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The present article aims to examine the asymmetric effects of foreign direct investment (FDI) on economic growth in India during 1991–2019. Along with FDI, financial development, inflation and trade openness are used as control variables. To check the influence of these variables on economic growth, this study employed the non-linear autoregressive distributed lag (NARDL) model. The results indicate that a positive shock in FDI inflows positively influences India's economic growth while negative FDI inflows have a negative influence. Also, the Wald test establishes the asymmetric effect of FDI on gross domestic product (GDP) growth both in the short-run and long run. Moreover, financial development and inflation rate significantly reduce the pace of economic growth in both the long run and the short run. However, trade openness boosts economic growth only in the long run. Based on these empirical findings, several policy implications are designed to increase the pace of economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigated the variations in the corporate financial performance (CFP) of firms that integrate ESG factors into their business practices, focusing on the mediating role of corporate efficiency (CE). Using 909 company-level data, we applied Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) to measure CE. We examined how these efficiency scores and CFP viz., Return on Assets (ROA), market value, and profit after tax (PAT) are influenced at different levels of ESG. To provide variational and distributional aspects, we employed quantile regression to estimate the relationship between ESG, CE, and CFP across different quantiles. The findings indicated that the impact of ESG integration on efficiency and CFP positively varies across quantiles. Further, a non-linear U-shaped relationship is established between the overall ESG score, environmental score, and social score with the CE. The efficiency initially dips at a lower disclosure score and surges to its highest at a higher disclosure score. Finally, our results revealed that ESG integration brings CE, which in turn channeled into financial outcomes, suggesting that CE plays a crucial mediating role. These results contribute to the understanding of how ESG practices can be leveraged for better financial outcomes through CE. These findings provide companies and policymakers with vital direction, encouraging a focus on robust ESG disclosure in establishing the path toward long-term corporate sustainability and profitability, guided by improved CE. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the asymmetric effect of economic policy uncertainty (EPU) on life and non-life insurance consumption in India using monthly data from April 2004–October 2020. The paper has employed a nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag (NARDL) model with a structural break. The results reveal that there exists an asymmetric effect of EPU on life insurance as well as non-life life insurance consumption. A negative relationship is found between EPU and insurance consumption in both life and non-life insurance. Based on the findings, the study suggests the policymakers to consider the asymmetric effects of EPU while formulating insurance-related policies in India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of the present study is to examine the impact of socioeconomic conditions on happiness in 21 Emerging Market Economies (EMEs) with the help of three sub‐samples comprising America, Asia, and EMEA (Europe, Middle East, and Africa) countries from 2006 to 2019. For this objective, panel corrected standard error model is used to resolve the problem of cross‐sectional dependence, group‐wise heteroscedasticity, and panel autocorrelation. The results of the study reveal that economic growth plays a positive role in determining the happiness of EMEs of America and EMEA sample countries. At the same time, globalisation and inflation affect the happiness of people in American sample countries in a negative way. In the sample of Asian countries, social support has a substantial impact on happiness. Corruption in the government and business sectors reduces the happiness of selected countries of both Asia and America. This article contributes to the existing literature by first time considering EMEs which have undergone liberalisation reforms and experienced transformation in their socioeconomic conditions. In conclusion, the study suggests that GDP per capita and social support positively stimulates happiness while the perception of corruption negatively impacts happiness in selected EMEs. These implications can help in building a line of actions for strengthening anti‐corruption institutions and promoting social integrations among these EMEs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper examines India's trade prospects with Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) countries during 2000-2019. The study uses the contribution to the trade balance index and the export similarity index. The findings show that India's imports increased faster than exports with all sample countries except Singapore, Myanmar, and Lao De Republic during the sample period. India has a high revealed comparative advantage in textile, consumer goods, chemicals, and food products with RCEP countries. However, untapped potential in its specialised products can be explored, as Indonesia's top export product, i.e., ships and boats floating structures, has a negative CTB & POS value compared to South Korea's product Petrol Oil Bitium Mineral (nt Crud) Etc Nt Biodiesel. Further, the export similarity index reveals low values, implying that India has no such trade competition from member countries in its top 10 exports among any non-member countries. Based on the findings, it can be concluded that many opportunities are waiting. Still, before that, the government has to bring reforms in trade policy with sample countries so that India would benefit from RCEP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]