The globalization revolution has led to many countries considering advancing technology, which has led to electronic finance becoming an important aspect in all economic and financial sectors. This study aims to investigate the impact of information and communication technology (ICT) on the financial development index of six Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries from the period 2000 to 2016. The results are reported in terms of two main ICT variables: fixed broadband and Internet users as a proxy of ICT and domestic credit to private sector as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) and broad money supply/GDP as two proxies of the financial development index. This methodology used fixed effects (FEs) estimations, and the results show that an increase in fixed broadband has a statistically significant and positive effect on both proxies of financial development. In terms of domestic credit as a percentage of the GDP proxy, the positive effects of ICT (broadband) are greater than the one from Internet users. A 1% increase in fixed broadband leads to approximately 2% increase in financial development, but the Internet user variable resulted in about a 0.09% increase. The other money supply proxy increased by 0.40% when ICT increased by 1%. Additionally, money supply increased by 0.11% when the Internet user ratio increased by 1% .To control for the endogeneity problem, the study used a generalized method of moments estimator, and the results confirm the previous results of the FE. Moreover, the negative impact of economic growth and natural resources was found to be valid and significant, while urbanization and trade openness were found to significantly and positively affect both financial development proxies. The main conclusion of the study is that GCC countries should take action in building an effective joint information system to help construct efficient economic sectors.

Purpose: This study aims to examine the relationship between foreign finance, economic growth and CO₂ to investigate if the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) exists as an empirical evidence in 32 selected Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries. Design/methodology/approach: This study used quantitative analysis to test two main hypotheses: H1 is the U-shape relationship between foreign finance and environment, and H2 is the N-shaped association between economic growth and environment. In doing so, this study used panel data techniques. The panel set contained 32 countries over the period from 1990 to 2015, with 27 observations for each country. This study applied a panel OLS estimator via fixed-effects control to address heterogeneity and mitigate endogeneity. Generalized method of moments (GMM) with fixed effects-instrumental variables (FE-IV) and diagnostic tests were also used. Findings: The results showed that foreign finance and environmental quality have an inverted U-shaped association. The three proxies’ foreign investment, foreign assets and remittance in the first stages contribute significantly to CO₂ emissions, but after the threshold point is reached, these proxies become “environmentally friendly” by their contribution to reducing CO₂ emissions. Also, a non-linear relationship denotes that foreign investment in OECD countries enhances the importance, as a proxy of foreign finance has greater environmental quality than foreign assets. Additionally, empirical results show that remittances received is linked to the highest polluted levels until a threshold point is reached, at which point it then helps reduce CO₂ emissions. The GMM and FE-IV results provide robust evidence on inverse U-shaped relationship, while the N-shaped relationship explains that economic growth produces more CO₂ emissions at the first phase of growth, but the quadratic term confirms this effect is negative after a specific level of GDP is reached. Then, this economic growth makes the environment deteriorate. These results are robust even after controlling for the omitted variable issue. The IV-FE results indicate an N-shaped relationship in the OECD countries. Practical implications: Most studies have used different economic indicators as proxies to show the effects of these indicators on the environment, but they are flawed and outdated regarding the large social challenges facing contemporary, socio-financial economic systems. To overcome these disadvantages, the social, institutional and environmental aspects of economic development should also be considered. Hence, this study aims to explain this issue as a relationship with several proxies in regard to environmental, foreign finance and economic aspects. Originality/value: This paper uses updated data sets for analyzing the relationship between foreign finance and economic growth as a new proxy for pollution. Also, this study simulates the financial and environmental future to show their effect on investments in different OECD countries. While this study enhances the literature by establishing an innovative control during analysis, this will increase to add value. This study is among the few studies that empirically investigate the non-linear relationship between finance and environmental degradation.

This study analyzes the impact of petroleum and non-petroleum indices on the financial development of the Sultanate of Oman from 1978 to 2017. To this end, it uses the petroleum proxy of oil rents (% of gross domestic product, GDP) and the non-petroleum proxy of industry (including construction) value added (% of GDP); agriculture, forestry, and fishing value added (% of GDP); and services value added (% of GDP) to determine the effect on financial development, measured by the amount of domestic credit extended to the private sector by banks (% of GDP). It applies an autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) model. The long-term equation illustrates that the agriculture and industry GDPs have a negative and significant relationship with domestic credit in Oman. However, the oil and service sector GDPs promote financial development. The short-term equation illustrates that the oil, agricultural, and service sectors have positive and significant effects on domestic credit. The conclusion is that the economy of Oman is still in the first phase of economic diversification. Accordingly, the government should use oil revenues to develop various non-oil industrial sectors. This would enhance the country’s competitiveness in the global economy and positively contribute to improving the liquidity of the banking sector for stimulating credit at the macroeconomic level.

This study aimed to analyse the stock market capitalisation and financial growth nexus of Western European countries from 1989 to 2018 in order to understand the interactive relationship between the stock market and the economy to identify the specific financial market channels through which economic growth is managed. The pooled least square findings identified positive significant relationships between stock market capitalisation, foreign direct investment and stocks traded and financial growth, while negative and significant relationships were found between GDP per capita growth and inflation and financial growth. The fixed effect, random effect and pooled mean group models yielded the same results, indicating positive significant relationships between stock market capitalisation and stocks traded and financial growth, while the effect of foreign direct investment on financial growth was positive and insignificant. Finally, there were negative and significant relationships between GDP per capita growth and inflation and financial growth. The results from the quantile regression (tau = 0.10, 0.20, 0.30, 0.40 and 0.50) there were positive relationships between stock market capitalisation and stocks traded and financial growth for all percentiles, while there were negative relationships between GDP per capita growth and inflation and financial growth except at the 0.30 percentile; foreign direct investment also had a negative relationship to financial growth at the 0.30 percentile. Most variables were significant at a 1% significance level. However, inflation was insignificant at the 0.10 percentile, foreign direct investment was insignificant at the 0.20, 0.30, 0.40 and 0.50 percentiles, and stocks traded were insignificant at the 0.40 and 0.50 percentiles. All of the applied the diagnostic tests confirmed the robustness of the data. The main conclusion is that countries should minimise any regulatory obstacles to financial markets and protect the rights of shareholders. Furthermore, advanced financial systems should reduce the obstacles faced by companies in terms of external financing.