Embedding Value-Based Principles in the Culture of Islamic Banks to Enhance Their Sustainability, Resilience, and Social Impact

Value-based banks strive to build a self-sustaining banking model with inclusive and transparent governance that is sustainable and resilient to external disturbances. Initiatives for value-based intermediation in Islamic finance started in Malaysia. The growth in VBIBs is accompanied by claims about its relative resilience to crisis and efficiency compared to VBBs and conventional banks. However, little empirical evidence is available to support such claims. This study aims to analyze the resilience and efficiency of VBIBs compared to the VBBs and GSIBs. It highlights the role of value-based strategy in developing a sound and resilient Islamic banking system to overcome future crises and further strengthen the impacts of Islamic banks. The study used quantitative and content analysis research methods, with data collected from the annual reports of 10 VBIBs from 2017 to 2020. The empirical results show that VBIBs have better risk-adjusted capital levels and asset quality, enabling them to be more resilient during crises. They provide more satisfactory returns compared to the VBBs and GSIBs. However, VBBs have a better asset structure and growth rate, which contributes to the real economy. The overall findings suggest that adopting value-based strategies in Islamic banking improve banks’ sustainability, resilience, and social impacts by concentrating resources on value-based activities that provide economic resiliency and enhance inclusive and sustainable economic growth. The study fills gaps in the current Islamic finance literature concerning empirical studies on value-based Islamic banking. It also helps practitioners to understand the relative efficiency, resilience, and social impact of VBIBs.

Margin Trading Program, External Profit Pressure and Enterprise Financialization—A Quasi-Natural Experiment Based on Double Difference Model

Based on the urgent need of the real economy to “get away from fictitious to substantial”, this paper constructs a quasi-natural experiment based on the margin trading program gradually implemented in China in 2010 and studies the influence of the margin trading program on the financialization level of the target company by using the difference-in-difference method. The results show that, because of the dominant role of financing transactions in margin trading programs in China’s capital market, financing transactions drive up the share prices of listed companies, which leads to an excessive easing of the financing constraints of listed companies and short-sighted behavior of executives, which has a significant role in promoting enterprise financialization. Moreover, the driving effect is more significant in state-owned enterprises, enterprises with a high degree of financing constraint, and enterprises with a low degree of marketization. Economic policy uncertainty will restrain the positive effect of margin trading programs on enterprise financialization through information and governance mechanisms. In contrast, the “branding” effect caused by the financial connection of senior executives will intensify the positive relationship between margin trading programs on enterprise financialization levels. When considering the intermediary effect, we find that the margin trading program will result in the optimistic deviation of analysts’ earnings forecasts and cause the external profit pressure of enterprises, thus increasing the financialization trend. This study is of great theoretical significance and practical value for evaluating the policy effect of the margin trading program, improving this policy, investigating the influencing factors of enterprise financialization, and promoting the real economy to move from fictitious to substantial.

Russia’s banking sector during the pandemic

Quarantine and self-isolation have become a new challenge for the Russian economy, changed many areas of our life, revealed new weaknesses in the banking system and monetary regulation of the economy, and also become a good test for the post-crisis financial system. In this article using a systematic approach to the study of information, analytical and graphical methods the dynamics of the Russian banking sector during the development of the coronavirus pandemic and the specifics of recovery from the crisis have been investigated. The innovations and improvements brought about by the pandemic have been studied. The Central Bank of Russia’s monetary policy instruments used to mitigate the impact of the pandemic on the real economy in general and on the banking sector in particular have been reviewed. The features of anti-crisis measures taken by the monetary authorities in our country have been revealed.

A Study of the Spatial Effects of Financial Support and Economic Growth under Optimal Control of Nonlinear Generalized Complex Systems

This paper provides an in-depth analysis and study of the spatial effects of financial support and economic growth with the help of nonlinear generalized complex systems. Taking the industrial sector as the research object and combining the relevant contents of neoclassical investment theory, information economics, and institutional economics, this paper clearly defines and argues that the main feature of current financial policy is financial constraint rather than financial inhibition based on an in-depth understanding of the theoretical connotation and policy rationality of financial constraint and, as a premise, further analyzes the financial constraint policy causing excessive investment and capital mismatch in the corporate sector. It further analyzes the mechanism of the role of financial constraint policies in causing overinvestment and capital mismatch in the corporate sector and conducts empirical tests from three research perspectives of measuring investment efficiency, output efficiency of investment, allocation efficiency of industry capital, and investment behavior of microenterprises, and finally puts forward relevant policy recommendations in conjunction with the evaluation of the efficiency of financial constraint policies. This paper selects three dimensions of the financial system, namely, financial structure, financial efficiency, and financial scale, and studies the adaptability between these three dimensions and the development of the real economy, respectively, and then uses different empirical methods to analyze the dynamic adaptability effects between the development of the real economy and these three dimensions of the financial system and finally explores the way of adaptability between the financial system and the development of the real economy. This paper provides a medium and micro theoretical basis and new empirical evidence for understanding the importance of financial system reform on economic growth and also opens up a space for exploring the exit path of financial constraints and using interest rate marketization as a general grip to reasonably guide financial resources to achieve economic transformation and upgrading and sustainable and healthy development through supporting high-quality investment, using more interprovincial level data in the analysis, so it is more comprehensive and detailed than previous scholars’ studies. The examination is more comprehensive and detailed than previous scholars’ studies.

The convergence level and influencing factors of China’s digital economy and real economy based on grey model and PLS- SEM

The paper constructs a research model mainly based on the Deng’s correlation analysis model on the convergence level measurement, the GM (1,1) coordinated development prediction model and PLS-Structural Equation Model (PLS-SEM) analysis model on the influencing factors. The data about China’s digital economy and real economy from 2005 to 2019 (totaled 2,250) is adopted to conduct an empirical analysis of the convergence level from 2005 to 2019 and predict the development trend from 2020 to 2029. The paper could further analyze the influencing factors of convergence, in an attempt to put forward relevant development suggestions. We hope the study could provide an objective reference and theoretical basis for improving the convergence level in China in some extent.

The Impact of Fintech on Corporate Technology Innovation Based on Driving Effects, Mechanism Identification, and Heterogeneity Analysis

Fintech relies on emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence and big data to bring a new business model to the financial system; can this new change promote corporate technological innovation? To explore this question, this paper examines the possible impact mechanism of Fintech on enterprise technological innovation based on the examination of the impact of Fintech on enterprise technological innovation through a panel fixed effects model, using A-share listed enterprises in Shanghai and Shenzhen markets in China from 2011–2019, and further explores whether there is heterogeneity in this impact among enterprises with different traits. The results show that Fintech development can significantly promote firm technological innovation and that Fintech can influence firm technological innovation through two mechanisms: alleviating firm financing constraints and providing market opportunities for firms to enhance their profitability. In addition, the driving effect of Fintech on technological innovation is more pronounced in new firms, state-owned enterprises, and nonborrowed and listed firms. Based on the conclusion, it is proposed that the government should enhance certain policy support for Fintech guided by emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, help Fintech empower the real economy, and at the same time promote the deep integration of Fintech and real enterprises, especially to strengthen the identification of Fintech for new enterprises and encourage state-owned enterprises to implement employee stock ownership system, as well as sound market construction to reduce barriers to listing of high-quality enterprises, so as to improve innovation policy effectiveness and provide a reference for the mitigation of enterprise innovation problems in the new situation.

Banking crises and financial instability: Empirical and historical lessons

The paper examines the importance of financial instability for the development of four Norwegian banking crises. The crises are the Post First World War Crisis during the early 1920s, the mid 1920s Monetary Crisis, the Great Depression in the 1930s, and the Scandinavian Banking Crisis of 1987–1993. The paper first offers a description of the financial instability hypothesis applied by Minsky and Kindleberger, and in a recent dynamic financial crisis model. Financial instability is defined as a lack of financial markets and institutions that provide capital and liquidity at a sustainable level under stress. Financial instability basically evolves during times of overheating, overspending and extended credit granting. This is most common during significant booms. The process has devastating effects after markets have turned into a state of negative development.The paper tests the validity of the financial instability hypothesis using a quantitative structural time series model. It reveals upheaval of 10 financial and macroeconomic indicators prior to all the four crises, resulting in a state of economic overheating and asset bubble creation. This is basically explained by huge growth in debts. The overheating caused the following banking crises. Finally, the paper discusses the four crises qualitatively. Again, the conclusion is that a significant increase in money supply and debt caused overheating, asset bubbles, and thereafter, financial and banking crises, which in turn spread to other markets and industries and caused huge slumps in the real economy.

Neiburg, F., & Guyer, J. (eds.). (2019). The Real Economy - Essays in Ethnographic Theory. Chicago: HAU Books. 310 p.

Resenha da coletânea The Real Economy - Essays in Ethnographic Theory, organizada por Federico Neiburg e Jane Guyer, publicada em 2019.