Macroeconomic Factors and Capital Markets. Selected Experiences in Central and Eastern Europe

The relationship between capital markets and macroeconomic variables is well documented in developed financial markets, but still developing in emerging financial markets. This paper looks at young financial markets from Central and Eastern Europe, focusing on two markets in the region: Romania and Hungary. Capital markets in these countries are analyzed from the perspective of two of their components: stock exchange markets and mutual funds markets and the effects of five macroeconomic variables (population, GDP/capita, inflation, unemployment, and savings) on the two components assessed. From a methodological point of view, the multiple regression analysis is employed for the period 2003-2019. The analysis is conducted in a comparative manner from two viewpoints: comparing stock exchanges with mutual funds markets and the role played by the macro-level determinants in the development of each and comparing the two national financial markets with one another. The study concludes that macroeconomic factors influence more the development of the stock exchanges than the development of mutual funds and that in the analyzed period, in Romania the impact of the macroeconomic factors on capital markets was stronger than in Hungary

Customer Relationship Management. Websites Analysis of the Top Ten Consumer Goods Companies

Customer relationship management (CRM) became one of the marketing practices that is assumed to bring success to companies in recent years. Therefore, the present research aims to identify the level of development of CRM in the top ten consumer goods companies as ranked at world level in 2021. Different models describe components of the CRM and the present research uses the theoretical framework proposed by Sin et al. (2005) that comprises four CRM dimensions: key customer focus, CRM organization, knowledge management and technology-based CRM. The methodology employed includes documentary research based on the public information available on the websites of the selected companies. Two types of analyses are conducted, descriptive analysis and comparative analysis. On overall, the dimension that is the most visible is the key customer focus, while the dimension that is the least visible is CRM organization. The results reveal that CRM is present in all top ten companies, but at different levels of development. US companies are more oriented towards CRM than companies originating from other countries. Companies that have a more developed CRM act in the direction of all four CRM dimensions

The Effects of the Covid-19 Crisis on Romania’s Main Trading Relationships in 2020

This paper is motivated by the influences that the COVID-19 health crisis had on the economies of the world. The economic crisis that has evolved from the health crisis affected economic life at all levels (global, national, industry, and company levels), including the trading relationships between countries. The purpose of the paper is to analyze the influence of the COVID-19 health crisis on the bilateral trading relationships between Romania and its main trading partners in terms of both exports and imports, for the year 2020. The research method used is multiple regression with exports and imports as dependent variables and the COVID-19 burden (solely the number of COVID-19 cases, solely the number of COVID-19 deaths and both taken together) and GDP in both Romania and the trading partners, as independent variables.  The data has been collected from international organizations' statistical databases. The findings of the paper illustrate that both the GDP of Romania and the COVID-19 burden in both Romania and the partner countries influenced the bilateral trading relationships of Romania with its main trading partners in 2020. Romanian imports were more affected than exports by the COVID-19 burden both from Romania and from the trading partners. The number of deaths due to COVID-19 had a higher influence on trade than the number of COVID-19 cases. Based on this country case study, we can assert that global sanitary crises do have an influence on the international trade relationships of countries. Consequently, specific measures need to be taken by policymakers in order to first ensure economic recovery and second to support and maintain international trade flows during times of strong health crises

The Evolution of Non-Banking Financial Markets in Hungary: The Case of Mutual Funds

The non-banking sector has an important place in financial markets. Therefore, the performance of financial markets can be looked at in different countries by analyzing the evolution of mutual funds, in terms of their inflows and outflows. This is even more important in the recent period, due to the recent global financial distress. Numerous studies, most of them conducted in the US, illustrate that flows are highly dependent on the previous performance and that a common behavior of investors is rather to look for highly performing funds than to give up the poorly performing ones. This paper studies the flows of funds into and out of Hungarian mutual funds during the period 2007-2014. The evolution of the mutual funds market depends on investor’s behavior and the paper analyzes the behavior of investors. The paper also tries to evaluate if and how the financial crisis affected the investing behavior of Hungarian investors. The main findings of the research illustrate that there are a number of factors that influence the way investors make their decisions. Among those fund flows in the previous month is the factor that influences the most the current flows, illustrating that Hungarians invest only in funds that attracted previously more new money. Other factors with a significant influence on the investors’ behavior are the size of the fund (measured through the net assets) and the risk (measured through the standard deviations of returns). The factor that surprisingly seems to have less influence on Hungarian inv estors’ decisions is the performance either measured as the evolution of the fund category or the rank and the square rank of the fund in its category. Another important finding was that data proved that the financial crisis had an impact on the capital market in Hungary, as investments decreased in that particular period and mutual funds performances were lower

The Utility of Magnetic Resonance Imaging in the Multidisciplinary Treatment of Patients with Rectal Cancer

Rectal cancer is one of the most common types of cancer in both men and women. In recent years, the importance of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has greatly increased in the multidisciplinary treatment of patients with rectal cancer. MRI has a particularly important role in the most accurate preoperative staging of these patients, both in terms of assessing the local invasion of the tumor and in terms of assessing the status of pelvic lymph nodes. Many patients with rectal cancer, especially those in the advanced stage of the disease, in the preoperative period undergo neoadjuvant radio chemotherapy. The evaluation of the clinical response of these patients to neoadjuvant therapy is of crucial importance both in terms of personalized treatment and in terms of their prognosis. In this regard, MRI has its clearly defined role at present in evaluating the efficacy of neoadjuvant therapy, as well as in postoperative follow-up

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Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche - Biblioteca Centrale -. P.le Aldo Moro, 7, Rome / CNR - Consiglio Nazionale delle RichercheSIGLEITItal

HOFSTEDE’S CULTURAL DIMENSIONS AND MANAGEMENT IN CORPORATIONS

In many cases the success or failure in management is caused by the way leaders understand the cultural environment the companies develop. The leadership approach and rules applied increase or decrease performance in economies and companies. The paper describes the relation between management failure or success and the management adjustment to the cultural dimensions. People build organizations and rule them according to their values, but in the corporation field specific values might be successfully applied or implying the whole company failure. The analysis is made based on Hofstede research and having in mind his dimensions on a dynamic hypothetical case where there are taken into account cultural dimensions for Romania, Germany, Kazakhstan and United States of America