The impact of corruption on analyst coverage.

This study investigates the impact of country-level corruption and firms' anti-bribery policies on analyst coverage. Analyst coverage has been identified as a powerful tool to detect fraud and should equally act as a possible tool to reduce corruption. It employs a negative binomial count regression method on a longitudinal dataset of a sample of S&P Global 1200 companies for the years 2010 to 2015. To control for potential endogeneity bias and improve the reliability of the estimation, both country-level corruption and firms' anti-bribery policies variables were instrumented. After controlling for potential endogeneity bias, the results show that the adoption of anti-bribery policies at firm level attract more analysts to follow a firm. The results for corruption at country level show that analyst coverage increases in less corrupted countries indicating that the costs of corruption exceed its potential benefits. When the variables corruption at country level and anti-bribery policies are interacted, the relationship is positive and highly significant. Given the potential important role played by anti-corruption measures, firms are encouraged to adopt them to reduce the incidence of corruption and to increase analyst coverage which will reinforce the benign effect of monitoring. Although the literature on corruption at the country level is rich, it is geared towards the determinants of corruption in contrast to its consequences, and fewer studies have focused on the impact of corruption at firm level due to data limitations. This paper addresses this gap and contributes to the literature on the consequences of corruption at firm level

The extent of financial disclosure and its determinants in an emerging capital market: the case of Egypt.

This paper uses panel data analysis to investigate the extent and determinants of disclosure levels of non-financial companies quoted on the Egyptian Stock Exchange. It distinguishes between private sector companies and public business sector companies in terms of company characteristics and disclosure practice. Results show gradual increases in disclosure levels, with a high compliance for mandatory disclosure, although the voluntary disclosure level was rather limited. Public business sector companies appear generally to disclose less information than private sector companies. Furthermore, more profitable companies disclose more information than less profitable ones. Results for firm size, gearing and stock activity are mixed

The impact of foreign direct investment on the productivity of China’s automotive industry

• This study contributes to the existing literature by empirically investigating the effect of FDI inflows on the aggregate labour productivity of China's automotive industry. • A production function model is developed using a panel data set at sub-sector level. Two statistical models: pooled ordinary least squares model (POLS) and fixed effects model (FES) were used to estimate the influence of foreign direct investment on aggregate labour productivity in the industry

New evidence on the output-inflation trade-off from developing economies: the case of the CFA Franc zone

This aim of this paper is to give a contribution to the debate on whether output-inflation trade-offs are negatively influenced by the mean of inflation (as postulated by new-Keynesians) or by the variability of inflation (as postulated by neo-classical economists). To remove any concerns about the arbitrariness of the choice of the sample, the analysis will focus on a group of countries belonging to the same currency union, the Franc Zone. The results do not provide conclusive evidence on either theory as it was found that there existed a negative relation between the output-inflation trade-offs and the mean of inflation on the one hand, and the variability of inflation, on the other.

The impact of corruption on analyst coverage. [Presentation]

This study aims to investigate the impact of country-level corruption and firms' anti-bribery policies on analyst coverage. Analyst coverage has been identified as a powerful tool to detect fraud and should equally act as a possible tool to reduce corruption. Although the literature on corruption at the country level is rich, it is geared towards the determinants of corruption rather than its consequences; in addition there are fewer studies that have focused on the impact of corruption at firm level, because of data limitations. This paper addresses this gap and contributes to the literature on the consequences of corruption at firm level. The research used a negative binomial count regression method on a longitudinal dataset, consisting of a sample of S&P Global 1200 companies for the years 2010-2015. To control for potential endogeneity bias and improve the reliability of the estimation, both country-level corruption and firms' anti-bribery policies variables were instrumented. After controlling potential endogeneity bias, the results show that the adoption of anti-bribery policies at firm level attracts more analysts to follow a firm. The results for corruption at country level show that analyst coverage increases in less corrupted countries indicating that the costs of corruption exceed its potential benefits. When the variables - i.e. corruption at country level and anti-bribery policies - interact, the relationship is positive and highly significant. Given the potentially important role played by anti-corruption measures, firms are encouraged to adopt them to reduce the incidence of corruption and to increase analyst coverage, which will reinforce the benign effect of monitoring. This was an invited presentation. The conference was originally meant to be hosted in Seoul, South Korea, but was moved online due to COVID-19 concerns