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The purpose of this paper is to explain the European Market Infrastructure Regulation, known as EMIR, adopted on July 4, 2012 as the Regulation on OTC Derivatives, Central Counterparties and Trade Repositories.

The paper explains EMIR's clearing and reporting requirements, who is within the scope of those requirements, who is a financial and non‐financial counterparty, the clearing thresholds, the clearing and reporting obligations, when those obligations will begin, the risk mitigation obligations, and a range of potential questions anyone trading in OTC derivatives should consider.

EMIR requires that all standardized OTC derivatives contracts be cleared through a central counterparty and reported to a trade repository.

The paper provides practical guidance by experienced financial services lawyers.

The purpose of this paper is to answer a specific research question: How have EU and US regulators translated the idea of central clearing into law?

A meticulous legal research is carried out. First, the pre‐crisis regulatory regime for credit default swap (CDS) is reviewed, from a securities law angle as well as from a comparative Euro‐American perspective. Next, the regulatory processes leading to the adoption of the central clearing regulations are discussed. Thereafter, a material comparative analysis is made of the provisions related to central clearing in the EU and US regulatory initiatives. Finally, the paper is concluded with an evaluation of both legislations in the light of all previous analyses.

The research first shows that central clearing regulations rely on a series of presumptions, both concerning the gravity of counterparty risk threats and the necessity of central clearing. Additionally, the EU and US clearing regulations are similar with regard to the broad innovations they introduce, i.e. the mandatory central clearing of a variety of over‐the‐counter derivatives and counterparty risk management requirements for central clearing institutions and for non‐cleared swaps. However, the specific content of the provisions often differs. Furthermore, both legislations are limited to enouncing broad principles. This is also the case for the crucial provisions related to counterparty risk management. Therefore, these provisions in se do not guarantee the proper regulation of counterparty risk management practices. Consequently, much is to be expected from the implementing measures adopted by regulatory institutions.

The paper provides an overview of those provisions in the European and US regulations that specifically concern central clearing for CDS. It is one of the first papers which does this in a very well‐structured and clearly written manner. Also it is one of the first to provide a clear comparison between the provisions in the EU and the US regulations.

The role of insurance is a backbone for consumers to secure their future. It is important to know where to invest and what are the benefits. Therefore, for the Muslim segment, Islamic insurance system provides Riba (interest)-free environment where consumers invest their money and recover their losses according to sharia. This paper aims to examine the determinants that influence purchase intention of consumers toward Islamic insurance (Takaful) adoption in Pakistan with the help of the modified theory of planned behavior (TPB).

The authors added four specific variables related to Islamic sharia compliance in the conventional form of the TPB. The relationship among the variables is assessed by using partial least squares structural equation modeling, while the data are collected from 305 respondents.

The results suggest that attitude, subjective norm and perceived behavioral control are strong predictors of an Islamic insurance adoption in Pakistan. Moreover, factors such as compatibility, relative advantage and awareness have positive and significant impacts on takaful participation. A negative but insignificant relation is found between perceived risk and intention.

This paper provides insight for understanding the factors that lead to consumers' purchase intention of Islamic insurance.

This paper makes a unique contribution to the literature with reference to Pakistan, being a pioneering attempt to investigate the factors of Islamic insurance adoption by modifying the TPB and applying more rigorous statistical techniques like confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and partial least square structural equation modeling.

The Bureau of Economics in the Federal Trade Commission has a three-part role in the Agency and the strength of its functions changed over time depending on the preferences and ideology of the FTC’s leaders, developments in the field of economics, and the tenor of the times. The over-riding current role is to provide well considered, unbiased economic advice regarding antitrust and consumer protection law enforcement cases to the legal staff and the Commission. The second role, which long ago was primary, is to provide reports on investigations of various industries to the public and public officials. This role was more recently called research or “policy R&D”. A third role is to advocate for competition and markets both domestically and internationally. As a practical matter, the provision of economic advice to the FTC and to the legal staff has required that the economists wear “two hats,” helping the legal staff investigate cases and provide evidence to support law enforcement cases while also providing advice to the legal bureaus and to the Commission on which cases to pursue (thus providing “a second set of eyes” to evaluate cases). There is sometimes a tension in those functions because building a case is not the same as evaluating a case. Economists and the Bureau of Economics have provided such services to the FTC for over 100 years proving that a sub-organization can survive while playing roles that sometimes conflict. Such a life is not, however, always easy or fun.

This paper aims to understand Japan’s financial regulatory responses after the global financial crisis and recession. Japan’s post-crisis reactions show two seemingly opposing trends: collaboration with international organizations to strengthen the regulation to maintain financial stability, and regulatory forbearance for the banks with troubled small and medium enterprise [SME] borrowers. The paper evaluates the responses by the Japanese financial regulators in five areas (Basel III, stress tests, over-the-counter [OTC] derivatives regulation, recovery and resolution planning and banking policy for SME lending) and concludes that the effectiveness of the new regulations for financial stability critically depends on the willingness of the regulators to use the new tools.

This report evaluates the post-crisis responses by the Japanese financial authorities in five dimensions (Basel III, stress tests, OTC derivatives regulations, recovery and resolution planning and bank supervision).

The effectiveness of the new regulations for financial stability critically depends on the willingness of the regulators to use the new tools.

The paper is the first attempt to evaluate the financial regulatory trends in Japan after the global financial crisis.

Discussion of security in supply chains has been intensified since the tragedy of 9/11 in the United States. The World Customs Organization's SAFE Framework with its Authorized Economic Operators (AEO) program is one of the prominent supply chain security initiatives. At the time of its introduction in 2005, 168 member countries signed their support for its implementation. However, the last AEO Compendium reports only 69 countries currently have AEO program in place. This relatively slow development indicates the complexity of issues that might challenge countries to implement the initiative. Against this background, this paper aims to look at the AEO implementation in an environment where supply chain security initiative is relatively new. It focuses on policy development perspectives where the case study of Indonesia might represent challenges of other countries. Involving methods of desk research, interviews, and field observation, this paper starts with the development of various international supply chain security programs where the AEO finds it prominence. It follows with a discussion on the Indonesian AEO implementation where challenges and its policy development process are explored.

The purpose of this paper is to explain the link between national business system (NBS) and innovation decisions at the firm level by offering sequentially ordered sense-making mechanisms that enable the formation of firm-specific knowledge repositories and knowledge-processing capabilities.

This study engages in an extensive scale development effort to collect representative data about the NBS in the Pakistani setting, complemented by relevant validity and reliability tests. The overall theoretical model was tested on 214 firms by means of a structural equation modeling approach, using partial least-squares algorithms.

The results statistically supported the role of firm-level knowledge repositories (intellectual capital) and knowledge exploration and exploitation capabilities (absorptive capacity) as sequential mediators in the association of NBS and firm-level innovation. Besides, bridging networks of lateral ties among Pakistani businesses are found to be more effective than bonding networks of vertical ties in encouraging radical innovations.

This study significantly extends the literature about the NBS approach. It provides specific sense-making mechanisms (i.e. priming, triggering and editing) about how abstract institutional templates constituted at the business system level are translated into firm-level actionable sets by the help of intangible resource repositories and processes that guide knowledge exploration and exploitation.

This paper aims to identify the barriers that are linked to the institutional, external and social environmental factors in the emerging economies of South-East Asia (SEA). Through a comparative analysis of China, India and Pakistan, this study attempts to understand the constraints that might inhibit small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in this region from becoming more successful.

This study proposes an empirical research framework to identify the constraints to determinants of SMEs’ growth (the CDSG model) in an important geographic and industrial cluster of SEA countries including China, India and Pakistan. Six propositions are tested, using data from 1,443 SMEs obtained from Enterprise Survey Data Repository database from the World Bank. Ordinary least-squares estimation is applied for statistical analyses and testing of the research propositions.

The results show the differential effects of the proposed CDSG model in China, India and Pakistan. Access to external finance is found to be irrelevant to the growth of SMEs in China, while it has a positive influence in India and Pakistan. Furthermore, in terms of the innovation process, partial mediation is traced. Using the tax rate factor, negative mediation is found between CDSG variables and SMEs’ growth. Both mediators play different roles in firm growth activities, while the level of significance of some variables is found to be more relevant to a specific region rather than to all.

The prudent management of the proposed CDSG variables could revolutionize the constraints facing SME growth, making them into success factors. This could invigorate the growth of SMEs’ in SEA countries. The paper concludes with practical implications for policymakers and investors.

This SMEs’ theoretical framework is the first to use innovation and tax rate mediators to highlight the determinants of business growth in three SEA regional economies (China, India and Pakistan).

Are we now entering the era of a new type of economy, with new rules? What we perceive is more than just an addition to today’s economics. By removing the effects of distance, and giving more equal access across nations and classes, networks will effectively reengineer our basic economic equations. Electronic networks can provide access to skills, work and commerce at much lower cost, via electronic markets in jobs, products, services and education. At the same time, they introduce new economic behaviour, as a large enough quantitative change becomes a qualitative change. Electronics and optics enable the networking of human capital, expanding its application and accelerating its enrichment via education. So knowledge‐based operations may slowly replace traditional capital‐based assets. Consequently, the conventional process for the creation of wealth with its prerequisites for capital investment is revised:economic value in traditional fixed assets is replaced by “electronic assets”. At the same time, the network effect pushes the market mechanism to its limits, through a step‐change in breadth of access, reduced costs of entry and pace of trading. National differences and national markets, all the trappings and devices of commercial locality, are challenged. In this first of two articles, the initial conditions and the evidence for change are examined and the emergence of a new form of economy, or “tele‐economy”, is reviewed. Following from this, a view of the form of capitalism driving the economic environment – “electronic capitalism” – is put forward. The second article, to be published in a forthcoming issue of foresight, examines the consequences and conclusions on assets, wealth accumulation, national players and the benefits and dangers of a tele‐economy.