Scopus database could be a possible solution.

The four key research streams contribute to a comprehensive understanding of liquidity, informational efficiency and default risk. The emerging trends integrate existing knowledge and leave the chance for innovative research to expand the research frontier.

This study fulfills the systematic literature review streams in the fields of liquidity, informational efficiency and default risk, and provides fruitful opportunities for future research.

This study investigates (1) whether democratization drives sovereign credit ratings (SCR) changes (the “democratic advantage”) or whether SCR changes affect democratization, (2) whether the degree of democratization in sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries affects the associations and (3) whether the associations are significantly affected by resource dependence.

This study investigates the effects of SCR changes on democracy in 22 SSA countries over the period of 2000–2020 VEC Granger causality/block exogeneity Wald tests, and impulse responses and variance decomposition analyses with Cholesky ordering and Monte Carlo standard errors in a panel VECM framework.

The full sample impulse responses find that a SCR shock has a long-run detrimental effect on the democracy and political rights but only a short-run positive impact on civil liberties. Among the sub-samples, it is found that the extent of natural resource dependence does not affect the magnitude of SCR shocks on democratization mentioned above but it is found that a SCR shock affects long-run democracy in SSA countries that are relatively more democratic but is more likely to drive democratic deepening in less democratic SSA countries. The full sample variance decompositions further finds that the variance of SCR to a political rights shock outweighs the effects of all the macroeconomic factors, whereas in more diversified SSA countries, the variances of SCR are much greater for democracy and political rights shocks, which suggests that democratization and political rights in diversified SSA economies are severely affected by SCR changes. In the case of the high and low democracy sub-samples, it is found that the variance of SCR in the relatively higher democracy sub-sample is greater than in the low democracy sub-sample.

These results have three implications for democratization in SSA. First, the effect of a SCR change is not a democratically agnostic and impacts political rights to a greater extent than civil liberties. Second, SCR changes have the potential to spark a negative cycle in SSA countries whereby a downgrade leads to a deterioration in socio-political stability coupled with increased financial economic constraints that in turn drive further downgrades and macroeconomic hardship. Finally, SCR changes are potentially detrimental for democracy in more democratic SSA countries but democratically supportive in less democratic SSA countries. Thus, SSA countries that are relatively politically sophisticated are more exposed to the effects of SCR changes, whereas less politically sophisticated SSA countries can proactively shape their SCRs by undertaking political reforms.

This study is the first to examine the associations between SCR and democracy in SSA. This is critical literature for the Africa’s scholarly work given that the debate on unfair rating actions and claims of subjective rating methods is ongoing.

In Argentina, soy and maize represent 28% of the total country exports, affecting the balance of payments, international reserves accumulation and sovereign credit risk. In the past 10 years, three extreme and moderate droughts have affected the agricultural areas, causing significant losses in soybean and maize production. This study aims to estimate the economic impact generated by different drought levels for soy and maize production areas through a financial perspective that allows the estimation of the cash flow and income losses.

By analyzing the extreme deviations in yields during dry periods, the losses generated by droughts were valuated among 183 departments nationwide.

The aggregated results indicated a total loss of US$24.170m, representing 57.45% of the international reserves of the Argentinean Central Bank in 2021. This estimate shows the magnitude of the climate impact on the Argentinean economy, indicating that severe droughts have macroeconomic impacts, with the external sector as the main transmission channel in an economy with historic restrictions on the balance of payments, international reserve accumulation and sovereign credit risk.

This study analyses the macroeconomic impact of drought on Argentinean soybean and maize production.

Providing loans, particularly to small-scale farmers, is one of the roles of formal financial institutions. Lending to small farmers is risky. An institution's health is closely related to the institution's ability to manage credit and portfolio risk. Expanding smallholder farmers' access to finance while maintaining a sustainable financial system is essential; however, pandemics present additional challenges. Accordingly, as reported in the literature, the pandemic's high loan default rates and decreases in return on assets (ROAs) call for further credit risk management research. There have been limited studies on credit risk management during coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), so this article aims to provide useful information on its influences.

Researchers used data from formal financial institutions in 2018 (before COVID-19) and in 2021 (during COVID-19) to accomplish the study's broad objective. Descriptive and inferential statistics were the main analytical tools. The credit risk management indicators were categorized into collateral management, loan management, loan recovery management, governance and Information and Communication Technology (ICT). Weights were assigned to each category based on the importance to credit risk management. A binary logit model was employed in assessing the factors influencing credit risk management as proxied to loan repayment, while Ordinary Least Square (OLS) was used to examine factors that influence ROAs.

One of the most noteworthy findings is that credit risk management is affected by different factors and magnitudes before and during the COVID-19 era. Loan recovery and ICT management indicators were most influential during the pandemic. In addition, the study noted that low agricultural productivity during the pandemic contributed to an additional challenge in loan default rates because of various COVID-19-containing measures. Additionally, there was a lack of governance and ICT management capacity to drive credit and portfolio risk management during the epidemic.

The paper presents new empirical findings on credit risk management during the COVID-19 era. The study used a methodology which has not been used previously in credit risk management in Nigerian financial institutions. Therefore, this research could become the cornerstone of further academic research in other developing countries using this methodology.

Applying universal ownership theory and drawing on a multiplecase study design, this study aims to analyze what drives institutional investors to engage with government entities and what challenges they find in the process.

The authors relied on document analysis and conducted 12 semi-structured interviews with representatives from asset owners, asset managers, investor associations and academia.

The authors identify a trend where investors conduct policy engagement to fulfill their fiduciary duty, improve investment risk management and create an enabling environment for sustainable investments. As for engagement challenges, investors report the longer-term horizon, a perceived limited influence toward governments, the need for capacity building for investors and governments, as well as the difficulty in accessing government representatives.

This research contributes to filling a gap in the literature on this new form of investor activism, as a growing number of investors engage with sovereign entities on environmental, social and governance issues.

Purpose: This chapter presents a discussion of the COVID-19 global debt crisis.

Methodology: The chapter uses the discourse analysis method to identify the cause of the COVID-19 global debt crisis and suggests ways to overcome the crisis.

Findings: The chapter argues that the high debt incurred by many countries during the COVID1-19 pandemic, combined with tightening global financial conditions, led to a significant increase in global debt. The author suggests ideas to avert a debt crisis. It was argued that rich countries could forgive the debt owed to them by heavily indebted countries or consider interest repayment holidays, debt-for-green swaps, or other debt-relief options. Heavily indebted countries can consider restructuring their debt, reevaluating their economic policy priorities, and raising taxes. Multilateral organisations can assist heavily indebted countries and engage in debt forgiveness advocacy.

Implication: There is a need for rich countries and creditor organisations to offer some relief to heavily indebted countries to help them meet their debt repayment obligations during and after the pandemic.

Originality: The chapter is one of the first to analyse the global COVID-19 debt situation.