The aim is to identify differences in spillovers between regions within the economy of the Czech Republic. Based on the choice of spillover effect determinants and a shift-share analysis, a regional spillovers indicator has been constructed. It was discovered the differences in the sizes of spillovers between the regions are increasing over time, which indicates deepening economic disparities. The main contribution is the constructed indicator identifying the different effects of FDI in different regions in order to better identify the strengths and weaknesses of the regions and better model economic policies to set up more effective support for the FDI inflows.

Unlike conventional banks' interest payment on deposits, Islamic banks do not pay interest to depositors. What they pay to depositors is called the rate of return to depositors. Does the rate of return of Islamic banks on deposits follow conventional banks' interest rates? This paper empirically investigates the relationship of causality and the causal direction between conventional banks' interest rate and Islamic banks' return applying VEC model. The results of the VAR Granger Causality/Block Exogeneity Wald Tests fail to reject the null hypothesis of bidirectional causality between Islamic banks' rate of return and conventional banks' interest. The pairwise Granger causality also confirms the same results. This suggests that Islamic banks' rate of return and the conventional banks' interest rate are not independent of each other rather they follow each other in the Bahrain financial market.

Though the ideology of efficiency has been investigated for many centuries, still it has not gained a clear definition and interpretation either in the scientific literature, or in the practice of corporate governance. This paper seeks to examine the mainstream theories of corporate governance in an attempt to suggest that efficient corporate governance has no logical claim to objectivity and it does not always contribute to trust-building. The purpose of this paper is to explore the ideology of efficiency, both with respond to its inconsistency and incoherence within trust-building corporate governance. The results suggest that efficiency is ideological and political concept that fails in repairing the breach of trust-building corporate governance. The efficiency as a new ideology of trust-building corporate governance promises to advance our understanding of corporate purpose beyond the old shareholders-versus-stakeholders and shareholders-versus-society debates.

Today, engineering enterprises in Ukraine are experiencing poor development. The crisis development of many domestic engineering enterprises is reinforced by both internal and external factors, so it is critical to develop new methodologies to comprehensively estimate their level of financial security, thus serving as the information basis for the application of anti-crisis management. The objective of the study is to develop a model to assess the financial security of engineering enterprises. The subjects of the study are the activities of the top ten engineering enterprises in Ukraine for the period 2013-2017. The purpose of our research is to form a methodical approach to assess the financial security of engineering enterprises, which would become the basis for applying a certain type of anti-crisis management and encouragement in domestic engineering enterprises. The results of the study made it possible to form and implement a model to assess financial security, which will help to establish the need to apply anti-crisis management in an enterprise.

Asset misappropriation is a kind of fraud that may cause severe damages to the businesses. The internal control system is expected to provide a reasonable assurance for the management of the businesses in preventing and detecting frauds, including asset misappropriation. The study is conducted to examine the effect of internal control system on asset misappropriation in Vietnamese firms. Based on questionnaires collected from internal auditors, accountants and department managers in Vietnamese firms, the study assess the impact of COSO five internal control components on the popularity of asset misappropriation in the firms. The results show that of the five components, control environment presents the strongest impact, followed by control activities, information and communication in respective order. Determinants with the mildest impact are risk assessment and monitoring of control. Based on the findings, it is important that the management of the firms improve the internal controls to effectively reduce the chance of fraud in their firms.

A country’s political stability and trends in economic growth are important factors to attract foreign investment. Most developing countries struggle to achieve political stability and high levels of growth. Due to these issues, developing countries attract limited foreign investment. Applying the Bounds test for cointegration, an ARDL model was utilized using time series data from 1995 to 2016, this study examined the potential impact of political risk and gross domestic product (GDP) on foreign direct investment (FDI) flows to the South Africa. Findings of the study revealed that in both short and long run, political risk and economic growth affect the level of foreign direct investment. The political risk rating was found to have a higher impact on FDI flow if compared to GDP. The lower the political risk level (resulting in a highly rated index), the higher the level of FDI inflows. Using the Granger causality approach, empirical results indicated a bi-directional causal relationship between FDI and economic growth, while it was found that political risk causes changes in FDI. In other words, individually, political risk and gross domestic product cause changes in FDI. Based on the study findings, it is imperative for the South African government to reduce the level of political risk in order to increase foreign investment into the country which, in return, could assist in economic growth and welfare.

The purpose of paper is to assess the long-term memory of stock index returns in the pan-European platform Euronext (CAC-40, AEX, BEL-20 and PSI-20). We find evidence of time dependency in much of the data, suggesting that the series may best be described as fractional Brownian motion. Modified Rescaled-Range Analysis and Detrended Fluctuation Analysis were used to measure the degree of long memory. The global Hurst exponents evidence persistent long memory in the Dutch, Belgian and Portuguese markets. In the French market, evidence of long memory is inconsistent and weak. Fractal structure suggests non-conformity with the Efficient Market Hypothesis, and may compromise the reliability of asset pricing models. Furthermore, time-dependent Hurst exponents show evidence of weakening persistence in these markets, particularly after the international crises of 2000, 2002 and 2010. A possible explanation for those changes is that the markets may have matured over time, becoming more efficient after these severe events.

This paper presents an assessment on the effect and consequences of burnout as a factor impacting premature sign-offs (PMSO) among internal auditors. Hence, questionnaires were sent to 187 internal auditors from Jordan to gather data. The data analysis results show the presence of some job burnout antecedents which are: ethical tension, role conflict, role ambiguity, and neuroticism personality trait. For internal auditors, job burnout can reduce the level of their job satisfaction. Meanwhile, dissatisfaction in the workplace among internal auditors, may increase negative behaviours including premature sign-offs.

By using a two-stage quantile regression approach (2SQR), this study demonstrates how the insurer’s leverage is determined across various quantiles. The evidence shows that the influence of the business concentration and marketing channel at the lower leverage quantiles is opposite to that at the higher leverage quantiles, which proposes that the mean effects of the two-stage ordinary least squares method are insufficient to capture the effects of business strategies on the insurer’s capital structure determination. Moreover, the 2SQR evidence also shows that the magnitude of the impacts for some determinations varies among the different leverage quantiles. In sum, the evidence suggests that these two competing approaches should be viewed as complementary functions when discussing the insurer’s capital structure.

<p>This study investigates the influence of “offer for sale” by existing shareholders on investors’ reaction in the IPO immediate aftermarket. The “offer for sale” is measured by the proportion of shares offered to public from the sale of the existing shareholdings prior to IPO against the total number of shares offered during IPO. The “offer for sale” activity suggests that proceed from the shares sold at an IPO would go into the pocket of the existing shareholders. That is, the proceed does not actually meet the primary goals of the IPO to raise funds for business expansion. IPO firms that go public mainly through “offer for sale” activity are expected to receive less demand during IPO from potential investors as the investors are less optimistic in firms which their shares are offered mostly through “offer for sale” activity relative to firms which their shares are newly issued. Thus, firms which their shares are offered through “offer for sale” activity are predicted to produce poor initial aftermarket return and trading. Using a final sample of 419 Malaysian IPOs issued from January 2000 to December 2015, regression results of this study reveal that firms which their shares are offered highly through “offer for sale” report poor and lower initial aftermarket return and trading volume. The results support the proposition of this study that investors are less optimistic in firms which their shares are offered mostly through “offer for sale” activity.</p>