Sovereign Wealth Funds: Investment and Governance Practices

Sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) are large, growing, and concentrated investment vehicles, with a current estimated value of U.S. $3 trillion. The combination of low transparency and government ownership has raised questions about political agendas, national security, and transfers of technology. In this article the authors report on the current status of SWFs in terms of investments, regulation, governance, and transparency of activities. They also review some recent studies on SWF investments and their impact on financial markets.     

Effects of store image and store brand price-image on store brand purchase intention: Application to an emerging market

Several factors have been underlined to explain store brands' (SBs) purchase behavior. This research investigates jointly the effect of store image perceptions, SB price-image and perceived risk toward SBs on SB purchase intention in the context of an emerging market (Brazil). Data were collected from a consumer survey with 379 respondents randomly selected. Structural equation modeling was used to test the hypothesized relationships. Our results show that store image perceptions and SB price-image influence significantly SB purchase intention directly or indirectly via the effect of perceived risk toward SBs. These findings are discussed and their theoretical and managerial implications are provided.     

How Do Price Perceptions of Different Brand Types Affect Shopping Value and Store Loyalty?

This research investigates the relationships among price perceptions for different brand types (national brands, standard store brands, regional store brands, organic store brands), shopping value dimensions (quality, price, social, and emotion value), and store loyalty (retention and word of mouth (WOM)). A comprehensive model depicts determinants of customer store loyalty. Using structural equation modeling, the model test includes 671 consumers intercepted during shopping trips. The data analysis yields several surprising results. In particular, low product price perceptions do not necessarily signal negative store quality evaluations. Shopping value dimensions influence store retention loyalty and WOM behavior differently. Furthermore, different brand types exert distinct effects on the value creation process. Favorable prices for national and standard store brands have comparable positive effects on store price value and emotional value creation; appealing prices of regional store brands instead reduce the emotional value of the store, and low prices for organic store brand products significantly increase social value creation.     

Adoption and use of mobile banking by low‐income individuals in Senegal

The wide use of mobile phones increases low‐income individuals’ access to a large range of services. One of these services is mobile banking (m‐banking). Today, m‐banking represents a key vector of financial inclusion in many countries in sub‐Saharan Africa, especially Senegal. Based on technology adoption theories applied to households in developing countries, this paper studies the determinants of the adoption and use of m‐banking. We distinguish between possession or adoption and actual use of m‐banking and examine the interdependence between these two decisions by using the Heckman sample selection model, through a sample of 1,052 individuals in the suburbs of Dakar. Our main results are that the two decisions (adoption and use) are not independent of each other. Individual characteristics, such as education, possession of a bank account, and family network effects, are determinants of the adoption, and age, gender, and being a member of a tontine are determinants of the use. A major result of this study concerns women’s low propensity to adopt m‐banking because of their low levels of education. However, compared with men, when women adopt m‐banking, they have a stronger propensity to use it.     

Trade Flows Versus Capital Flows: Are China’s Trade Surpluses Overestimated?

China has received massive foreign capital inflows after experiencing capital flight earlier in the last decade. The present paper offers estimates of capital inflows into China through the misinvoicing of trade after having outlined a model describing how trade prices could be manipulated by firms. In fact, the widely perceived undervalued Yuan has fueled expectations of a future revaluation of the Chinese currency. In a panel gravity modeling framework, we show that, China’s export and import prices for some commodities are sensitive to the non-deliverable forward exchange rate for the RMB in Hong Kong. In light of the evolution of this rate, which has rather systemically reflected anticipated revaluation of the Chinese currency, it is contended that the persistent Chinese trade imbalances may actually camouflage hidden ‘hot money’ inflows. Our findings provide evidence for export over-invoicing and import under-invoicing.     

FINANCIAL RATIO ADJUSTMENT DYNAMICS AND INTEREST RATE EXPECTATIONS

This paper re-examines the financial ratio adjustment model by (1) respecifying the model such that the speed of adjustment coefficient follows a dynamic adjustment process in response to some kind of economic shocks, and (2) proposing a joint estimation of firms within the same industry to capture unobservable industry effects. Examining six financial ratios within seven industries that contain 85 firms, our results reveal that a joint estimation method substantially improves the traditional model based upon an OLS method and that economic shocks, measured by changes in interest rate expectations, affect the speed of adjustment coefficients for over one-third of the sampling firms.     

How Valuable Is On-Farm Work to Farmers?

In this article, we estimate a rural household model that allows specific tastes for working on-farm and can fit the data as well as the general model of Lopez . We use two samples that are matched by individual characteristics and adopt the method for matched surveys proposed by Arellano and Meghir . We replicate using French data, the empirical finding of Elhorst who reports evidence that implicit wages of on-farm family labor are significantly below off-farm wages. We then provide estimates of the lower bounds for preferences for on-farm work for males and females which are significant and positive.     

A new multi-factor risk model to evaluate funding liquidity risk of banks

The present paper investigates funding liquidity risk of banks. We present a new statistical multi-factor risk model leading to three new funding liquidity risk metrics, thanks to liquidity gap's probability distribution analysis. We test our model on a large sample composed of 593 US banking companies, this allows us to identify some stylized facts regarding the evolution of liquidity risk and its relationship with the size of banking companies. Our main motivation is to develop ‘the contractual maturity mismatch’ monitoring tool proposed within the Basel III reform.