1. Scholarly Works

During the year 1997, the Asian financial crisis disclosed the inherent weaknesses of the financial market in Asia. Organisations had an over-dependence to the banks as the primary sources of fund is one of the reasons why companies faced difficulty during the financial crisis. One of the factors that contributed to the financial crisis was that organizations failed to diversify their financing structure. It is to be noted that when organisations want to source for funds, they can either issue stocks, bonds or finance from banks locally or globally. Source capital from equity and borrowing through debt is considered difficult, expensive and will distort the financial leverage of the company. The development of securitization allows the organization to smooth up their cash flow by converting the illiquid assets into a liquid asset through a special purpose vehicle (SPV). SPV is a legally separated entity from the company or the holder of the assets. SPV can take the forms of either a trust, corporation or partnership set up just for the purchasing of the originator's assets. There are many literature pieces of research that regard the factors that contribute to the pricing of corporate bonds but there are few empirical studies on the determinants on securitization in Malaysia.

The purpose of this paper is to empirically investigate the determinants and the impact of financial development on shadow economy in OIC countries and then compared with non-OIC countries. The study applies advanced panel GMM technique. The study finds that macro-variables (unemployment, economic growth, money supply and foreign trade) and institutional variables reduce shadow economy both in OIC and non-OIC countries. The study also explores that financial development mitigates shadow economy; however, its impact is significantly less in case of OIC economies compared to the non-OIC countries. Since the focus of this study is OIC countries vs non-OIC countries, the research only includes discussion about shadow economy in 42 OIC member states and 99 non-OIC economies. The decision to restrict the study to 42 OIC economies and 99 non-OIC nations is due to the availability of data. The study suggests that free market and good business environment in the formal economy are the keys to have less shadow economy. Good institutional setup and ease in regulations can attract firms and businesses from informal sector to the official economy, while political instability is one of the main factors for having large size of shadow economy. The OIC member countries should implement policies which improve accessibility to finance of every citizen of the country.

Cost efficiency plays a significant role in bank risk taking behaviour. This paper examines the effect of cost efficiency on the liquidity risk of Islamic banks and conventional banks in 16 OIC countries from 1999 to 2013. The findings suggest that cost efficiency has a positive effect on liquidity risk. Other significant factors of liquidity risk include capital, bank specialization, credit risk, profitability, size, GDP and inflation whereas market concentration is not significant contributor to banking liquidity risk. There is weak evidence to support the notion that Islamic banks have higher level of liquidity risk than conventional banks. The findings imply the need to provide liquidity, probably through a well-functioning money market to lower liquidity risk in banking.

Income inequality is a serious problem confronting not only the developed world but also developing countries. Recently, financialization has been one of the culprits identified in literature as one of the cause of income inequality. This book offers the only detailed presentation of the how financialization aided the spread of income inequality in Organization of Islamic Cooperation, OIC countries. Finance has taking a center stage in the affairs of most developing economies, surpassing the real sector of the economy. The result is the creation of an indebted society in which people are comfortable with financing their financial needs through credit. This creates a debt laden society that is trapped in the cycle of debt. This book represents a comprehensive and indispensable source for students, practitioners and the general public at large. It presents data which shows the buildup of debt and the rising income inequality in Muslim countries. It includes discussion of the rise in rentier income, financialization of everyday life, decline in physical capital accumulation and deregulation of the financial sector. The book therefore, proffers solutions on how Muslim countries can come out of the present economic problem facing them. The promotion and adoption of Islamic principles, which promotes risk sharing based contracts as against debt based transaction is the way to go. When financial contracts are based on the principles of risk sharing, any gains from economic activities get to be shared equitably. Hence, not only capital owners get to enjoy the benefit from the income derived from investments, but rather, all parties that partake in the contract. Distinguished by its clarity and readability as it is written in a very easy to understand language, it is an important reference work for any concerned individual interested on the recent causes of income inequality in Muslim World.

Connections between politicians and business houses are not uncommon. Literature shows that firms tends to connect with politicians/political parties to get easy access to credit, to have lax regulatory oversight, to have preferential treatment for the government contracts and for having access to insider information. On the other hand a Shari'ah compliant firm is considered to perform ethically and justly due to adherence to the rules and regulations prescribed by Shari'ah. In recent years the research on political connections of Malaysian listed firms is increased. But the comparison of politically connected listed firms and Shari'ah compliant listed firms in Malaysia is lacking. Malaysia is a leading country in Islamic finance hence; this paper analyzes the impact of political connections and Shari'ah compliance on the profitability of the listed firms' in Malaysia for the period of 2000-2014. The paper used regression technique for the analysis. The result of the study shows that Shari'ah compliant firms perform better than the politically connected firms. Shari'ah compliance has positive and significant impact on the profitability of the firm whereas political connections have negative and significant impact on the profitability of the firm in the case of Malaysia.

This paper examines the roles of trade, institutional quality and their interactions in explaining carbon dioxide emissions in a panel sample of 40 Sub-Sahara African countries using the system generalised method of moments. We find that institutional reforms are unequivocally environmental improving. Meanwhile, the impacts of trade on the environment tend to depend on the institutional setting of a country. More specifically, trade openness is harmful to the environment in countries with low institutional quality and beneficial to the environment in countries with high institutional quality. This means that institutional reforms are a perquisite for the countries with low institutional quality to actualise the beneficial environment effect of trade. As for the countries with adequate institutional quality, trade and institutions are reinforcing each other in bringing down pollution. From these results, we conclude that trade openness implemented in a sound institutional setting potentially brings better trade, more growth and better environment.

This paper studies the effect of political stability on economic growth by taking 120 developing countries over the period of 1996-2014. We apply relatively advanced dynamic two step system-GMM and quantile regression. Political stability is found to be a key determinant of economic growth. More importantly, political instability (or risk) is found to be higher in the OIC countries and is a deterrent to economic growth. Also, for the lower and middle income OIC countries, political instability appears to affect economic growth more severely perhaps due to the absence of strong economic and political institutions. Moreover, political instability is also found to be significantly higher in the oil-dependent OIC countries. Notably, political instability is likely to affect growththrough the channels of investment and human capital accumulation in the developing countries. Finally, the impact of political stability and political instability on growth is found to be equally distributed across the OIC countries with higher or lower growth level. Therefore, the development of political and economic institutions along with human capital development is recommended for all the developing countries in general and the OIC countries in particular.

The purpose of this paper is to review the evolution of the global financial crisis, draw lessons from it, and analyse its effect(s) on the Islamic financial industry (IFI). Based on an extensive literature review, this paper aims to highlight, explain, and discuss the implications of the global financial crisis for IFI and suggest necessary steps for the future development of the industry. The findings show that although the crisis had limited impact on IFI the major flaws of the capitalist financial system are relevant to the development of IFI. Without learning and applying the lessons from the crisis, IFI runs a risk of committing the same mistakes. Finally, greater attention should be given to the fundamental principles of Islamic finance in order to ensure the future development of industry. The effects of the global financial crisis are still being felt all over the world, and its implications on IFI have yet to be fully understood. Owing to unavailability of relevant data, an empirical study is needed to show the real effects of the crisis on IFI.

This paper examines the complementarity/substitutability of international trade and financial development in the mitigation of carbon emissions for a panel sample of 62 middle-income countries from 1991 to 2010. Applying the bias-corrected LSDV estimator, the paper yields interesting results. For the full sample, international trade and financial development play an interactive and complementary role in reducing CO2 intensity of energy use. That is, the environmental benefit of international trade is materialized only if a country has a well-developed financial market. Likewise, financial development is beneficial to the environment only in a highly open economy. Having stated these, the analysis also uncovers evidence that these results may be different across levels of income or across regions. The results bear important policy implications for the abatement of the environmental problem in the middle-income countries.