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Given the continuous debate about the foreign direct investment (FDI)‐inequality nexus, there is an acknowledged need for reconsidering their relationship from a new perspective. Therefore, applying balanced panel data composed of 60 countries from 1998 to 2014, this research estimates a finite mixture model with country risk as a concomitant variable to explore the interrelationships among FDI, inequality, and country risk so as to offer fresh insight into the FDI‐inequality nexus. We present evidence that shows a significant role of compositing country risk on this. Specifically speaking, FDI deteriorates inequality under the condition of high risk, whereas it alleviates inequality in a country with low country risk. Moreover, we can also obtain the similar findings by considering the role of components of country risk (economic risk, financial risk and political risk) as a determinant for the FDI‐inequality nexus. FDI deteriorates inequality under the condition of high political, economic and financial risks, whereas it alleviates inequality in a country with low political, economic and financial risks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The financial industry has been affected by the rise of informational technology and is actively developing digital finance. The use of technology has become an alternative resolution to improve global financial inclusion. This research discusses whether the development of mobile payment systems promotes financial inclusion and improves green environment in 29 low- and middle-income countries in Asia from 2014 to 2018. We utilize the outstanding bank deposit ratio and bank loan ratio as measures of financial inclusion and three measures for mobile payment. This study considers green recovery under an education indicator that shows awareness about the implementation of green recovery technologies. We find that some amount from loans is also useful when spent on green recovery in the move towards a clean environment. The empirical investigation notes a significant impact from mobile payment to financial inclusion development with the effect from mobile payment to financial inclusion more critical for lower- than higher-income countries in the sample. The empirical findings offer concrete evidence to encourage mobile payment ecosystems through the cooperation of government, financial institutions, and technology companies. A few policy implications are presented at the end of the study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the risk-sharing and risk-taking effects of multidimensional globalization and government regulation on multifaceted country risk by using a panel data of 77 countries over the period 1984–2015. To gain further insights into this issue, we also examine the roles of banking activities, economic development, and geographic regions on the relationship between globalization, government regulation, and country risk. Our main empirical results show that a higher level of globalization and less restricted government regulation of the financial sector significantly decrease country risks, supporting the risk-sharing hypothesis in our study. In addition, bank performance, bank concentration, and economic development play an essential role as conditional factors to influence the country risk. This finding offers several useful insights for policymakers and researchers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The goal of this study is to explore the causal relationship among economic growth, economic complexity and CO 2 emissions by using panel data of 95 countries for the period 1996–2015. A novel panel Granger approach proposed by Juodis et al. (2021) is adopted. Under this approach, we can explore the Granger causality in homogeneous or heterogeneous panels. To uncover the heterogeneous causal effects at different income levels, this study further divide the sample into three groups according to their annual income levels. Empirical results show that there are bi-directional causalities among economic growth, economic complexity and CO 2 emissions for all groups. However, the magnitudes of the effects are heterogeneous for different groups. As to low-income countries, economic complexity is positive and significant for CO 2 emissions, while CO 2 emissions are negative for economic complexity. Furthermore, there is a positive interaction between economic complexity and CO 2 emissions for middle-income countries. Regarding high-income countries, however, increasing economic complexity might effectively reduce CO 2 emissions, and CO 2 emissions can significantly increase economic complexity. Additionally, economic complexity will prominently decrease GDP in low-income countries. These findings are robust to different economic complexity indexes. Our results suggest that both developing and developed countries should set a reasonable CO 2 emissions target, and on this basis, maintain a good balance between economic complexity and CO 2 emissions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We explore what firm and macroeconomic factors assisted Chinese firms to resist the global financial crisis. We find that firms with higher top ten shareholder ratios or firms that are older exhibited saliently higher performance during the crisis, but performed poorly during the non-crisis period. Firm size has a notably negative impact on firm performance. Firms audited by the Big Four accounting firms have a significantly negative correlation with performance. During the crisis, stock markets became less efficient in incorporating firm-specific information into stock prices, signifying that the determinants of firm performance vary across non-crisis and crisis periods. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper empirically investigates the relationship among the tax evasion and local disposal income, unemployment rate and demographic variables by using 20 municipalities in Taiwan with the official interior, latest, and wider range of panel data over the period from 1998 to 2011. The main findings support the positive impact of disposal income on tax evasion, while unemployment rate has a negative impact. Among the interest rate effect models, if policy-makers want to hinder the extension of tax evasion, they should reduce the interest rate. Furthermore, government not only applies fiscal policy but also applies monetary policy for improving tax evasion. In our regional effect model, we have found evidence on a positive impact of the demographic structure variables on tax evasion except social expenditure of local government. We have also found clear evidence on the positive impact in South and East areas on tax evasion in the regional effect model. Moreover, both interest rate and regional factors have an influence on tax evasion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Just as the world has witnessed the increased importance of the insurance sector over the past few decades, it has also witnessed a sharp rise in risks and uncertainties. Surprisingly, studies analyzing the relationship between economic policy uncertainty and the insurance sector are almost non-existent. Another major limitation of insurance literature is the choice of methodology. Most studies on the insurance sector do not take into consideration issues of heterogeneity and cross-sectional dependence, and are therefore subject to errors. To address the identified gaps, this research investigates the impact of economic policy uncertainty on insurance premiums in a panel of 15 countries over the period 1998–2016 by employing heterogeneous panel estimation techniques with cross-sectional dependence. The Durbin-Hausman cointegration tests of Westerlund (2008) confirm that a long-run relationship exists between the variables. Findings from the error correction based panel estimations show that the insurance sector is not immune to the effects of economic policy uncertainty. Economic policy uncertainty raises insurance premiums both in the short and long run, although the long-run impact is greater than the short-run impact. In addition, economic policy uncertainty exerts a bigger influence on non-life insurance premium than on life insurance premium, indicating that the economic risks covered by non-life insurance are more sensitive to uncertainty than the mortality and longevity risks covered by life insurance. Our findings further show that national income, education, population, financial development and institutional quality all raise insurance premiums, while inflation lowers insurance premiums. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]