Our study attempts to discover contagion amongst the Asia-Pacific equity markets (Japan, Hong Kong and Australia) during twelve major crises around the world. We apply both discrete and continuous wavelet decompositions to unveil the multi-horizon nature of co-movement and lead–lag relationship. We find that shocks were transmitted via excessive linkages, with the Asian crisis as the most influential in relation to a sudden stop. We also find that the subprime crisis revealed fundamentals-based contagion, due to the strengthening fundamental linkages, with a dominant role of the Japanese market. Finally, we find low co-movements in the short run, suggesting a partial convergence across the markets

This study aims to dispel the myth of the value anomaly by employing the logic of the well-known Austrian British philosopher Sir Karl Raimund Popper, who espoused that positive outcomes of empirical observation cannot confirm an anomaly, such as value premium (Popper, 1953).

Recent literature draws attention to the issue of whether heterogeneity in investment horizons has an effect on resulting investor exposures. In this article, using Malaysia as a case study, we make the first attempt to examine comovement dynamics of Islamic equity returns to identify international portfolio diversification opportunities for investors having heterogeneous investment horizons. We use three recent and appropriate methodologies: M-GARCH-DCC, Continuous Wavelet Transforms (CWT), and Maximum Overlap Discrete Wavelet Transform (MODWT). The results significantly tend to indicate that effective portfolio diversification opportunities between our sample markets exist mainly for short holding periods while for longer investment horizons, where investor stockholding periods exceed one year, the markets appear to be mostly highly correlated yielding minimal portfolio diversification benefits. Overall, the results critically highlight the significance of heterogeneity in investment horizons and bear important implications for portfolio diversification strategies

In presence of the market frictions, firms aim to attain target capital structure by making strategic choices towards re-engineering the leverage. These choices influence not only firm’s investment patterns, capital costs and expected returns but also lead to conflict of interest among the stakeholders. The dynamic market forces make targeting a continuous exercise for the firm, as it strives to make optimal financing decisions to raise its value and reduce the risk of bankruptcy. An occurrence of acute financial crisis disturbs the capital structure and firms may foresee this and try to adjust. If adjustment is seen prior to a crisis in favour of higher leverage and moving away from the optimum capital structure, then it may signify cheaper adjusting costs and greater access to the debt financing. If adjustment takes place post crisis, then it means that valuable lessons are learnt and steps are taken to attain the optimum capital structure.

This paper investigates the effect of political patronage on firms' capital structure. The evidence is from Malaysia, a country characterised by relationship-capitalism, and covers 1988 to 2009. Using a system GMM estimator we find firms set leverage targets and adjust towards them following deviations at the rate of 28% per annum. Next, we construct a natural experiment and use a difference-in-differences model to investigate if the strategic financing decisions of politically patronised firms differ from non-connected firms after an exogenous shock caused by the 1997 Asian crisis. Our results unambiguously demonstrate a significant difference in the capital structure of patronised firms relative to non-connected firms following the exogenous shock but only for the crisis period 1998–2001. After 2002 the capital structures of patronised and non-connected firms are statistically equivalent.

Although literature on shadow economy has been growing, the examination is scarce in the case of developing countries, especially the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) economies. In this study, we develop various testable hypotheses related to shadow economy. We investigate the determinants of shadow economy across a large sample of 141 countries and examine whether it varies across OIC (42) and non-OIC (99) countries. The average size of the shadow economy in OIC countries is 34.36% of gross domestic product (GDP) while it is 30.57% of GDP in non-OlC economies. The approach of exploring various definitions, historical development, types, Islamic viewpoint and the determining factors behind people's preference to join shadow economy is adopted in order to provide a deeper understanding of shadow economy. As far as our first objective Is concerned, we explored the determinants of shadow economy in OIC and non-OIC countries (1995-2015). Our results show that economic growth and institutional variables have negative association with shadow economy in both types of countries whereas government expenditure has a positive effect on shadow economy in both groups ...

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the implication of trade on carbon emissions in a panel of eight highly trading Southeast and East Asian countries, namely, China, Indonesia, South Korea, Malaysia, Hong Kong, The Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. The analysis relies on the standard quadratic environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) extended to include energy consumption and international trade. A battery of panel unit root and co-integration tests is applied to establish the variables’ stochastic properties and their long-run relations. Then, the specified EKC is estimated using the panel dynamic ordinary least square (OLS) estimation technique. The panel co-integration statistics verifies the validity of the extended EKC for the countries under study. Estimation of the long-run EKC via the dynamic OLS estimation method reveals the environmentally degrading effects of trade in these countries, especially in ASEAN and plus South Korea and Hong Kong. These countries are heavily dependent on trade for their development processes, and as such, their impacts on CO2 emissions would be highly relevant for assessing their trade policies, along the line of the gain-from-trade hypothesis, the race-to-the-bottom hypothesis and the pollution-safe-haven hypothesis. The analysis adds to existing literature by focusing on the highly trading nations of Southeast and East Asian countries. The results suggest that reassessment of trade policies in these countries is much needed and it must go beyond the sole pursuit of economic development via trade.

The slides highlight 1) finance growth theory used in the study; 2) social cohesion and growth nexus.

In spite of the expanding number of studies investigating the effect of institutional quality on capital flows, a very few attempts has been made to investigate the impact of capital flows on the institutional quality of host countries.This study investigates the role of capital flows on the institutional infrastructure of the OIC countries, which are divided into three separate essays. The first essay investigates the impact of the official development assistance (ODA) on the institutional development of the OIC counties. The research uses system GMM, and the data for this study is obtained from 40 OIC countries for the three-year average period from 1991 to 2016. Empirical findings suggest that aid reduces the Institutional quality for the aid recipient countries. For robustness test and heterogeneous relationship among aid recipient countries, this study uses panel quantile regression and finds that foreign aid generally reduces Institutional quality, and its reduction effect is greater in less institutionally developed countries ...

This study explores the long run and dynamic relationships between the stock price of Cathay Pacific Airways and China Airlines against key determinants of financial risks exposure confronting the airline industry, which include interest-rate, exchange rate and fuel price risk exposures for the period of January 1996 to December 2011. The (Johansen & Juselius, 1990) cointegration technique was employed to detect any long time trending relationship followed Vector Error Correction Model (VECM) and Vector Auto-Regression (VAR). The generalised forecast error variance decomposition and the generalised impulse response function were employed to comprehend the effects of theses financial risk exposures. Our empirical results suggest that exchange rate movements have a substantial impact, compared to the fuel price and interest rate exposures against the stock price of the analysed airline. Our findings play a pertinent role in the determination of the respective airlines foreign vulnerability and financial policies which would be helpful for industry players and policy makers from a financial stability perspective.

The present paper addresses the question whether the less developed states, namely; Kedah, Kelantan, Pahang, Perlis, Sabah, Sarawak and Terengganu are converging with the richer state of Selangor, using unit root test and cointegration approach to test for income convergence for the period 1970-2013. We tested convergence on per capita real GDP for the states involved and the results suggest that the less developed states have been converging to the state of Selangor for the period under study. We also identify two convergence clubs among the states. In this respect, the state government has an important role to play in enhancing growth by continuously providing stable economic environment for investment and other productive economic activities. Without the Five-Year Malaysia Plans, this convergence phenomenon could not have been achieved in Malaysia. To ensure further convergence can take place at a faster rate in the future, government efforts and policies to foster narrowing states' income disparity has to be enforced further.

This study is the first attempt to investigate both the linear and non-linear Granger causality between wavelet transformed spot and futures oil prices. Our findings consistently indicate bidirectional causality between the spot and futures oil markets at different time scales, under linear and non-linear causality assumptions, and also during the recent financial crisis. Our results tend to shed further light on the ongoing controversy over the relative price discovery role played by spot market as opposed to futures market in oil price fluctuations, especially during periods of high uncertainty.

This paper examines the causality between military expenditures and economic growth for twenty selecteddeveloping countries. In this paper we test for Granger long-run causality employing the Panel Error-Correction Model (ECM) framework using annual data for the period 1970 to 2005. Military expenditure is measured using the logarithm of the ratio of military expenditures to gross domestic product (milex); while economic growth is proxied by the logarithm of real GDP per capita (rgdppc). Causation (as well as cointegration) is inferred from milex to rgdppc, in a panel setting using the Pooled Mean Group (PMG) estimator proposed by Pesaran et al. (1999) when the Error-Correction (ECM) term is significant in an equation with rgdppc as dependent variable. On the other hand, Granger causality is said to run from rgdppc to milex, when the ECM term is significant in an equation with milex as dependent variable. However, before testing for cointegration or causality, the order of integration of both time-series in a panel setting was tested using the three standard panel unit root tests (Levin et al., 2002; Im et al., 1997; Maddala and Wu, 1999). Our PMG results suggest that the ECM term is significantly different from zero in a model when milex is the dependent variable but not otherwise. The result implies that there is cointegration between military expenditures and economic growth, on average, for all the selected developing countries.

Studies have shown that natural disasters could pose a spectrum of challenges to human development, especially in developing countries. United Nations Development Programme (UNDP, 2004) estimates that low human development countries accounted for more than half of reported casualties due to natural disasters for the last two decades. The study also estimates that nearly 85 percent of the people exposed to natural disasters live in either medium or low human development countries. Other related studies have shown that corrupted officials in poor countries would increase the vulnerability of these countries to natural disasters. Thus, the purpose of the present study is to investigate the impact of human development indicators, such as income per capita and human capital development (education level), as well as corruption (a measure of governance) on fatalities and damages due to natural disasters in selected 77 developing countries. By employing the two-step system GMM estimators, we identified several economic variables that are significantly related to fatalities and property damages due to natural disasters, such as flood, storm, earthquake, landslides, drought, extreme temperature, wildfire, and volcanic eruption. By exploring the impact of economic development, population density, unemployment rate, investment, government consumption expenditure, education, openness, and corruption, on disaster preparedness, it would be useful for both government and international disaster risk reduction and mitigation agencies to re-evaluate their approach towards target recipients in the future.

The money supply impacts on interest rate and liquidity were first proposed in 1961 by Friedman, the late Nobel laureate. The liquidity effect has yet received unanimous empirical support. Also, research interest on liquidity subsided in the 2000s. Using quarterly data over 1960–2011 and simultaneous solution to a system of equations, this paper reports positive liquidity effect from money supply. By extending the system of equations with a liquidity equation and after controlling the effect of earnings, evidence is found of a significant positive effect from liquidity on share prices. Money supply is found to be endogenous as in post Keynesian theory. These findings, obtained after solutions to several econometric deficiencies in prior studies, provide clear verification of the endogenous money supply theory, money effect on liquidity and on the extension of the model for a liquidity effect on asset prices.

This paper investigates the relation between aggregate investment and oil volatility and its permanent and transitory components for a developing country, Malaysia. In the paper, the components generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity (CGARCH) model is utilized to decompose conditional oil volatility into permanent oil volatility and transitory oil volatility. Respectively reflecting fundamental-driven and random shifts in oil volatility, they are expected to exert differential effects on aggregate investment. Adopting a vector autoregression (VAR) framework to allow feedback effects between aggregate investment and its determinants, the paper documents evidence supporting the adverse effects of conditional oil volatility, permanent oil volatility and transitory oil volatility on aggregate investment and real output. Interestingly, contrary to the findings for the developed markets (US and OECD), the real effects of permanent oil volatility tend to be stronger. These findings are reasonably robust to variable specification and measurements in the VAR system. Hence, there is an indication that heightened oil volatility accounts for the slumps in Malaysia's aggregate investment after the Asian financial crisis

This paper investigates the characteristics, performance, and share price reaction of politically connected firms versus a control sample of independent firms in Malaysia. Politically connected firms had higher level of leverage, lower profitability, and lower sales to profitability, and paid lower taxes and lower dividends compared to independent firms. Their share prices increase with the announcement of favorable political events. In terms of performance, the active rent-seeking activities in return for preferential treatment produce comparable performance to independent firms during an economic upturn. However, their performance deteriorates more than independent firms during an economic downturn. The percentage of ownership of government institutions in politically connected firms is also much lower, and these firms use more Tier 1 auditors than the independent firms. Overall, the findings are consistent with expectations and evidence from similar studies in developed and developing economies

Firms are increasingly resorting to private placements in recent years, yet there is no published study of emerging markets. There is a unique opportunity to study this behavior during a severe financial crisis, when firms resorted to private placements to recover financially distressed firms. Our analysis using data over fifteen years shows (a) a significant 2–3% positive share price reaction, affirming asymmetric information effect, (b) a significant volume activity, and (c) the price impact is different across a period of a major financial crisis. If the proceeds from placement are earmarked for investment, share price is negatively (positively) correlated during the crisis (non-crisis) periods. Our finding on regulation is inconsistent with prior reports in developed markets: this is explained by the stricter restrictions on trading of private issues in emerging market. These results provide modest new contributions to the literature on private placements.

Islamic finance is often criticized for its non-practicality in today's modern economics. The principles of promoting exchange and prohibition of interest-rate based transactions are understood as endorsing risk sharing economic system is said to be incompatible in an open and modern market like today. This view was contrary to the spirit of the 2012 Kuala Lumpur Declaration, where Islamic-scholars, jurisprudents, and economists all vouched to force the enactment of risk sharing principle into our economic system ...

This paper examines the responses of sectoral returns to shocks in five macroeconomic indicators using the vector autoregressive (VAR) model and generalised impulse response functions for an emerging stock market, Malaysia. The empirical results suggest that, while the temporal responses of sectoral returns to macroeconomic shocks are relatively identical, their initial responses are slightly different. Monetary policy and exchange rate shocks have the largest effect on the finance sector, whereas output and exchange rate shocks exert most influence on the property sector. Comparatively, among the shocks, monetary shocks (i.e., money supply, interest rate and exchange rate shocks) are more influential in influencing sectoral returns than goods market shocks (i.e., output and consumer price shocks).

This paper explores the link between the shadow economy and financial sector development in Malaysia for the period 1971-2013. We calculate the size of the shadow economy by using the modified-cash-deposits-ratio approach recently developed by Pickhardt and Sardia (2011). We investigate the contention made by Blackburn et al. (2012) that financial sector development can mitigate shadow economy, higher level of financial sector development lead to lower level of shadow economy. Our results show that there is a non-linear long-run relationship between shadow economy and financial sector development in Malaysia, an inverted-U shape curve, suggesting that at lower (higher) level of financial sector development commensurate with higher (lower) level of the shadow economy. One policy implication from this study is that the financial sector can play an important role in reducing shadow economy by improving the accessibility to financing and to the credit market.