Speculate Research Articles

Reformulating theories of ‘accumulation by dispossession’: ‘Contested accumulations through displacement’ in postcolonial Punjab, Pakistan

The reformulation of Harvey’s seminal theory of ‘accumulation by dispossession’ (ABD) has sparked a robust debate within the heterodox political economy literature. On one hand, there’s an argument that ‘extra-economic’ coercion should be the defining characteristic of ABD. On the other hand, Leitner and Sheppard have demonstrated that both forced evictions and consensual sales of land rights are integral processes of ABD. This paper contributes to this debate by expanding Leitner and Sheppard’s framework of ‘contested accumulations through displacement’ in two key ways. Firstly, the paper unbundles the postcolonial state and illustrates that its role is more nuanced than merely the ‘expropriation’ of land within the process of ABD. Based on theoretically grounded empirical research in the context of Sheikhupura, Punjab (Pakistan), the paper shows that the postcolonial state engineers new ground rents and facilitates land speculation through selective provision of road infrastructure, favouring certain areas while excluding others. In Sheikhupura, the uneven provision of road networks has enhanced the connectivity and accessibility of some places (connected villages) over others (isolated villages). Consequently, large landholders in ‘connected villages’ have been incentivized to extract high ground rents by converting farmland to gated housing enclaves (real estate development). This process has resulted in the loss of farm-based livelihoods and displacement for landless and small peasants. This illustrates that ABD does not necessarily require violent forms of expropriation in the age of neoliberal capitalism, as infrastructural development can lead to changes in land use, causing displacement and further marginalization of historically disadvantaged groups like landless and small peasants. Secondly, the paper introduces the concept-phenomenon of ‘economic-hybridity’ in the context of ABD which makes visible the dual and often contradictory nature of socio-economic and legal impulses in postcolonial social formations. Further, economic-hybridity helps in unravelling the intricate connections between place, property and power within processes of ABD.

Absentee Ownership and Rental Affordability: Evidence from Commuting Zones

In this paper, we examine the intersection of financialization, wealth inequality, and the housing market in the United States with an emphasis on the relationship between absentee ownership and declining rental affordability. At the same time as financialization has increasingly transformed the market for residential real estate into a vehicle for financial speculation, households at the bottom of the income distribution have been disproportionately affected by rising rents and declining housing affordability. Using data from the decennial Census and the American Community Survey from 1990 to 2020, we investigate the link between absentee ownership and rental affordability across US commuting zones. Panel fixed-effects estimates suggest a 10 percentage-point increase in absentee ownership results in a 6.7% increase in average rent, a 1.6 percentage-point increase in the ratio of median commuting zone rent to median commuting zone income, and an approximately 1.4 percentage-point increase in the share of households in a commuting zone that are rent burdened. These effects are concentrated in commuting zones with large non-white populations, and are particularly severe in commuting zones with a large share of black non-Hispanic residents. Our findings contribute to the understanding of how financialization and absentee ownership exacerbate housing affordability issues in marginalized communities and urban areas in the economic periphery, shaping the urban affordability landscape in locations beyond ‘first-tier’ global cities.

MEGA‐REAL ESTATE SPECULATION AND RACIALIZED DISPOSSESSION: Miami's Little Haiti

AbstractThis article contributes to research on racialized dispossession through the lens of popular responses to local/global conjunctures of urban financial speculation. How has a predominantly Black immigrant community, Little Haiti, confronted a surging variant of Miami's history of racialized dispossession—corporate mega‐real estate speculation—since 2008's global financial crisis? I examine Little Haiti's confrontation with the proposed Magic City Innovation District, which is, in fact, no more than a large‐scale, mixed‐use commercial venture. Greater Miami's conjuncture undermined the community's capacity to resist or effectively negotiate with Magic City's partnership in three ways: a real estate hegemonic metropolis devoid of potent allies; the near absence of neighborhood‐resident resistance leadership in a working‐poor immigrant community; and a political fracture within Greater Miami's Haitian collective responses over the politics of patronage and accommodative versus contentious bargaining. By enveloping patronage practices within speculative imaginaries of inclusive, tech‐led neighborhood and metropolitan prosperity, Magic City's partnership and local government reinforced that fracture and politically marginalized both the accommodative and contentious factions. I conclude by considering the dilemma of disenfranchised communities today when confronting racialized speculative intrusions. The article's empirical content draws primarily on my collaborative‐community activism, city commission planning sessions and official documentation.

Food Financialization: Impact of Derivatives and Index Funds on Agri-Food Market Volatility

This study explores the financialization of agricultural commodities, focusing on how financial derivatives and index funds impact the volatility of agro-food markets. Using a Dynamic Conditional Correlation (DCC) GARCH model, we analyze volatility spillovers among key agricultural commodities, particularly maize, and related financial assets over a sample period from 2007 to 2020. Our analysis includes major financial assets like Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs), the S&P 500 index, and agribusiness corporations such as ADM and Bunge and the largest corn flour producer, GRUMA. The results indicate that financial speculation, especially via passive investments such as ETFs, has intensified price volatility in commodity futures, leading to a systemic risk increase within the sector. This study provides empirical evidence of increased market integration between the agro-food sector and financial markets, underscoring risks to food security and economic stability. We conclude with recommendations for regulatory actions to mitigate systemic risks posed by the growing financial influence in agricultural markets.

Temporalities of speculation and discounting in the twentieth century

AbstractThis article reviews Paul Crosthwaite’s Speculative Time: American Literature in an Age of Crisis (2024) and Liliana Doganova’s Discounting the Future: The Ascendancy of a Political Technology (2024), situating them within recent scholarship on a future-oriented, speculative, and economic subject. It focuses on the relationship between financial speculation and temporalities in the twentieth century, specifically on futures and the politics of value in American literature and the calculating technology of discounting. These books bridge what have been two distinct scholarly approaches to studies of capitalist futures: a theoretical focus on futures as cultural imaginaries or narratives of economic action and a material emphasis on practices for anticipating futures and managing risk. The article concludes with a discussion of power and profit in speculation and discounting, emphasizing inequitable access to speculative futures, and suggests that the multidirectional, nonlinear, recursive mode of financialized temporalities in these books might offer a guide to imagining and creating more just futures for us all.

Urban Growth and Land Artificialization in Secondary African Cities: A Spatiotemporal Analysis of Ho (Ghana) and Kpalimé (Togo)

While many studies have used Earth observations to quantify urbanization in Africa, there is still a lack of empirical evidence on the role of secondary cities in the fastest urbanizing region in the world. Moreover, the diversity of urbanization processes in Africa, which can be more or less compact in terms of land consumption, remains insufficiently acknowledged and under-documented. This empirical study employed mixed methods to address these research gaps. We analyzed and compared the spatiotemporal dynamics of two secondary African cities, Ho (Ghana) and Kpalimé (Togo), between 1985 and 2020. We compared their spatial growth (the rate of urbanization of land) with their respective population growth rates using Landsat TM and ETM+ imagery, and population data. To understand the factors behind eventual differences between the spatial patterns of urbanization of the two cities, our quantitative analysis based on remote sensing was confronted with qualitative data from individual interviews with key stakeholders. Our results showed two distinct urbanization trajectories between 1985 and 2010, with Ho following a more compact pattern than Kpalimé. Since 2010, however, both cities have tended towards urban sprawl, with an urbanization rate greater than the population growth rate. According to the interviews, the main determinants of urban sprawl in these two secondary cities were the absence of housing policies for low-income groups, the absence or inefficacy of urban master plans, the preponderance of single-family housing, and land speculation.

Microprudential Regulations and Bank Lending in Nigeria

Objectives: The current study aimed at investigating the relationship between microprudential regulations and bank lending in Nigeria. Theoretical framework: The theoretical underpinning of the study is drawn on the theory of risk-return tradeoff which maintains that potential return rises with an increase in risk. Method: Financial data of 13 banks over a period of 15 years were sourced from the repository of Central Bank of Nigeria, and were analyzed using the Panel (Least Squares) Multiple regression technique. Results and Discussions: The result of analyses revealed a high R-squared value of 0.75, an indication that microprudential regulation accounted for 75% variation in profitability in the Nigeria banking institution. Also, the F-statistic of 101.31 and a p-value of 0.000, indicated that the Ordinary Least Square regression model is statistically significant at the 1% level. Overall, microprudential regulation impact on lending and profitability in Nigeria. Research Implications: More so, the study’s relevance is evident in its applications to the principles and practice of lending, fund mobilization and other finance related policies and decisions in the banking sector. Originality/ Value: The outcome of the current study is valid and can be used for statistical inference. The conceptual framework of the study is a novel model that demonstrates how the variables in the study are interconnected. Furthermore, the model specification presents a viable template for financial speculations and calculations.

The Role of Generative Artificial Intelligence in Managing Speculative Financing Risks in Islamic Banks

Artificial intelligence has witnessed great importance and rapid growth in light of the rapid technical development, the increase and diversity of the volume of data, the power and speed of computers, and the accuracy of machine learning models, so that the role of machines has become not only limited to understanding our world, but contributing strongly to shaping it, and here the role of generative artificial intelligence has emerged to reflect... How machines interact with users and generate new and innovative content. Given the interest of the early theorists of Islamic banking in speculation as a basic formula for mobilizing and using resources in Islamic banks, as it is more capable of accumulating investable cash balances, and more capable of distributing available monetary resources to the best uses for the purposes of economic and social development, and contributing directly to the fair distribution of national income. In view of what we see in our contemporary reality of the limited dealing with speculative financing in Islamic banks, due to considerations related to the difficulty of managing their risks, whether these considerations relate to the Islamic bank itself, the financing clients, or the surrounding circumstances. This reality represents a problem for which practical solutions need to be sought. The importance of the research appears to be that, in light of the emergence of artificial intelligence in general and generative artificial intelligence in particular, generative artificial intelligence can be utilized in managing the risks of speculative financing in a way that enables the Islamic bank to protect its funds and opens the way towards development horizons instead of focusing financing on debts. The research aims to identify generative artificial intelligence in terms of its concept, origins, development, and relationship to finance, and the prospects for benefiting from it to contribute to managing the risks of speculative financing in Islamic banks. The research relies on the descriptive and analytical approach, as this approach is consistent with the nature of the research topic, as well as its objectives. The research addressed the definition of artificial intelligence and generative artificial intelligence, the definition of speculative financing and its risks in Islamic banks, and the role of generative artificial intelligence in managing the risks of speculative financing in Islamic banks. The research reached the role that generative artificial intelligence can play in managing speculative financing risks in Islamic banks, whether it comes to the stages of managing those risks or their mechanisms.

The Gene Editing Business: Rent Extraction in the Biotech Industry

ABSTRACT This article analyses the mechanisms governing the extraction, circulation, and distribution of rent in the biotech industry. Building on recent scholarship, it contributes to debates surrounding the importance of rent in technoscientific capitalism. We analyse genome editing as a global labour process. Part One examines the ongoing patent battle over CRISPR-Cas9 as a struggle for control over a foundational biotechnology increasingly central to several industrial sectors: a process of enclosure that facilitates a shift towards monopoly, rent extraction, and financial speculation. Part Two then details how patented CRISPR technologies are valorised through the construction of global, multi-layered infrastructures of rent extraction based on complex webs of financial and licensing deals. Part Three maps the uneven global geographies of CRISPR patenting. It considers how monopoly power emerges through the continuous conversion of public research into private assets, and how this enclosure reinforces profoundly unequal systems of distribution of royalties and rents in the global biopolitical economy. We interrogate how CRISPR technologies cement and expand neocolonial geographies of rent extraction, privatising the economic benefits and socialising the ecological risks. Finally, we argue that an increasingly monopolistic corporate biopower mediates how genome editing technologies are developed, and which mutant ecologies are socially produced.

Modeling Returns to Currency Speculation: The Importance of Accurate Trading Costs

Modeling Returns to Currency Speculation: The Importance of Accurate Trading Costs

Crypto/Space: Computational parasitism, virtual land grabs, and the production of Web3 Exit zones

This paper explores how so-called ‘Web3’ blockchain projects are materially and socially constituted. A blockchain is an append-only distributed database. The technology is being hyped as applicable for a whole range of industries, social service provisions, and as a fix for economic disparities in communities left behind by mainstream financial systems. Drawing on case studies from our ongoing research we explain how, despite being virtual, Web3 projects are dependent on clearly defined spaces of production from which they derive their speculative value. We conceptualise this relationship as Crypto/Space, where space and blockchain software are mutually constituted. We consider how Crypto/Spaces are produced in three ways: 1) how project developers are adopting a parasitic relationship with host locations to appropriate energy, infrastructure, and local resources; 2) how projects enable ‘virtual land grabs’ where developers are engaging in land acquisitions, and associated displacement of local people, with no real intention to use the land for the declared purpose; and 3) how blockchain technology and speculative finance imaginaries are inspiring new anarcho-capitalist crypto-utopian ‘Exit zones’, often in the Global South. Far from being a zero-sum virtual game world, we argue that cryptocurrency projects are parasitic, often requiring predation on poor and otherwise marginalised communities to appropriate resources, onboard new users and enable favourable regulation.

The Safe Heaven Appeal of Gold: A Comparative Analysis of Gold Price and Nifty50 Index during Financial Crises

The historical view of gold as a trustworthy investment has made it a popular choice as a place of refuge resource during seasons of financial strife. This study looks at how the bullion market responds to financial crises and how the perceived safety of gold during a period of uncertainty affects market behaviour. This research looks at how gold prices, investor actions, and market liquidity have changed throughout various economic downturns, like the Coronavirus pandemic and the 2008 monetary emergency. The paper evaluates the effect of gold's safe-haven status on market performance and investor trust using both quantitative and qualitative methods. The findings show that although demand for gold rises during times of crisis, other factors like market speculation, fluctuations in interest rates, and changes in currency values also have an impact on price movements of gold. The study highlights the complex relationship that exists between the market dynamics of gold and its role as a protective asset, providing a comprehensive understanding of the metal's behaviour during financial instability. These findings offer insightful guidance for investors and policymakers navigating economic downturns and add to the larger discussion on asset diversification and risk management techniques.

Double-edged sword of industrial internet of things: Empirical evidence from green transformation of enterprises

The industrial revolution based on the Internet of Things brings new opportunities and challenges for enterprises' green and sustainable development. Therefore, this study explores the relationship between the Industrial Internet of Things (IIOT) and the Green Transformation of Enterprises (GT) based on the data of China's A-share listed companies from 2009 to 2023 using two-way fixed, mediated effect, and moderated effect models. The results show that for every unit increase in IIOT, the GT increases by 28.89 percent on average, indicating that IIOT can break down information barriers and effectively promote GT. However, after disaggregating the GT, it was found that the IIOT guided companies to implement the Symbolic Green Transformation (SGT) instead of adopting the Realistic Green Transformation (RGT). This strategic choice preference is more pronounced among firms that are larger, in energy-intensive industries, in regions with weaker environmental regulations and higher levels of development. The intermediary mechanism test proved that the IIOT can drive firms to implement comprehensive GT through paths that enhance investment attractiveness, productivity, technological innovation, and pay gaps. In particular, the masking effect reminds us that smart technology is a “double-edged sword”. The negative effects of smart technologies hinder the implementation of RGT. Further analysis reveals an inverted U-shaped relationship between IIOT and RGT preferences. In addition, in companies that focus on Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) performance and avoid financial speculation, the dark side of intelligent technology is suppressed. The findings of this study enrich the research scope of smart technology, GT, and provide important insights for enterprises in emerging economies to rationally utilize IIOT to seek green and sustainable development under the wave of rapid development of smart technology.

The Practice of Urban Planning In Managing Urban Expansion: The Case of Level-I Towns in Southern Ethiopia

The world’s urbanization continues to grow rapidly occurring in developing regions. The rapid pace of urbanization without equivalent economic growth causes uneven spatial dispersion, land speculation, urban sprawl, ecological damage, and socio-cultural chaos. Urban planning is a key tool in managing such urbanization and particularly urban expansion challenges through several strategies. The objective of this study is to evaluate the practice of urban planning in managing urban expansion by applying both quantitative and qualitative research approaches. The first-hand data was collected by a structured questionnaire survey, interview, and physical observation, whereas secondary data was analyzed from spatial and non-spatial data of the study towns, national urban policy and strategy documents, and the national urban development spatial plan. Descriptive analysis, principal factor analysis, spatial trend analysis, and content analysis techniques were applied with the help of the SPSS and GIS analysis tools to reach the findings. The practices of urban planning in managing the urban expansion of the study town were evaluated on the basis of factors including urban spatial growth management, community engagement, economic change, and peri-urban communities’ understanding of urban planning. The major findings indicated that these variables are poorly practical, and their failure has been collectively posing significant obstacles to the effectiveness of urban planning. This implies that the urban planning practice in managing urban expansion was insignificant in the study towns. Therefore, it is best to use the alternative expansion area planning strategy, that promotes planned spatial growth, community inclusivity, mixed economic activity, environmental sustainability, and the community’s awareness of expansion areas.

Conservation threats from tourism land grabs and greenwash

We report a new threat to conservation, namely land grabs by large tourism developers inside public protected areas. Locally, these tourism land grabs damage national parks through building footprints and access corridors, bringing habitat fragmentation, noise, light, roadkill, fire risk, and invasive plant and animal species and pathogens. They also create negative impacts on social equity and regional economies. The global tourism industry now perceives private development in public national parks as a mechanism to profit from land speculation, rather than merely monopoly provision of visitor services. Investment funds now use tourism, often with socialwashing components, as a political lever for land grabs. International “nature positive” marketing by tourism industry associations and multilateral tourism advocacy organisations is greenwash: it lacks substance, and aims to coopt conservation organisations.

Financial speculation meets cultural heritage in China's wildlife markets.

Environmental regulations restricting the use of a natural resource or species often have unintended consequences. One example is prohibitions on the international trade in culturally important endangered wildlife. Trade restrictions may artificially increase scarcity and, consequently, value. In China, international trade restrictions may trigger bouts of speculative investment that have the opposite effect of the restrictions' intent. We examined how China's speculative economy and cultural history have together led to unintended consequences when regulating wildlife trade. In China, wildlife markets occupy a legal gray area that can make regulations ineffectual or even counterproductive. In extreme cases, prohibiting trade can provoke market booms. Further unintended consequences include potential cultural backlash. In China and across the Global South, international trade restrictions are sometimes considered a continuation of a longstanding history of Western intervention and thus may not be enforced as strongly or may generate resentment. This pushback has contributed to rising calls to decolonialize conservation and may lead to growing alliances between China and other Global South countries when negotiating international wildlife trade restrictions in the future.

Problems and Countermeasures of Apple Agricultural Products Futures Market in China

In recent years, the improvement of quality and efficiency of national economy and agricultural modernization have directly promoted the innovative development of apple industry in China. At the end of 2017, the first Apple futures in China was born, and then the scale of Apple trading market continued to expand, and the standardization of Apple futures trading market increased year by year, which directly promoted the adjustment and upgrading of Apple industry. However, the development of Apple futures market lags behind the current situation of spot market development, and the imperfect risk management system, low internationalization level of Apple futures, imperfect laws and regulations of Apple futures market and chaos of market speculators still need to be solved urgently. In order to promote the rapid development of China's apple futures market, it is important to improve the trading system of bulk agricultural products; Strengthen the risk management mechanism; Strengthen international market cooperation and exchanges; Revise and improve the relevant laws and regulations of the Apple Futures Market and improve the level of market standardization; Take measures to limit speculation.

Inequalities and Trends in Under-Five Mortality Between Formal and Informal Areas in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso

The physical expansion of the city of Ouagadougou, the capital and largest city of Burkina Faso, subsided in 2015 after the government banned land speculation that contributed to the growth and entrenchment of informal areas. The government subsequently implemented social policies such as free health care for pregnant women and children under 5 years of age. Against this background, we tested the convergence of under-5 mortality trends between formal and informal areas in the city between 2010 and 2019; data covering that period came from the Ouagadougou Health and Demographic Surveillance System (HDSS). The analyses included the calculation of all-cause and cause-specific mortality rates, the implementation of a Poisson regression model, and competing risk models. Over the study period, children in formal areas had lower mortality than those in informal areas. However, the inequality gap decreased over time due to a faster mortality decline in informal areas. This decline was explained by a rapid decline in deaths from malaria and other causes including sepsis, HIV/AIDS, measles, meningitis, and encephalitis. The pursuit of upgrading informal areas and the implementation of social policies targeting the poorest are likely to accelerate the mortality decline in Ouagadougou overall.

Demystifying Financial Speculation in Commodity Future Markets of Emerging Economies

Present study focuses on comparing financial speculation on commodity future markets of China and India. Two agricultural products and two metal products were chosen from both countries for the present study. Utilizing a comprehensive dataset spanning over twenty years, we employ quantitative methods to measure the hedging and speculative ratios within Chinese and Indian commodity future markets. Relevant results and visual representations were extracted using EVIEWS. Outcome of the study demonstrated that Indian commodity future markets are more speculative than Chinese commodity future markets both in cases of agricultural and metal products. The results will provide valuable implications for policymakers and market participants aiming to compare financial speculation in commodity markets vis-à-vis emerging economies like China and India. Additionally, the outcomes of this study are particularly relevant for market players, and policymakers to comprehend the mind-set/behavioural pattern of investors trading in Chinese and Indian commodity future markets.

Home boundaries: a socio-spatial analysis of Cairo’s housing market. Using justified plan graph (JPG) theory

Purpose This paper aims to define the socio-spatial considerations of apartment users in Cairo, during their decision-making process. It provides a set of socio-spatial guidelines for professional architecture designers that are based on regionalist sociological theories and the evaluation of participant responses. These guidelines can also help users choose better plan configurations or make socially conscious adjustments as formal residential interiors in Egypt are not arranged based on social interaction at home or the cultural specificity of the region. On the other hand, users have little clue about choosing better plan configurations for sustainable social relationships. Moreover, the private housing sector has mostly neglected the social boundaries that traditionally shaped home interiors. This is because the designers focus on physical attributes to satisfy market demand and economic aspects. Design/methodology/approach The research reviewed past literature on the impact of different home arrangements relative to inhabitant and social relationships. Simultaneously, preliminary open-ended sorting surveys were undertaken at the Cityscape 2020 exhibition. Based on the results, a comprehensive online survey was developed to map the socio-spatial preferences of users. Finally, a sample of 150 apartment plans was analyzed by using the justified plan graph (JPG) theory to reveal the most common arrangements in the speculative market, measuring unit depth. Findings The findings of this study will benefit the following: practitioners, including architects and real estate developers, will be able to learn about end-user preferences and offer better products (residential units). Designers can rely on a reference that visualizes recommended home arrangements in the form of justified graphs. This research will expose the academic theories that currently shape residential plans and those that are overlooked and need to be applied. Academics, on the other hand, will learn about the market, and the extent of the influence of architectural theory. Originality/value The value of this paper lies in the gathering of theoretical recommendations on traditional home arrangements and investigating the preferences of both professionals and laypeople when choosing between apartments. The open-ended study in this research will test its efficiency in the Egyptian context and serve as a reference for future social studies. It highlights the importance of cultural adequacy and how to design homes related to local residents’ natural lifestyle, by doing so, people will be able to overview the options available in the market and how to manipulate their own houses to control or encourage different social interactions.