Purpose: Our study investigates the combined effects of financial technologies (fintech) and the digital economy on sustainable development, considering geopolitical risks as a moderating factor. Origin: While sustainable development is a global imperative, the integrated roles of digital transformation and fintech remain insufficiently explored. Our research addresses this gap by analyzing their impacts on socioeconomic advancement and environmental sustainability across diverse contexts. Methodology: Employing panel data from 30 developed and developing countries between 1990 and 2023, we assess sustainable development using the Environmental Performance Index (EPI) and the Human Development Index (HDI). Independent variables include proxies for the digital economy (e.g., internet usage, mobile subscriptions, and high-tech exports) and fintech (e.g., digital payments, digital currency, and peer-to-peer lending). The Geopolitical Risk Index (GPRI) is used to evaluate the effect of political instability. We apply generalized least squares (GLS) and fixed-effects estimation (within) to ensure robustness. Findings: Our results indicate that digital transformation and fintech significantly foster socioeconomic development and environmental performance, even amidst geopolitical instability. Key variables such as digital payments and internet access show substantial positive impacts, providing valuable insights for policymakers aiming to enhance resilience and sustainability. Contributions: Our article offers a comprehensive evaluation of how the digital economy and fintech jointly influence sustainable development under geopolitical risks, providing a nuanced understanding for policymakers and researchers.

Our study focuses on analyzing the impact of the digital economy on sustainable development, taking current geopolitical risks (GPR) in seventeen developed and thirteen developing countries over the period 1990–2022. We found a lack of scientific work addressing our original issue. To address this scarcity, we synthesized previous research on the contribution of the digital economy to sustainable development, the influence of geopolitical factors on this development, and the repercussions of the digital economy on socio-economic development during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our analysis based on Environmental Performance Index (EPI) and the Human Development Index (HDI) as two proxies for sustainable development, using macroeconomic indicators, various measures of the digital economy, and a global geopolitical risk index (GPRI). We adopted the Static and Dynamic Panel methodology, revealing a significantly positive contribution of the digital economy to environmental and socio-economic development in developed countries, as well as a high positive impact in developing countries. However, it is important to note that GPR have had a negative influence on environmental performance and have degraded the Human Development Index of each country. In conclusion, we highlight the strong dependence of environmental performance and socio-economic development on measures of the digital economy and macroeconomic indicators, while emphasizing the importance of mitigating geopolitical risks.

Type of the article: Research ArticleThis study aims to investigate how geopolitical risk shocks influence return dynamics, volatility transmission, and hedging properties across sustainable financial assets, financial technology instruments, energy markets, and precious metals during major global crisis episodes over a daily period from June 15, 2018, to September 14, 2024. We examined three major events: the trade conflict between the United States and China from June 15, 2018, to November 30, 2019; the COVID-19 pandemic from December 22, 2019, to February 23, 2023; and the ongoing wars between Russia and Ukraine, as well as Hamas and Israel, from February 24 to September 14, 2024. We found anomalies explained by the volatility of these returns. Using static, dynamic, and fractional QVAR methodology, we concluded that gold and two indicators of green finance can be considered safe-haven assets and hedging instruments, while FinTech plays a stabilizing role during these crises. Spillovers and connectivity networks at the median quantile validate the negative impact of geopolitical risk on non-renewable energy. However, we observed that the geopolitical risk index does not significantly affect green finance indicators, eco-friendly cryptocurrencies, or various measures of FinTech, with a low sensitivity of this index to gold prices.