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The purpose of this paper is to examine the determinants of mutual funds’ performance at both a country level and a fund level in Vietnam.

The different types of funds with more than three-year operation are selected to remove outliers of the stock market boom from 2015 to 2018. The data set includes 54 mutual funds operating during the period from 2008 until November 2018.

The research finds that there is a positive relationship between macroeconomics and mutual funds’ performance. Furthermore, country-level governance such as regulation effectiveness, political stability, economic growth and financial development has a positive correlation with mutual funds’ performance. However, the impact of fund-level factors is diverse with the no significant impact of board size on mutual fund’s performance, while passive funds perform better than active funds in Vietnam.

The research results suggest that investors should pay attention to the types of funds and operating expense when making an investment decision in mutual funds. There are some recommendations for both government policy-makers and the mutual fund industry that are likely to facilitate the development of this field in Vietnam.

The research contributes to the understanding of what are the factors that should be considered when investing in mutual funds.

This study aims to analyze the contribution of business angels (BAs), defined as wealthy individuals who provide risk capital to entrepreneurial firms without family connections, in Estonia, an emerging country in Eastern Europe.

This study compared the data of the financial and non-financial performance of BA-backed firms with that of “twin” non-BA-backed firms, extracted from all Estonian unlisted firms using propensity score matching.

The results of the comparative analysis showed that BAs were patient enough to allow their investees to spend for future growth rather than squeezing profit from increased sales. This is not patience without options for a BA in a situation in which the investee's sales are deteriorating, but rather deliberate patience in the presence of options for a BA where the investee's sales growth is increasing, contrary to conventional investor behavioral principles. It also showed that BAs' post-investment involvement did not make a direct contribution to their investees' sales, although BAs contributed to the sales increase through BA funding itself.

This study has two unique research contributions. First, it shows that the patience of BAs was not a by-product but was intentional, and adds to the debate on whether BAs are patient investors. Second, there are only a few studies on the contribution of BAs to their investees in emerging countries; this study aims to help fill this research gap using the case of Estonia.

The study compares the impacts of mixed syndication venture capital (VC) investment and private VC (PVC) investment on the transitional performance indicators of intangible assets, fixed assets, liabilities and number of employees in Estonia. It also examines the impact of mixed syndication on investees' sales and profit.

This study conducted panel data regression analyses based on the dataset consists of yearly data from 2006 to 2015 for more than 187,000 unlisted firms in Estonia.

Results showed that mixed syndication had a significant positive effect on the number of employees of investees but not on investees' sales and profit. PVC investment had a significant positive effect on investee sales but not on the transitional performance indicators of investees.

The study has two unique research contributions. First, it investigates the impact of syndicated investment on investees' transitional performance indicators in addition to performance indicators. Second, it focuses on Estonia, an emerging country that has somewhat achieved success in fostering information and communications technology startups and is one of the earliest emerging countries to implement a mixed syndication VC investment policy.

The aim of this paper is to examine the effect of information disclosure by unlisted bond issuers on the stock price informativeness of listed firms in the same industry.

This paper takes advantage of information disclosure during the bond issuance and examines the spillover effect of unlisted bond issuers' information disclosure on listed firms in the stock market. The sample is composed of A-share firms listed on the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges from 2007 to 2018. All the data are obtained from the China Stock Market and Accounting Research and WIND databases. The impact of bond market information disclosure on price informativeness of listed firms in the same industry is identified through multivariate regression analyses.

Empirical results show that price informativeness of listed firms has a significantly positive association with the information disclosure of same-industry unlisted bond issuers. Further analyses show that the above finding is more significant when information disclosure of bond issuers is a more important channel for acquiring industry information (i.e. when industry is more concentrated, when economic uncertainty is high, and when industry information is less transparent) and understanding the industry competitive landscape (i.e. when bond issuers are relatively large, when bond issuers and listed firms have more direct product competition, when bond issuance firms are large-scale state-owned business groups), and when there are more cross-market information intermediaries (i.e. more cross-market institutional investors and more sell-side analysts). This paper indicates that information disclosure of bond issuers has a positive spillover effect on the stock market.

The novelty of the research is that the authors examine industry information spillover from unlisted firms to listed firms leveraging on unlisted firms' information disclosure in bond markets.

This paper empirically investigates the performance of Islamic funds, which have been praised for weathering the 2008 financial storm relatively well and compares it to a European product designed to protect the most vulnerable of investors, UCITS funds.

This paper builds on 128 time-series regressions using various factor models to analyse the risk-return relationship of 242 Islamic and UCITS funds relative to a market benchmark, over a 10-year period starting January 2006, to capture severe bear and bull market conditions.

Islamic funds do not face a competitive disadvantage arising from their strict compliance with Sharīʿah principles, and their performance and investment style is relatively similar to UCITS schemes.

Islamic funds represent a low risk investment due to their very mild betas. Therefore, when forming part of a diversified portfolio, they can act as a hedging tool against adverse market movements.

Muslim investors are not punished relative to conventional retail investors when following their own beliefs. Other investors can consider Islamic funds in their portfolio allocation, especially those who seek socially and ethically responsible investments.

This paper fills a lacuna in the existing literature, because the sample is made up of Islamic funds established worldwide and includes not only equity, but also fixed income and mixed allocation funds.

Using overlapped portfolio data on public equity funds in Korea, the authors construct several types of fund-stock weighted bipartite networks and measure fund network centrality. The authors also examine the relationship between network centrality and fund investment performance. The authors' results are three-fold. First, the authors find that the fund centrality of the network in which funds and stocks are connected based on the most active investing behavior positively affects the fund performance. Second, the funds with a high centrality level based on the same network generate higher returns by holding stocks with high value uncertainty. Third, the authors find that fund centrality is not associated with herd behavior. Based on these results, the authors argue that fund centrality is a proxy of information advantage and skill of fund managers. The authors' paper shows that network analysis could be a new way to identify funds with better performance and measure the skill and information advantage to construct an optimal portfolio.

This study aims to fill the gap in previous research that focuses on the superficial aspects of equity crowdfunding (ECF) campaigns and financial practices by examining financial literacy aspects, such as due diligence and valuation, in terms of factors that influence Japanese individual investors' investments in ECF.

The status of information disclosure in ECF campaigns is checked. In addition, the feasibility of the initial due diligence and valuation using this information is verified. Specifically, the lack of financial literacy hypothesis is developed and (1) expected market capitalization in the final fiscal year of the business plan and (2) expected returns on investment (IRR: internal rate of return) are estimated.

ECF campaigns in Japan disclose information equivalent to that obtained by professional venture capitalists. Analysis of the disclosed business plan allows for initial due diligence and valuation. By contrast, due diligence reveals that some projects are unlikely to be listed even if their business plans are met, and others have low IRRs. In addition, a stock acquisition rights project, in which even professional investors are unable to calculate IRRs, is completed at the same rate as a common stock project; this suggests that individual investors lack financial literacy.

Analyzing ECF from financial literacy aspects, such as due diligence and valuation, is unique. Such aspects are essential for private equity investments but have not been addressed in previous studies.

Islamic crowdfunding, an alternative way to finance social projects, is a new development in Malaysia. Little is known about its operation. This study aims to explore the practice of Nusa Kapital, the first Islamic crowdfunding platform in Malaysia.

This study adopted a descriptive approach. The data was collected through document analysis and interviews with two officials of Nusa Kapital. The data gathered was analyzed through the thematic analysis technique.

This research discovered that Nusa Kapital was established considering the financing needs of the growing number of small medium enterprises (SMEs) in Malaysia. It uses the murabahah concept to make financing arrangements for entrepreneurs. Murabahah is a debt-based concept where the investors, instead of giving cash to the entrepreneurs, purchase an asset and sell it to them at a cost-plus profit. The Securities Commission Malaysia (SCM) regulates the crowdfunding operation of Nusa Kapital, which sets guidelines for the different types of investors, entrepreneurs and platforms. Nusa Kapital conducts an extensive background check of the company for its creditworthiness and takes the necessary measures for the transparency of the project's operation.

This study has unique implications for the regulatory authorities and practitioners in Malaysia and global industries. The study explored the practical scenario of the crowdfunding institution, which will be beneficial for similar industries within and outside of the country.

While previous literature provides a theoretical discussion of Islamic crowdfunding, this study contributes to the body of knowledge by demonstrating its practice.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the financial factors across multiple levels of analysis that influence the performance effects of the unrelated diversification strategy, including institutional-, industry- and firm-levels.

Using a unique panel dataset of Italian firms from 1980 to 2010, the paper tests hypotheses on how industry external financial dependence and the firm's financial constraints both separately and jointly alter the performance benefits of unrelated diversification in contexts with financial market inefficiencies.

Unrelated diversification increases performance in weak financial contexts and such positive effect is enhanced by greater industry external financial dependence and greater firm financial constraints. However, as financial markets develop, the moderating effects of firm financial constraints shrink.

The study highlights the importance of recognizing the multiple financial contingencies that may alter the benefits of the unrelated diversification strategy, suggesting caution in its pursuit to boost firm performance.

The authors develop a theoretical framework that explains the performance outcomes of unrelated diversification, linking the benefits of an internal capital market (ICM) with the financial context of the firm and offering a fine-grained analysis that moves beyond the advanced/emerging economy dichotomy. Furthermore, leveraging on the unprecedented time frame of the empirical analysis, the paper highlights the crucial role of industry- and firm-level financial contingencies and demonstrates that their effects change at varying levels of development of the financial context.

The study introduces a new approach to leverage-value relationship. Besides applying the classical regression models, the study deals with leverage as a continuous treatment variable implemented on the firm’s value using the dose-response function (DFR).

After proper model calibration and splitting the treatment (leverage) into ten doses, a response function is generated, which enables the realization of the dose level at which the firm’s value is maximized. Furthermore, the study tests the pecking order theory (POT) and the trade-off theory (TOT) using the threshold model to see whether firms are under or over-indebted. The analysis is carried out on panel data from small-medium enterprises (SMEs), providing more valuable insights than large and mature companies.

The study used two leverage measures: total liabilities ratio and bank debt ratio. Value is measured by the market capitalization and Tobin’s Q. In general, the study finds a positive relationship between leverage and value; POT is not strongly supported, firms are below their optimal leverage and there is a certain leverage dose that would maximize firms’ value.

Since the threshold model and DRF show that SMEs are under-indebted, firms could benefit from extra leverage doses without affecting the firm’s risk profile, especially in a low-interest rate regime, and the potential increase in public-private expenditure after Italy obtained the European Recovery Funds.

The study contributes to new knowledge and understanding of financial leverage from new methodological perspectives, offering valuable insights from SMEs using novel approaches.