The Effects of Preferential Trade Agreements on Foreign Direct Investment: Evidence from the African Caribbean Pacific Region

Open Economies Review - Our empirical analysis utilises panel data on bilateral FDI stocks from 34 OECD countries into 45 ACP countries over the period 2000–2017 to consider the role of PTAs...     

Exchange-rate volatility, trade and “fixing for life” in Thailand

At the outset of the 1997 financial crisis, the quest to find a more suitable exchange-rate policy has become an urgent task facing the East Asian economies. One of the key policies agreed under Thailand’s August 1997 Letter of Intent (LOI) with the IMF was the adoption of a more flexible exchange-rate policy. However, the country re-adopted its pre-1997 crisis rigid exchange-rate policy in early 1999. To grasp this “fixing for your life” phenomenon, we test the impact of the exchange-rate volatilities of Thailand’s baht against the yen and the US dollar on the performance of the country’s bilateral trades with the two key partners.     

Is there an export or import-led productivity growth in rapidly developing Asian countries? a multivariate VAR analysis

In contrast to cross-country studies, the paper investigates the relationships between trade and labour productivity for nine rapidly developing Asian countries in a time-series framework using a vector error-correction model. Independent tests on the long-run and short-run relationship between trade variables of exports and imports and productivity are conducted. The results suggest that trade has an important impact on productivity and output growth in the economy, however it is imports that provide the important?‘virtuous’?link between trade and output growth. The results indicate that exports and imports have qualitatively different impacts on labour productivity. The long-run result shows that there is no causal effect from exports to labour productivity growth for Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Taiwan and Thailand; thereby suggesting that there is no export-led productivity growth in these countries. However, significant causal effects were found from imports to productivity growth, suggesting import-led productivity growth in India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Taiwan. In addition, the results indicate that imports tend to have greater positive impact on productivity growth in the long run.     

Effects of inter-organizational compatibility on supply chain capabilities: Exploring the mediating role of inter-organizational information systems (IOIS) integration

Growing globalization and environmental uncertainty have increased the challenges managers face in delivering services or products to the customer. Integration of information systems across partnering organizations has become the backbone of supply chain management, as amalgamation facilitates the sharing of information required to enhance organizational flexibility and responsiveness while minimizing risk and inventory costs. Using data from the Australian retailing sectors, this study investigates the mediating role of inter-organizational information system (IOIS) integration on the relationships between inter-organizational compatibility and supply chain capabilities. The results indicate that inter-organizational compatibility of technical, strategic, and cultural inter-organizational dimensions facilitate IOIS integration and supply chain capabilities. To maximize benefits for all chain members, IOIS integration needs to be embedded in the strategies and goals of partnering organizations. Business-to-business and industrial marketing managers need to be aware that IOIS integration processes require support of top managers of the partnering organizations and should be embedded in the organizations' strategic goals.     

Investigating the determinants of domestic bonds: the role of socio-economic and institutional factors

This article investigates the determinants of the size of domestic bond market using economic, social and institutional factors. We expand the body of existing literature by suggesting that economic and social environment as well as institutional settings vary between developed and emerging economies. The article uses recent data from a wide range of countries, incorporates a variety of macroeconomic variables, social indicators and institutional factors to reassess the determinant of domestic bond markets. Robustness of the empirical analysis is established through both two-stage least squares and generalized method of movements techniques. The results of this article show that the size of the economy, breadth and depth of the banking system, the monetary policy stance, the degree of openness, the level of corruption, the degree of civil liberty and status of market access to investors, all play a crucial role in the determination of the size of the domestic bond market. We also find differences across developed and emerging market samples. The results are robust to different specifications and the corresponding estimation techniques.     

Motion Picture-Induced Visual,Vocal and Celebrity Effects on Tourism Motivation: Stimulus Organism Response Model

Motion pictures play a predominant role in enhancing the consumers' awareness of tourism destinations and inspiring their motivation to visit destinations. “Hallyu” (Korean Wave), a platform of Korean cultural exports, has altered the Korean tourism industry and now attracts travelers from around the world. Utilizing the popularity of the Korean Wave, the Korean Tourism Organization promotes Korean tourism attractions through motions pictures, including Korean films, television drama series, music and K-pop. The visual, vocal and celebrity effects which emanate from Korean motion pictures are expected to influence travelers' intent to visit and actual visitation. A questionnaire was distributed to Thai travelers and a total of 191 valid questionnaires were analyzed using regression analysis. The results indicate that visual and vocal effects emanating from Korean motion pictures fueled travelers' intention to visit Korea and explore Korean culture and tourism attractions. However, the results indicate no significant effect of celebrity endorsements on travelers' intentions.     

A response surface analysis of critical values for the lead-lag ratio with application to high frequency and non-synchronous financial data

Granger causality tests are being supplanted by new methods such as the Lead-Lag Ratio, particularly in finance where data arrives at random times and systematic sampling often produces spurious results. Existing approaches are insufficient; outside of block-sampling using a bootstrap, the lead-lag ratio has generally been assessed against a benchmark of 1 without regard for statistical significance. We use simulations to generate a response surface for the Lead-Lag Ratio. Our modelled critical values are applied to reassess the findings of three previous studies of lead/lag relations between financial return series with high frequency data. Our response surface method proves to be a convenient and efficient alternative to using a bootstrap.