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Over the last few years, the European Central Bank (ECB) has adopted unconventional monetary policies. These measures aim to boost economic growth and increase inflation through the bond market. The purpose of this paper is to study the impact of the ECB’s quantitative easing (QE) on the investor’s behavior in the stock market.

First, the authors theoretically identify the transmission channels of the QE shocks to the stock market. Then, the authors empirically assess the financial market’s responses to QE shocks in a data-rich environment using a factor augmented VAR (FAVAR).

The results show that the ECB’s unconventional monetary policy positively affects the stock market. A QE shock leads to an increase in stock prices and a drop in the realized volatility and the implied risk premium. The authors also suggest that the ECB’s QE is transmitted to the stock market through five main channels: the liquidity, the expectation, the portfolio reallocation, the interest rates and the risk premium channels.

The findings help to better understand the behavior of stock market assets in a data-rich economic context and guide investors and policymakers in the presence of unconventional monetary tools. For instance, decision-makers and investors should consider the short-term effect of the QE interventions and the changing behavior of the financial actors over time. In addition, high stock market returns can increase risk appetite. This can lead investors to underestimate the market risk. Decision-makers and market participants should take into consideration the impact of the large injection of money through the QE, which may raise the risk of a speculative bubble in the financial market.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study that incorporates a theoretical and empirical analysis to explore QE transmission to the stock market in the European context. Unlike previous studies, the authors use the shadow rate proposed by Wu and Xia (2017) to quantify the effect of the ECB’s QE in a data-rich environment. The authors also include two key risk indicators – the stock market risk premium and the realized volatility – to capture investors’ behavior in the stock market following QE shocks.

This study aims to investigate the factors influencing the social responsibility performance of Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) megaprojects. Specifically, it examines the role of isomorphic pressures and the joint influence of perceived benefits and top management support on megaproject social responsibility performance (MSRP).

Drawing from institutional theory, social exchange theory, and top management literature, this study established a conceptual model featuring eleven hypotheses. Subsequently, a questionnaire survey was administered to collect data from 238 actively engaged participants in BRI megaprojects. Structural Equation Modelling was utilised to analyse the data.

The empirical findings indicate that mimetic and coercive pressures positively influence MSRP. Perceived benefits and top management support significantly enhance MSRP. Moreover, perceived benefits and top management support partially mediate the effects of coercive and mimetic pressures. However, when it comes to normative pressures, their impact on MSRP is solely channelled through the support of top management.

This study is one of the early endeavours to explore the factors influencing the social responsibility performance of BRI megaprojects. It sheds light on the interplay between external pressures and internal factors in shaping social responsibility efforts in these projects. These findings are of particular significance for BRI actors and stakeholders, offering guidance for enhancing social responsibility strategies within the context of BRI megaprojects.

Many studies have analysed the impact of various variables on the ability of companies to raise capital. While most of these studies are sector-agnostic, literature on the effects of macroeconomic variables on sectors that established over the last 20 years like property technology and financial technology, is scarce. This study aims to identify macroeconomic factors that influence the ability of both sectors and is extended by real estate variables.

The impact of macroeconomic and real estate related factors is analysed using multiple linear regression and quantile regression. The sample covers 338 observations for PropTech and 595 for FinTech across 18 European countries and 5 deal types between 2000–2001 with each observation representing the capital invested per year for each deal type and country.

Besides confirming a significant impact of macroeconomic variables on the amount of capital invested, this study finds that additionally the real estate transaction volume positively impacts PropTech while the real estate yield-bond-gap negatively impacts FinTech.

For PropTech and FinTech companies and their investors it is critical to understand the dynamic with mac-ro variables and also the real estate industry. The direct connection identified in this paper is critical for a holistic understanding of the effects of measurable real estate variables on capital investments into both sectors.

The analysis fills the gap in the literature between variables affecting investment into firms and effects of the real estate industry on the investment activity into PropTech and FinTech.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between accounting conservatism and pledging of shares by controlling shareholders of a firm to obtain a loan. The pledging of shares by the controlling shareholders of a firm results in alterations to the payoff and risk structure for these shareholders. Since accounting numbers have valuation implications, pledging of shares by a controlling shareholder has an impact on accounting policy choices made by the firm. The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of controlling shareholder share pledging to obtain a loan on a specific accounting policy choice, namely, conservatism.

The paper uses a large data set from India comprising 14,786 firm years consisting of 1,570 firms belonging to 58 industries for a period of 11 years (2009–2019). The authors use ordinary least square regression with robust standard errors. The authors conduct robustness checks and the results are consistent across alternative statistical methodologies and alternative measures of the primary dependent and independent variables.

The primary results show that pledging of shares by the controlling shareholders results in higher conditional conservatism and lower unconditional conservatism. Further analysis reveals that the relationship is stronger when the controlling shareholder holds a majority ownership in the firm. Additionally, the results show that for business group affiliated firms, which are unique to developing countries, both the conditional and the unconditional conservatism are incrementally lower when the controlling shareholder pledges the shares. For family firms with a family member as CEO, the conditional conservatism is incrementally higher and the unconditional conservatism is incrementally lower. Finally, the authors show that the results hold when the pledge intensity variable is measured with a one-year lag and finally, the authors show that conditional conservatism is incrementally higher in the year of the increase in the pledge and the year after, but there is no such incremental impact on unconditional conservatism.

The research is limited to the listed firms in India. Since majority of the listed firms are controlled by families and the family firms around the world are heterogeneous the findings of the research may not be applicable to other countries.

The study has implications for policy-making and monitoring of the pledging by the controlling shareholders. It also helps the investors in making investment decisions with respect to family firms in India.

The study is unique as it focuses on the relationship between pledging of shares by the controlling shareholders and its impact on accounting conservatism. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first research integrating these two aspects.

This study aims to test the Kuznets curve between economic growth and child labor, along with the influence of exports, household size and rural population in the context of Pakistan.

To achieve the research objective, this study applied the unit root test, bound co-integration test, and autoregressive distributive lags (ARDL) method for the period of 1972–2021.

The findings show an inverted U-shaped relationship between economic growth and child labor indicating that at the beginning stage of economic development, child labor increases due to lower per capita household and subsequently, in the long-run of economic development, child labor decreases due to the higher per capita households. Moreover, the results also show that exports, household size and rural population have a positive influence on increasing child labor.

The policymakers and government of Pakistan need to focus on long-term economic growth policies, ensure free quality education and cheap equipment which practices minimum manpower to reduce the threat of child labor.

Having long-run economic growth, the government of Pakistan need to equally benefit the households and the poor population to reduce child labor and enhance the social welfare of society.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study that investigates the Kuznets curve relationship between economic growth and child labor in the context of Pakistan. Moreover, this study contributes to the reduction in child labor through long-term economic growth in the context of Pakistan.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-05-2023-0387

This study is intended to analyze the impact of information and communication technology (ICT) infrastructure, technological innovation, renewable energy consumption and financial development on carbon dioxide emissions in emerging economies.

The present study adopts the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) cointegration technique for the annual data collection of Vietnam from 1990 to 2020.

The results of the study unveil that renewable energy consumption, the interaction between renewable energy consumption and ICT infrastructure and financial development have significant predictive power for carbon dioxide emissions. In the long term, renewable energy consumption, export and population growth reduce CO2 emissions, whereas the interaction between renewable energy consumption and ICT infrastructure and financial development increases CO2 emissions, while ICT infrastructure does not affect emissions. In the short run, changes in ICT infrastructure contribute to carbon dioxide emissions in Vietnam. In addition, changes in renewable energy consumption, financial development, the interaction between ICT infrastructure and renewable energy consumption and population growth have a significant effect on CO2 emissions. Notably, technological innovation has no impact on CO2 emissions in both the short and long run.

The current study provides new insights into the environmental effects of ICT infrastructure, technological innovation, renewable energy consumption and financial development. The interaction between renewable energy consumption and ICT infrastructure has a significant effect on carbon dioxide emissions. The paper suggests important implications for setting long-run policies to boost the effects of financial development, renewable energy consumption and ICT infrastructure on environmental quality in emerging countries like Vietnam in the coming time.

This study examines the impacts of the Ethiopian developmental state model on the competition, efficiency and profitability of banks.

The competition, efficiency and profitability of the Ethiopian bank are measured using Panzar Rose, data envelopment analysis and financial ratio. Fixed-effect panel regression methods are applied to test the direction and strength of association between the Ethiopian developmental state model and the competition, efficiency and profitability of the country's banks while controlling bank-specific market structure and macroeconomic factors.

The Ethiopian developmental state model embeds the state-directed financial system, which affects the banking industry using a range of credit allocation instruments. Of which, directed credit schemes, interest rate control and the lack of financial freedom reduce the competition and efficiency of banks. The National Bank of Ethiopia (NBE) advances to the government and the sale of Treasury bills to a captive market enhances banking competition while negatively affecting banking efficiency. Interest rate control and the lack of financial freedom lower banking profitability. Unexpectedly, directed credit schemes improve banking profitability.

As with any study, this one has limitations. The intra-period comparison of efficiency is based on balanced data. Future studies can use methods that can measure the efficiency of banks using unbalanced data. The computation of the yearly H-statistic is constrained by the small sample size. The use of high-frequency data for measuring competition can provide us with better insights into banking competition in Ethiopia. Furthermore, there are a number of methods for measuring banking competition, efficiency and profitability with different assumptions. Approaching the subject of this study by applying different methods will offer different insights.

The contributions of this study to practice are at two levels. First, at the policy level, it enhances our understanding of the impacts of developmental state model policies, as implemented in Ethiopia, on the banking industry and therefore provides suggestions to policymakers to reform the sector's policies. Second, it offers input to the management of banks regarding the factors that impact the industry.

The banking industry is often studied in the context of financial liberalisation. The originality of this study lies in investigating how the competition, efficiency and profitability of banks are affected when operating in the context of significant state interventions in the industry.

This paper examines whether technological changes that promote communications between investors and managers help bridge the gap in the cost of equity capital among firms in different regions.

We use the online interaction platforms of listed firms in China and utilize brokerage presence (BP) to capture the geographic distribution of financial factors. We explore whether online interactions would reduce the cost of equity to a greater extent for firms located in low brokerage presence regions (hereafter “low-BP firms”) than those in high brokerage presence regions (hereafter “high-BP firms”).

We find low-BP firms benefit more from an improved information environment created by online interactions. We also find that posts about low-BP firms are more value-relevant and useful in processing corporate disclosures. Further, a higher number of interactions significantly enhances more informational efficiency for low-BP firms, and the effect of reducing the gap in financing costs is more pronounced when corporate information is complex.

We conclude that online interactions alleviate geography-induced information frictions and create a relatively level playing field for firms located in all regions.

The diffusion of technologies from other sectors, and innovations in kitchen equipment, fueled structural changes within the foodservice industry. However, this change comes at a price of disrupting the critical step of assessing the demand forecast accuracy. This study aims to explore a surprisingly unique and elevated complexity when assessing the critically important demand forecast accuracy.

The paper develops a mathematical model to describe and explore the nature of the problem in structural biased demand forecast accuracy assessment. It then uses numerical simulation to construct a market example to gain better insights on the bias characteristics. Finally, the forecast accuracy measurement’s inherent bias is contrasted with that of other typical hospitality forecasting setups.

This paper outlines the theoretical underpinnings of how demand forecasts in the central kitchen setup are dynamic and thus produce a structural bias. More specifically, this paper discovers how, in this context of orders from a central location, the forecasts set the capacity constraints, and, consequently, generate a considerably more biased forecast accuracy measure. Relying on such forecast accuracy measures can lead to serious negative business outcomes.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, this study is the first to show that in the unique new technology enabled environment of central kitchen operation, where daily dish demand forecasts set the daily constrained capacity levels, the accuracy measure is severely biased, and consequently accuracy is likely to deteriorate, which in turn, could lead to suboptimal decisions. The major theoretical contribution of this study is a novel analytical model which explains and describes the bias in the accuracy measurement.

技术从其他行业的传播以及厨房设备的创新推动了餐饮业内的结构变化。然而, 这种变化直接影响了评估需求预测准确性。本研究探讨了在餐饮业结构改变后，评估至关重要的需求预测准确性时所面临的令人独特和复杂性。

本文自研了一个数学模型来描述和探讨评估需求预测准确性中的结构性偏差的本质。然后, 使用数值模拟构建一个市场示例, 以更好地了解上述偏差的特征。最后, 将这种预测准确性评估的系统性偏差与其他传统的餐饮业需求预测情境进行对比。

本文概述了中央厨房运营中需求预测是动态的, 因此产生了结构性偏差的理论基础。更具体地说, 在使用中央厨房并集中订单的情境下, 本文发现需求预测直接设定了容量限制, 因此产生了在需求预测准确度衡量中的结构性偏差。依赖这样的预测准确性度量可能产生严重的负面商业结果。

这项研究首次表明, 在中央厨房运营的独特的新环境中, 由于新的设定即每日菜品需求预测直接决定每日容量水平, 需求预测准确度衡量标准有着严重偏差, 长期来讲准确性可能下降, 从而导致次优的商业决策。本研究的主要理论贡献是提供一个餐饮企业在新运营环境中解释和描述需求预测准确度中结构性偏差的全新分析模型。

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the extent to which a sample of US-based higher education institution’s (HEI’s) climate targets and associated climate action planning efforts align with the definitions of and practices associated with science-based targets (SBTs) that are typically used to organize corporate climate efforts. This analysis will be used to explore similarities and tease out differences between how US-based HEIs and corporations approach sustainable target setting and organize sustainable action.

The degree of intersection between a sample of HEI climate action plans from Ivy Plus (Ivy+) schools and the current SBT initiative (SBTi) general corporate protocol was assessed by using an objective-oriented evaluative approach.

While there were some areas of overlap between HEI’s climate action planning and SBTi’s general corporate protocol – for instance, the setting of both short- and long-term targets and large-scale investments in renewable energy – significant areas of difference in sampled HEIs included scant quantitative Scope 3 targets, the use offsets to meet short-term targets and a low absolute annual reduction of Scope 1 and 2 emissions.

This paper unites diverse areas of literature on SBTs, corporate sustainability target setting and sustainability in higher education. It provides an overview of the potential benefits and disadvantages of HEIs adopting SBTs and provides recommendations for the development of sector-specific SBTi guidelines.