Purpose: Islamic banking products and services have always claimed to be unique from its traditional interest-based counterpart. However, in practice, many Islamic banks are alleged to have drifted away from its paradigm version. The purpose of this study is to gauge the perception of university students in Malaysia towards Islamic banking products. Research design, data and methodology: Data were collected from 250 Malaysian university students. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was performed to test proposed hypotheses to identify factors influencing customers' perception toward Islamic banking products. Results: The main finding indicates that most of the respondents are familiar with Islamic banking products and consider Islamic banking products as useful as its conventional counterparts. The regression results show that respondents are less convinced of adherence to Shari'ah, efficiency and helpfulness of existing Islamic banks. Conclusions: This is a cue to the Islamic banks' stakeholders that they need to realign their practices in an ethically responsible way in accordance with Shari'ah if they wish to secure existing customers and attract potential ones. In a competitive banking environment, most banks provide efficient and readily available service; thus, focusing on this as a strategy hardly distinguishes an Islamic bank from an interest-based bank.

Purpose: The main purposes of this study are to examine what the most important hotel facilities that sharia hotels must provide, and to study the relationship between importance of sharia compliance and Muslim tourists' judgment on the performance of sharia hotels. Research Design, Data, and Methodology: The data were collected in Lombok Island. Questionnaires were distributed to Muslim tourists who stayed at one of the sharia hotels, with a total sample of 205 respondents. Factor Analysis Method and Two Independent Sample Tests have been applied in this research to analyze and interpret the data. Result: The results show only one factor is formed from all statements of Sharia compliance variable, and there is a significant difference in the customer experience and customer satisfaction ratings based on the importance of hotel facilities. Conclusion: The present study revealed that Muslim tourists who place a high level of importance in sharia compliance present a more positive assessment for all services provided by sharia hotels. The assessment from Muslim tourists with higher level of importance in Sharia compliance is more positive about their experiences during their stay at the sharia hotels, which also affects their satisfaction.

Purpose: The purpose of this study is for the leading sector, a pattern of shifting structure of the economic sector, and community export competitiveness on the economy Malinau Regency. Research design, data, and methodology: The type of data used is secondary data with a quantitative approach of 2009-2018. The study data used Location Quotient (LQ), Shift Share Analysis (SSA), and Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA) analysis tools. Results: There are 6 leading sectors: agriculture; electricity, gas, and clean water; building and construction; trade, hotels, and restaurants. That has been classified has changed the economic structure of the Malinau Regency from the secondary sector to the tertiary and primary sectors in 10 years. While, community export competitiveness of the Malinau Regency through RCA Analysis, see if the export products of coal and excavation (types A, B, C) are shown to have a higher comparative advantage with comparative advantage. This shows that only a few commodities that can provide the good performance of export. Conclusions: Analysis of economic growth in the Malinau Regency after regional autonomy shows that there has been a shift in the economic structure of the economy which is dominated by the structure of the primary sector.

Purpose: Vietnam's financial sector has grown substantially but microfinance institutions (MFIs) still face up many challenges in providing financial services to underserved customer segments, including small businesses, rural populations, and urban migrants. The recent worldwide explosion of fintech, including in Vietnam, promises to fill this gap. The purpose of this paper is to analyze fintech activities in microfinance sector and recommend for fintech adoption of MFIs in Vietnam. Research Design, Data and Methodology: The paper's data is mainly based on international organizations such as Asia Development Bank (ADB), Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and Vietnamese organizations such as Vietnam Microfinance Working Group. The authors suggest new directions for microfinance activities in Vietnam. Results: In recent years, the application of fintech in microfinance sector has brought many good results, such as improving the quality of products and services, easy access to many customer groups, and scaling up the operating model. Conclusion: MFIs in Vietnam have developed new products and services by applying fintech. The application of technology and digital solution has supported MFIs in Vietnam to gradually achieve targeted growth through expanding geographical inclusion/scale, enhancing product supply/provision, helping in-depth customer understanding as well as improving operational efficiency.

Purpose: This study assesses the marketing practices and value-added fish products under the Coral Reef Rehabilitation and Management Program (COREMAP) in East Indonesia. Research design, data and methodology: This study gathered qualitative and quantitative data through i) focus group discussions (FGD) with fishers, traders and COREMAP officers, ii) surveys and iii) interviews with fishermen and traders. This study surveyed 714 households (365 in COREMAP and 349 in non-COREMAP) and 33 traders (17 in COREMAP and 16 in non-COREMAP) using structured questionnaires between January and March 2016. This study used Shepherd’s Index to estimate the marketing efficiency for each stage of the marketing channel. For value-added fish products, the value is determined by the difference between processed output and the raw product used. Results: Marketing cost in the non-COREMAP area was more efficient than in COREMAP as indicated by lower operational cost and higher selling price. However, no value-added fish products were produced in the non-COREMAP area. This study noted a lower catch in COREMAP area, which implies COREMAP program successfully reduced fishing pressure. Conclusions: This study identified poor infrastructure and the limited market as the major problems in developing value-added fish products in both COREMAP and non-COREMAP area.

Purpose: This study examines the impact of individual reciprocal preferences on coalition formation. The reciprocal model considers a player’s own payoff, the player’s perception of others’ payoffs, and others’ perceptions of the player’s payoff. Research design, data and methodology: A reciprocal model is built to illustrate how reciprocity influences individual decisions in a coalition game and its formation. The prediction is examined with experimental evidences from a dictator game and a membership game. Results: The theoretical result suggests that the coalition formation could be unstable due to negative reciprocal kindness. The experimental findings support that negative reciprocal kindness could lead players participating in a coalition, no matter their dominant strategies are. When subjects were essential to make contributions to a coalition, they were more likely to cooperate if they were treated badly. In contrast, when subjects were unnecessary, the reciprocal kindness could enhance cooperative tendencies. Conclusions: This study reveals that the reciprocal behavior could influence individual decisions and reshape the coalition formation. In terms of policy implications, this study has shown that coalition formation could be reshaped by reciprocal prefe rences. Due to the strategic and complicated decision process in an interactive environment, a comprehensive investigation of factors would be required in a climate coalition in practice.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to find out the impact of financial leverage on firm’s profitability in the listed textile sector of Bangladesh. Research design, data and methodology: A sample of 22 DSE listed textile firms has been used to conduct the study. In this study, firm profitability is measured by Return on Equity (ROE) and both short term debt and long term debt are used as the as proxies of financial leverage. Pooled Ordinary Least Squares (OLS), Fixed Effect (FE), and Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) models have been used to test the relationship between financial leverage and profitability of firms. Result: This study finds a significant negative relationship between leverage and firm’s profitability using the Pooled OLS method. The result is also consistent with the fixed effect and GMM method. This result implies that firm’s profitability is negatively affected by the firm’s capital structure. Conclusion: The study concludes that maximum textile firms use external debt as a source of finance as they don’t have sufficient internally generated funds. This study recommends that firm should give more emphasize on generating fund internally to meet up their financing needs.

Purpose: This paper explores diverse issues related to the problem of women’s unpaid domestic care work, and as a factor of gender inequality in their professional practice. Research Design: This article concentrated only on the analysis of secondary data available on the topic along with observation of facts in Kazakhstan based on diverse sources. In current conditions, the problem of women's unpaid domestic care work, and consequently, the lack of enough time and energy for professional employment. Distinguish domestic work vs. job/career/occupation, selffulfillment, education, and leisure has a significant impact on women's life satisfaction. Data, and Methodology: This article focuses only on secondary data available in different sources from which the researchers procures comprehensive data and information. Results and conclusion: A family policy that aims to promote combining maternity, and domestic work with paid employment is an effective way to increase the proportion of working mothers/women. It is crucial to not only proportionally distribute the household responsibilities in the family but also to form an effective mechanism of state support for women through the development of the social services sector, as well as the adoption of a system-wide approach to gender equality.