On intellectual capital efficiency and shariah governance in Islamic banking business model

This paper empirically investigates whether intellectual capital (IC) and shariah governance jointly affect the economic performance of Islamic banks (IBs). In contrast to prior research, this paper disaggregate IC and corporate governance features and examine whether the two are jointly related to economic performance. These relationships are further explored before, during and after the financial crisis based on a sample of 64 Islamic banks operating in different regions during the period 2007–2014. The required data to calculate different constituents of IC efficiency and governance mechanism is hand collected from 512 annual reports. After controlling for other corporate governance and bank‐specific characteristics (operational type, bank size, listing status, risk, type of auditor, accounting standard and region), we find both intellectual capital efficiency and shariah governance proxies (size and dominance of prominent scholars of shariah supervisory board) to have a significant positive relationship with accounting measure of performance. However, based on market performance measure, only one proxy for shariah governance mechanism, that is, prominent scholars on SSB, is found to be significant but in the negative direction. These results provide important insights into the relationship between IC efficiency, corporate governance and performance in Islamic banking business model and have policy and practical implications

Assembling webs of support: child domestic workers in India

This paper uses ethnographic and qualitative interview data with Muslim child domestic workers, their families and employers to investigate the social ties between young workers and their employers. Our analysis shows that working-class families use children’s domestic work with middle-class families as part of a web of resources to protect them from economic shocks and to enable them to afford to meet the cost of social obligations. We show that in this particular context, a town in Uttar Pradesh in north India, hiring domestic workers locks employers into relations of social obligation with their employees and their families. We conclude that these webs of support are enabled precisely because the domestic workers are children and not adults; their status as children makes it possible for the labour contract to be mystified and reconfigured as a social relationship

Optimal portfolios: are they optimal for the long run?

This study analyses the potential for diversification among assets as suggested by modern portfolio theory. It uses Johansen's cointegration methodology to identify long-term relationships among assets. We compare results from optimized portfolios constructed from samples of country funds and iShares with portfolios from the same samples but not optimized. The optimized portfolios exhibit diversification potential while the nonoptimized portfolios do not.

Strategies for the robust banking system and the determinants of the commercial and participation banks performance in ,Turkey evidence from a panel data analysis

The primary purpose of this study is to investigate the internal determinants of commercial and participation banks operated profitability in Turkey over the time from 2010Q1 to 2018Q4 and recommend strategies for the robust banking system regarding The Turkish bank system. Within this context, quarterly data of 20 commercial and three participation banks were analyzed by using the fixed panel regression model. The bank performance is measured by using return on asset (ROA) and return on equity (ROE). As a result, it was found that size has a negative and significant impact on participation banks ROE and commercial banks both ROE and ROA. It was also concluded that credit risk (CR) has an adverse and significant effect on participation banks. However, non-interest income to the total asset (OFFBS) has a positive and significant impact on all bank profitability. The results also showed that the coefficient of capital adequacy for participation bank ROA is positive and significant. At the same time, its effect is negative and significant for commercial bank ROE and participation bank ROE. Finally, liquidity management is positively related to participation bank ROE. Concerning the results of the model, the commercial and participation bank profitability are associated with the bank-specific determinants. Because of this situation, bank managements and policymakers should initially focus on improving bank management, the lending policy and banking activities so the bank performance will continue in a crisis period