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Purpose Based on the agency and resource dependence theories, this study aims to investigate whether nomination committee (NC) characteristics could serve as key attributes for reducing environmental, social and governance (ESG) disputes and whether NC composition affects the appointment of ESG-friendly directors to the board. Design/methodology/approach This study focuses on a sample of 30 global systemically important banks from 2015 to 2021. The authors estimate panel data models with fixed effects, clustering heteroskedastic standard errors at the bank level to account for the serial correlation of the dependent variables for each bank. Findings Banks’ exposure to ESG controversies can be reduced when NC members have specific skills, in particular when at least one member of this committee also belongs to the sustainability committee and is a foreign director. Moreover, banks’ ESG disputes decrease when the NC members are younger, while the share of independent NC members has a negative impact. Finally, a positive influence of NC composition and its members’ features as well as the appointment of ESG-friendly directors on the board is found. Originality/value The findings are particularly useful during periods such as the current one, when there is growing attention to both banks’ corporate governance, the subcommittees’ role and functioning and social and environmental issues. This study shows that the NC is important in reducing the likelihood of banks incurring ESG disputes and in appointing more ESG-friendly directors. NC effective functioning and its members’ qualities serve as a key attribute for fulfilling objective assessment and improving board effectiveness.

This review analyses the book titled "Innovation in financial restructuring: Focus on signals, processes and tools" co-authored by Marco Tutino and Valerio Ranciaro (Virtus Interpress, 2020; ISBN: 978-6-177309-10-8). The review highlights the original approach of the book to financial restructuring management and turnaround process. It describes in detail the structure of the book and content of chapters within the book. The review indicates that the book provides indications that will help academics, regulators and professionals to better manage the financial restructuring and prevent financial crisis.

This is the second issue of the journal in 2021 explores different areas of research regards: the client relationship management and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on consumption expenditures, governance and corporate social responsibility, board characteristics, risk management, and company performance

The article aims to verify whether the matrix forecasting method is valid for predicting the insurance market development trends. The methodology is based on the application of the Franchon & Romanet matrix to the insurance market. Our results indicate that the Franchon & Romanet matrix could be usefully employed in the insurance market to identify the initial market position (calculated as financial development potential distributed through the structure of the capital funds available for insurance and financial activities) and the possible future development strategies. The core limits are concerned with the small use of the matrix methods for performance measurement of the insurance market. No empirical study has been conducted. The application of the matrix is concerned with risk management or rating transition matrices. Despite this circumstance gives originality to our paper, it poses a problem of data collection and limits the possibility to conduct the comparison with other scientific results. The construction of the matrix allows identifying the initial position of a country’s insurance market, to evaluate the possible development strategies and to choose the preferable ones. The originality of the paper consists firstly, in the innovativeness of applying to the insurance sector the tool of matrix forecasting; secondly, in providing a supporting tool to policy-makers decisions.

We investigate how international investors evaluate the behaviour of those companies that have been excluded from the portfolio of the Norwegian Government Pension Fund-Global (GPF-G) due to environmental concerns. We concentrate on the excluded companies, to check if they are punished by SR concerned investors for their unethical environmental production and suffer from reputational damage. In particular, we focus on the 37 companies that have been excluded on the 14 of April 2016 that are listed on nine international stock markets. Building on the methodology generally used in these cases, we run an event study analysis to assess the stock price reaction to the public announcement of exclusion and to detect if an abnormal price reaction around the event exists.

Corporate social responsibility originates from the company’s behavioral problems. Corporate governance can be considered an environment of trust, ethics and moral values and in recent years has gained enormous importance. In addition, other factors that have been responsible for the new corporate governance paradigm are a stricter respect for the environment and the demand for greater corporate responsibility towards its shareholders and customers. Ecosystem load capacity is described with resource consumption input–output models. In line with this, the company should not use more than one resource that can be regenerated. Considering an organization as part of a broader social and economic system implies that these effects must be taken into account, not only for the measurement of the costs and value created in the present, but also in a future perspective for the company. In this context banks, which carry out the fundamental role as financial intermediaries, are linked with different stakeholder interests, both in economic and social field. This chapter analyzes the main novelties which has influenced corporate governance of them by reviewing its main phases. The chapter secondly addresses the specific features of board of directors by analyzing a sample of 25 banks defined as Global Systematically Important Institutions in 2018 following the EBA guidelines.

Governance and the internal control system represent a fundamental pillar in the Solvency II Directive. In that context, the insurance companies’ board plays a key role in assuming new responsibilities and duties. The present work aims to examine the role of insurance companies’ boards in view of the important changes introduced by Solvency II. An empirical analysis is conducted on a sample of 102 Italian insurance companies. Three areas of investigation, size and composition, board self-assessment processes and board remuneration policies, are covered by the survey. The results show a satisfactory level of compliance of the boards with respect to the requirements established by Solvency II. There is still room for improvement as regards the level of disclosure and diversity. The paper contributes to deepen the understanding of Solvency II effects on the composition and functioning of insurance companies’ boards. In addition, the study provides, through the Italian case analysis, some indications on the likely future development of the insurance companies.

The first issue of the journal in 2020 (volume 10, issue 1) provides a careful analysis of the important field of research regarding the social indicators, the corporate governance system, risk analysis and risk management, disclosure and bank regulation. Specifically, the current issue pays attention of an index to measure the quality of the most important European cities, the evolution of Saudi Arabia corporate governance systems, the econometric approach to estimate the influence of interest rates and inflation rates on default rates of banks, the Canadian companies and risks firms disclose, the relevance of enterprise risk management (ERM) information disclosure in the US banking sector and the bank regulation of capital and risk management in the Europe and Central Asia region.

The relationships between sustainable behavior, firm reputation, and economic performance are significant issues that continue to become more important. Corporate reputation has important implications for economic performance while corporate social responsibility engagement is considered a key determinant of reputation. The aim of this study is to empirically test such relationships regarding the banking sector and for the sub-prime crisis period (2008–2012). We apply our hypothesis to 75 large international banks using Reputation Institute and ASSET4 data and adopting a multiple econometric approach. Our initial results are encouraging and consistent with the existing literature: bank reputation is positively related to accounting performance and is negatively related to leverage and riskiness profiles. However, while a positive relationship between reputation and social performance exists, relationships between reputation, corporate governance, and environmental performance are always negative. We discuss these results by identifying related causes and by presenting avenues for future research. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment

The recent issue is devoted to the matters of human development, corporate governance mechanisms, economic crises and economic globalization, sport management, financial shenanigans, political disclosure, accountability, board of directors etc.

A growing body of research suggests that the composition of a firm&rsquo, s board of directors can influence its environmental, social and governance (ESG) performance. In the banking industry, ESG performance has not yet been explored to discover how a critical mass of women on the board of directors affects performance. This paper seeks to fill this gap in the literature by testing the impact of a critical mass of female directors on ESG performance. Other board characteristics are accounted for: independence, size, frequency of meetings and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) sustainability committee. We use fixed effects panel regression models on a sample of 108 listed banks in Europe and the United States for the period 2011&ndash, 2016. Our main empirical evidence shows that the relationship between women on the board of directors and a bank&rsquo, s ESG performance is an inverted U-shape. Therefore, the critical mass theory for banks is not supported, confirming that only gender-balanced boards positively impact a bank&rsquo, s performance for sustainability. There is a positive link between ESG performance and board size or the presence of a CSR sustainability committee, while it is negative with the share of independent directors. With this work, we stress the key role of corporate governance principles in banks&rsquo, ESG performance, with relevant implications for both banks and supervisory authorities.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, it aims to measure and compare the efficiency change of French, German, Italian, Spanish and UK banking groups in a context of financial crisis, over the period 2006-2010; second, it attempts to analyse the internal and environmental determinants of banking groups efficiency. Design/methodology/approach – In this paper the efficiency is estimated by a two-stage semi-parametric procedure. In the first stage, we build a common production frontier across countries using the data envelopment analysis (DEA) (Debreu, 1951; Farrell, 1957). To further analyse the efficiency changes over years we use the Malmquist total factor productivity index, based on DEA technique. In the second stage, in order to determine the factors that impact on bank efficiency, the authors perform a bootstrapped truncated regression model with discretionary inputs as independent variables, following Simar and Wilson (2007). Findings – The empirical results show that overall the “large” banking groups are more efficient than the “small” ones. However the Malmquist total factor productivity analysis highlights that during the crisis, in particular between 2007 and 2009, unless Britain, in all countries the small banks show a better cost performance than the larger ones. In general, the authors find a moderate efficiency convergence between countries and between large and small banking groups. As regards the determinants of banking groups efficiency, we find that more liquid, less capitalized banking groups and those more oriented towards the traditional activity of lending are more efficient. Practical implications – The authors find a positive and high statistically significant relationship between both long- and short-term liquidity degree and the cost efficiency of the banking groups. The policy implication of this result is very significative also in the light of the new banking regulation introduced by Basel III that imposes new rules to strengthen the liquidity risk management. Social implications – The authors find that the macroeconomic environment variables have some impact on efficiency: the higher the debt and the GDP per capita of the country the lower the bank’s efficiency. Originality/value – Unlike the most literature on this topic, that usually considers individual banks even if they belong to the same financial conglomerate, the authors analyse only banking groups. In particular, the authors consider all banking groups belonging to the most industrialized European countries in a context of financial crisis and cross-border aggregation movements. Furhermore the authors compare cross-country cost performance of small and large groups, considering the loan loss provisions as an additional input in order to correct the efficiency score for credit risk.

We are pleased to present the second issue of the journal in 2018. The themes that this issue of the Journal welcomes are numerous and cover anti-money laundering regulation, pricing of brand extensions, ownership structure and credit ratings, effect of Basel III liquidity regulations on banks’ profitability, debts and asymmetric information, differences and similarities between German and Chinese internal audit functions, influence of auditor rotation and non-audit services on earnings quality, audit quality and investor perceptions, and internal controls.

Purpose – The purpose of this research is to contribute to the development of an effective incentive policy implementation model, through an in-depth analysis of the stock option and/or stock grant schemes adopted by the major Italian banking groups. Design/methodology/approach – Out of the 77 banking groups operating in Italy on 30 June 2011, The paper selected 12 banking institutions that implemented either stock option or stock grant plans over the years 2007-2010. The documentary analysis was carried out on 22 stock option and/or stock grant schemes and based on the examination of corporate governance reports, as well as information memoranda on incentive plans. Findings – The results show a limited implementation of equity-based incentive plans in the Italian banking sector during the investigation period (2007-2010) and clearly demonstrates that, as far as these types of incentives are concerned, there is ample room for improvement as well as substantial adjustments. Research limitations/implications – The research covers a limited period of time. Therefore, further extending the scope of its survey will definitely be of great academic interest in the light of the latest regulatory changes made to the banking sector remuneration regime. Originality/value – By giving a clear indication of the critical points that should be addressed to improve the policies in force, this research study aims to provide greater knowledge about the remuneration practices adopted by Italian banks, in terms of equity-based incentive plans.

The current issue of the Journal pays attention to the variety of issues: key sectors of economic growth in Greece, the influence of executives’ characteristics on bank performance, the role of universities as entrepreneurial financial players, alternative corporate performance measurements, the influence of digitalization on corporate governance and others.

Moving on from a comparison of the analysed case studies, this chapter highlights the main findings and discusses the relevant phases of reputational crisis management for banks and provides helpful suggestions and advice to scholars and practitioners. In addition, the chapter focuses on the methods and tools that are beneficial in the various phases of a reputational crisis. Finally, useful guidelines for enhancing the effectiveness of banks’ reputation management are suggested.

The chapter focuses on the relationships between corporate reputation and corporate social responsibility. First, the main and most important measurement metrics of corporate reputation are analysed. Second, the focus shifts to CSR and an investigation of the measurement tools most frequently adopted by the scholars. Finally, an interesting analysis on the linkages between reputational crisis and the corporate social responsibility of banks is conducted. In this context, we highlight the role that CSR plays with regard to corporate reputation, the characteristics and the effectiveness conditions for CSR to operate as a reputational driver and, finally, when CSR can resolve the reputational crisis of a bank.

Il capitolo descrive il percorso storico ed istituzionale che ha portato all'Unione Bancaria Europea, e illustra i contenuti dei pilastri nei quali si articola (Single Supervisory Mechanism - SSM, Single Resolution Mechanism - SRM, European Deposit Insurance Scheme - EDIS).

Analisi della struttura di bilancio dei Confidi "minori".