scholarly journals The Dollar, Bank Leverage, and Real Economic Activity: An Evolving Relationship

2020 ◽  
Vol 110 ◽  
pp. 529-534 ◽  
Author(s):  
Burcu Erik ◽  
Marco J. Lombardi ◽  
Dubravko Mihaljek ◽  
Hyun Song Shin
Keyword(s):  
Financial Crisis ◽  
Economic Activity ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Empirical Relationship ◽  
Financial Sector ◽  
Global Trade ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Financial Conditions ◽  
Purchasing Managers ◽  
Shed Light

The interest in how financial conditions affect real economic activity has grown since the great financial crisis (GFC), not least because some of the mechanisms at play in the financial sector may have changed. We shed light on this issue by examining the empirical relationship between global Purchasing Managers' Indices, world trade, and indicators of global financial conditions, with a special focus on the broad dollar index. We show that the influence of the dollar on real economic activity and global trade seems to have increased since the GFC, while that of the VIX has decreased.

scholarly journals Identifying an index of financial conditions for South Africa

2015 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 256-274 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kirsten Thompson ◽  
Renee Van Eyden ◽  
Rangan Gupta
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Financial Crisis ◽  
Financial Markets ◽  
South African ◽  
Economic Activity ◽  
Content Type ◽  
The Real ◽  
Financial Variables ◽  
Financial Conditions ◽  
Rolling Window

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to construct a financial conditions index (FCI) for the South African economy to enable the gauging of financial conditions and to better understand the macro-financial linkages in the country. The global financial crisis that began in 2007-2008 demonstrated how severe the impact of financial markets’ stress on real economic activity can be. In the wake of the financial crisis, policy-makers and decision-makers across the world identified the critical need for a better understanding of financial conditions, and more importantly, their impact on the real economy. Design/methodology/approach – The FCI is constructed using monthly data over the period 1966 to 2011, and is based on a set of 16 financial variables, which include variables that define the state of international financial markets, asset prices, interest rate spreads, stock market yields and volatility, bond market volatility and monetary aggregates. The authors explore different methodologies for constructing the FCI, including full sample and rolling-window principal components analysis. Furthermore, the authors investigate whether it is beneficial to purge the FCI of the real effects of inflation, economic growth and interest rates, and evaluate the performance of our constructed FCIs by comparing their ability to pick up turning points in the South African business cycle, and by running in-sample causality (forecast) tests. Findings – The authors find that the estimated FCIs are good predictors of economic activity; with the rolling-window FCI being the “best” performing index. Causality tests indicate that this FCI is a good in-sample predictor of industrial production growth and the Treasury Bill rate, but a weak predictor of inflation. Practical implications – The authors find that the resulting FCI can act as an “early warning system”. This, in turn, may serve to indicate that monetary policy should take broader financial conditions into account. Originality/value – This study offers three main contributions to the existing literature on financial conditions in South Africa: the authors construct an FCI over a sample period that is three decades longer than existing indices, the FCI of this paper comprises a wider coverage of financial variables than others and the authors make use of rolling-window estimation techniques that allow them to account for parameter instability and to capture the real-time constraints faced by a policymaker.

Lawful Remedy or Illegal Response? Resolving the Issue of Foreign Subsidization Under WTO Law

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-24
Author(s):  
Victor Crochet ◽  
Marcus Gustafsson
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
World Trade Organization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Fair Competition ◽  
Trade Law ◽  
International Trade Law ◽  
The World ◽  
Shed Light ◽  
Do So

Abstract Discontentment is growing such that governments, and notably that of China, are increasingly providing subsidies to companies outside their jurisdiction, ‘buying their way’ into other countries’ markets and undermining fair competition therein as they do so. In response, the European Union recently published a proposal to tackle such foreign subsidization in its own market. This article asks whether foreign subsidies can instead be addressed under the existing rules of the World Trade Organization, and, if not, whether those rules allow States to take matters into their own hands and act unilaterally. The authors shed light on these issues and provide preliminary guidance on how to design a response to foreign subsidization which is consistent with international trade law.

scholarly journals Measuring the systemic risk in the South African banking sector

2017 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Gregory M. Foggitt ◽  
Andre Heymans ◽  
Gary W. Van Vuuren ◽  
Anmar Pretorius
Keyword(s):  
Financial Crisis ◽  
South African ◽  
Systemic Risk ◽  
Banking Sector ◽  
Risk Index ◽  
Financial Sector ◽  
Ethical Behaviour ◽  
The South ◽  
Case Scenario ◽  
Worst Case

Background: In the aftermath of the sub-prime crisis, systemic risk has become a greater priority for regulators, with the National Treasury (2011) stating that regulators should proactively monitor changes in systemic risk.Aim: The aim is to quantify systemic risk as the capital shortfall an institution is likely to experience, conditional to the entire financial sector being undercapitalised.Setting: We measure the systemic risk index (SRISK) of the South African (SA) banking sector between 2001 and 2013.Methods: Systemic risk is measured with the SRISK.Results: Although the results indicated only moderate systemic risk in the SA financial sector over this period, there were significant spikes in the levels of systemic risk during periods of financial turmoil in other countries. Especially the stock market crash in 2002 and the subprime crisis in 2008. Based on our results, the largest contributor to systemic risk during quiet periods was Investec, the bank in our sample which had the lowest market capitalisation. However, during periods of financial turmoil, the contributions of other larger banks increased markedly.Conclusion: The implication of these spikes is that systemic risk levels may also be highly dependent on external economic factors, in addition to internal banking characteristics. The results indicate that the economic fundamentals of SA itself seem to have little effect on the amount of systemic risk present in the financial sector. A more significant relationship seems to exist with the stability of the financial sectors in foreign countries. The implication therefore is that complying with individual banking regulations, such as Basel, and corporate governance regulations promoting ethical behaviour, such as King III, may not be adequate. It is therefore proposed that banks should always have sufficient capital reserves in order to mitigate the effects of a financial crisis in a foreign country. The use of worst-case scenario analyses (such as those in this study) could aid in determining exactly how much capital banks could need in order to be considered sufficiently capitalised during a financial crisis, and therefore safe from systemic risk.

The effects of shyness and loneliness on cell phone dependence in college students

2021 ◽  
Vol 49 (9) ◽  
pp. 1-9
Author(s):  
Yan Chen
Keyword(s):  
College Students ◽  
Mobile Phone ◽  
Cell Phone ◽  
Short Form ◽  
Mediating Effect ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Loneliness Scale ◽  
Mobile Phone Addiction ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Shed Light

I explored the relationships among shyness, loneliness, and cell phone dependence (CPD) in college students, with a special focus on the mediating effect of loneliness in the relationship between shyness and CPD. Participants were 593 students recruited from a college in Henan, China, and they completed the Cheek and Buss Shyness Scale, the UCLA Loneliness Scale–Short Form, and the Mobile Phone Addiction Index. The results show that shyness was significantly correlated with both loneliness and CPD, and that loneliness partially mediated the effect of shyness on CPD. These findings shed light on how shyness predicts CPD and have implications for preventing CPD in college students.

Does the WTO Need to Change?

2010 ◽  
Vol 109 (730) ◽  
pp. 355-357 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey J. Schott
Keyword(s):  
World Trade Organization ◽  
Trade Liberalization ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Global Trade ◽  
Doha Round ◽  
The World

The World Trade Organization is in disrepair. To fix it, and thereby boost global trade liberalization, nations must first successfully conclude the Doha Round of talks.

Sustainable Development in a Global Context: A Success or a Nuisance?

2015 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohamed El-Kamel Bakari
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Trade Liberalization ◽  
Global Governance ◽  
Global Trade ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Governance System ◽  
Global Context ◽  
The North ◽  
Similar Vein ◽  
The One

AbstractThis article argues that the evolution of, and challenges to, sustainable development cannot be understood completely outside its contemporary global context, consisting mainly of three interconnected spheres, i.e., the global governance system, the North-South debate, and global trade liberalization. As the boundaries of these three spheres get more and more blurred in a context of an intensifying globalization, the project of sustainable development is very often faced with obstacles that set back its evolution and might very well bring it to a halt. Above all, sustainable development is now caught in the crossfire between the push for exponential economic growth, on the one hand, and a compelling need to reverse catastrophic ecological threats and social exigencies, on the other. More often than not, the current structure and scope of global governance constitutes more of a hindrance than a help to the emerging paradigm of sustainable development. Accordingly, this article seeks to pinpoint the different challenges to the implementation of sustainable development in the field of global governance and to discuss to what extent these challenges are inherent in the structure and scope of this system. In a similar vein, this article examines and discusses the challenges to sustainability within two other highly interrelated spheres, namely global trade and the North-South politics. With this end in view, a special focus is placed throughout this paper on the interconnectedness of, and overlap between, these three global spheres and the determinant role played by the major actors therein.

scholarly journals Development of ecosystems in the financial sector of Russia

Upravlenets ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 2-15
Author(s):  
Georgy Kleiner ◽  
Maksim Rybachuk ◽  
Venera Karpinskaya
Keyword(s):  
Banking System ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Financial Sector ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Information Communication ◽  
Theoretical Concepts ◽  
Object Based ◽  
Ranking Score ◽  
Banking Institutions ◽  
Technological Platform

The paper examines the problems and factors in the development of ecosystems in the financial sector and related sectors of economy. It demonstrates the prospects for expanding the population of ecosystems in both the global financial market and the Russian banking system. Special focus is on two main prerequisites for the ecosystem development: digitalization of the entire economy and the emergence of innovative information-communication technologies in the financial sector (fintech). The study aims to juxtapose theoretical concepts and definitions of ecosystem with the real practice in Russia and the prospects for the development of ecosystems in the financial sector in order to produce recommendations on activating and regulating the transition from a traditional to an ecosystem economic model. Methodologically, the research rests on system economic theory, which implies that economy is a field for creating, interacting and developing socio-economic systems of various kinds – object-, process-, project- and environment-based systems. Within the framework of this approach, an ecosystem includes: an organizational component represented by a cluster as an object-based subsystem; infrastructure – an information-technological platform as an environment-based subsystem; communication and logistics component – a network as a process-based subsystem; innovative component – a business incubator as a project-based subsystem. Ecosystems in the financial sector are analyzed for compliance with this requirements. We scrutinize the case of FinTech Association as the most technologically advanced community of banking institutions. The research methods are content analysis, ranking score and logical grouping of research objects. The findings show that it is expedient to create a regulating institution that combines the functions similar to those of the FAS of the RF and the Central Bank of the RF in relation to the ecosystems’ activities.

scholarly journals The Investment in Fixed Assets Before and After the Global Financial Crisis (Empirical Study for Industry and Investment Sector in Palestine Stock Exchange)

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 52
Author(s):  
Tamer Bahjat Sabri
Keyword(s):  
Financial Crisis ◽  
Global Financial Crisis ◽  
Stock Exchange ◽  
Return On Assets ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
Fixed Assets ◽  
Before And After ◽  
The Global Financial Crisis ◽  
Investment In Fixed Assets ◽  
Shed Light

This paper seeks to shed light on investment in fixed assets before and after the financial crisis that took place in 2008 and compare the two periods together in the sectors of industry and investment in Palestine Stock Exchange. The period between 2005 – 2007 was chosen to represent to the pre-crisis time and the period between 2010 -2012 was chosen to represent the post-crisis time. The population of the study consists of fifteen organizations from both sectors. To test the hypothesis of the study, the independent samples T-test was employed.The average ratio of fixed assets to the total assets of industry and investment rose from 56.2% before the crisis to 58.5% after the crisis. As for the hypotheses of the study, the findings showed no difference except for the seventh hypothesis. There was a statically significant difference in the ratio of fixed assets to equity between the listed companies that a high return on assets and those that have a low return.

scholarly journals Empirical Relationship of Exchange Rate with Inflation, International Trade and Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Pakistan’s Economy

2019 ◽  
pp. 171-182
Author(s):  
Erum Khushnood Zahid Shaikh ◽  
Zahid H. Channa ◽  
Mehwish Bhutto
Keyword(s):  
Exchange Rate ◽  
Gross Domestic Product ◽  
Empirical Relationship ◽  
Exchange Rate Policy ◽  
Domestic Product ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Economic Variables ◽  
Independent Variables ◽  
The Exchange Rate ◽  
Relationship Of

In the modern world, the exchange rate plays an important role in measuring the strength of country’s economy in global economic conditions. An exchange rate is an important tool for controlling various macro-economic variables, and it is itself affected by different macro-economic variables. Pakistan is a developing country of the world and its unstable economy faces high variability in the exchange rate or devaluation of the domestic currency. Therefore, this study investigates the relationship of an exchange rate with selected macro-economic variables (i.e. import, GDP, Inflation & export), with a special focus on Pakistan’s economy. It also aims at finding out the degree of strength at which selected independent variables to leave a significant impact on the exchange rate in the economy of Pakistan (i.e. during the period of 1992 to 2017). For this secondary database study, data extracted from official website of World Bank, State Bank of Pakistan and Economic Surveys of Pakistan. Multiple regression models were used to measure the empirical impact of selected independent variables on exchange rate. Findings show that the Import and Gross Domestic Product (GDP) have a significant negative impact on exchange rate whereas, export and inflation have a significant positive impact on the exchange rate in the economy of Pakistan. The study recommends that the Government of Pakistan should adapt to make its exchange rate policy more effective through high production, more export with a reduction of import and price stability.

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