“FinTech” or a compound term of Financial Technology refers as a newly emerged industry that utilizes IT-centered technologies which aims to boost the efficiency of the financial ecosystem. Since its inception, FinTech has successfully established its presence in the global financial industry due to the benefits and advantages of the system. However, the research studies that highlight the importance of FinTech are scarce. Specifically, the consumers’ attitude towards FinTech products in the context of Malaysia remain unexplored by most of the studies. This preliminary study proposed the extension of Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) as to identify the potential factors that influence consumers’ intention to adopt FinTech products and services in Malaysia. This study reviewed five factors as independent variables, namely the usefulness, ease of use, competitive advantage, perceived risk, and perceived cost; in line with the mediating effect of attitude towards using FinTech products and intention to adopt FinTech products served as the dependent variable. This study attempts to create new knowledge geared towards behaviour to utilize FinTech products in Malaysia.

Hepatitis B (HepB) is a major public health concern in Malaysia yet little is known about knowledge and awareness of this infection in the country. Such information is essential for designing effective intervention strategies for HepB prevention and control. The aim of this study was to characterize knowledge and awareness regarding HepB in Malaysia and to identify their associated sociodemographic determinants. A community-based cross-sectional survey was conducted between January and May 2016 in Selangor state of Malaysia. A two-stage cluster random sampling design was used and one adult member of selected households was interviewed face-to-face. Logistic regression was used to estimate the differences in knowledge and awareness between groups. A total of 764 households completed the interviews and were included in the final analysis. Only 36.9 and 38.8% of the participants had good knowledge and awareness, respectively. The factors associated with good knowledge were being in the 35–44 year age group, Malay ethnicity, high educational attainment and high family income. Being Chinese, being older and having high educational attainment were determinants of having good awareness towards HepB. Participants who had good knowledge were 2.5 times more likely to also have good awareness (OR: 2.41, 95% CI: 1.78–3.26, p < 0.001). This study reveals a low level of knowledge and awareness of HepB among households in Malaysia. This finding highlights the need to improve public knowledge and awareness through well-designed programs targeting vulnerable groups in order to reduce hepatitis B virus transmission and achieve the governmental target of eliminating viral hepatitis as a public health concern by 2030.

A mobile wallet is a part of financial technology products and it is still in the infant stage in Malaysia. This study applied 2 theories such as Theory of Reasoned Action and Theory of Acceptance Model. The research objectives of this paper are 1) to investigate the factors influencing consumers’ behavioural intention to accept of the mobile wallet in Malaysia, 2) to analyze the relationships between perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, perceived security, social influence, price value, social media, brand image, and behavioural to accept the mobile wallet, and 3) to examine the relationship between the behavioural and intention to accept of the mobile wallet in Malaysia. Quantitative data analysis was employed in this study. The results implied that perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, social influence, and brand image have a significant relationship on the consumers’ behavioural to accept of the mobile wallet, and also the consumers’ behavioural has a significant relationship on the intention to accept mobile wallet. Considerably, the mobile wallet companies can formulate appropriate marketing decisions in designing a more personalized mobile wallet to Malaysian consumers and protect the benefits of consumers’ secured digital payment to motivate mobile wallet acceptance.

Purpose: Natural rubber (NR) production has a long history and has been contributing as one of the most important economic sectors in Malaysia recently. In enhancing the Malaysian rubber economy, it is crucial to find a balance between supply-side and demand-side considerations in order to stabilize the NR price in the worldwide market. This has raised the motivation and objectives of this research is to investigate the critical factors affecting the NR price instability in the world market, and to estimate and predict the NR price instability and to examine the most related factors that influence the price model by using ex-post and ex-ante forecast analysis. Methodology: Number of profound research methods Vector Error Correction Method (VECM) by Gujarati and Porter; cointegration rank test by Dwyer; and ex-post forecast method by Pindyck and Rubinfeld have been utilized in this study. The data used from 2008 January to 2016 December: monthly time series data. Results: The results show that the explanatory variables of NR production, total NR consumption, crude oil price, and Shanghai NR price indicate a significant relationship with Malaysian NR price (SMR20), on the contrary, the exchange rate is not significant. Implications: The outcome of the study is closely related to the current situation of the exchange rate appreciation in the late of 2017 that may benefit the decision-making process of economic planning for the NR production stability, and price in the worldwide NR market as well.

This article is a conceptual review of identifying the factors of the successful implementation of Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) on small-medium enterprises (SMEs) in Malaysia. China’s president Xi Jin Ping has launched the China’s ‘One Belt One Road’ (OBOR) initiative or BRI in 2013. BRI focusses on the connectivity and cooperation between Asian, European and African continents economically and strategically through massive infrastructure developments, trades and investments. BRI is specified to two international trade connections: land-based ‘Silk Road Economic Belt’ and sea-based ‘21^st Century Maritime Silk Road’. Malaysia is one of the Southeast Asia countries that actively participated in BRI. According to the World Bank, SMEs are almost 98.5 per cent of business establishments in Malaysia, which undoubtedly indicates how important SMEs are in Malaysia. As such, that is the question to ponder of how BRI could connect and associate with the enhancement and development of Malaysia’s SMEs. Therefore, the objective of the study is to identify the factors of the successful implementation of BRI on SMEs in Malaysia. Based on this study’s literature reviews, it would be suggested that new business and investment opportunity creations, connectivity and cooperation enhancement, trade and export boosting, geographic location and enhancement of e-commerce were the most critical factors in the successful implementation of BRI on SMEs in Malaysia.