Our paper examines the potential effect of different types of entrepreneurship (in particular, early-stage entrepreneurship, opportunity-driven entrepreneurship, and necessity-driven entrepreneurship) on economic growth at a national level and aims to identify whether the contribution of entrepreneurship to economic growth differs according to the stage of economic development of a country. Our empirical analysis is based on the panel data, which covers 17 years (2002–2018) and 22 European countries, classified into two groups. The results suggest that all three types of entrepreneurship have a greater impact on economic growth for the entire sample of European countries, and some types of entrepreneurship are more important than others. We find that opportunity-driven entrepreneurship and early-stage entrepreneurship would be key factors in stimulating economic growth across the sample of European countries. Our estimations also show that opportunity-driven entrepreneurship would have a greater impact in transition countries, while necessity-driven entrepreneurship would have a stronger influence in the innovation-driven countries. The results of our research could be of interest to policymakers, as it can help in identifying and implementing the most appropriate measures to eliminate the obstacles in the macroeconomic environment that entrepreneurs face, and measures to support innovative entrepreneurial activities.

The modernization of the banking sector has been a defining trend in new EU member state economies over the last decade. Financial innovations in particular have provided banks with the necessary tools to obtain competitive advantages. In this context, the aim of our research is to analyze the way in which the financial innovation represented by Internet banking services can contribute to the enhancement of the overall efficiency of Romanian banks. We apply DEA to compute the aggregate efficiency score for each of the 24 banks in our sample and, in addition, we utilize PCA to classify the banks into different operational strategies groups based on their relative efficiency scores. The results show that there are very few banks in our sample that have utilized Internet banking services in their production process to increase their level of efficiency and thus the research proposes a series of solutions and recommendations

Political observers predicted the Ukraine invasion by Russia for many days, but they could not precisely anticipate the scheme and timing of the invasion. This paper investigates the effects of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on the global commodity and stock markets using an event study methodology. The empirical results of this study suggest that this invasion unevenly affected the financial markets. More precisely, our results suggest that the onset of war has put pressure on global gold and stock markets. Furthermore, it seems that the only asset that could be considered a safe haven for investors after the outbreak of the invasion was oil.

As an emerging digital asset, Bitcoin has been traded for more than a decade, reaching an impressively high market capitalization and continuing to expand its volume of trading at a rapid pace. Many countries have legalized or are considering legalizing a trading platform for this asset, and a set of companies worldwide accept it as a medium of exchange. As a result of this expansion, many studies in finance literature have focused on studying the efficiency of this cryptocurrency. In line with this literature, this paper investigates, using the abnormal returns and abnormal trading volumes methodologies, the dynamics of investors’ reaction to the arrival of unexpected favorable and unfavorable information regarding the Bitcoin market in the context of the three famous hypotheses: the overreaction, the uncertain information, and the efficient market hypotheses. Overall, we find evidence confirming that the Bitcoin market tends to mature over time. More precisely, over the entire analyzed period, investors behave in accordance with the predictions of the uncertain information hypothesis when positive and negative events occur. However, splitting the timespan into sub-periods provides interesting insights. Remarkably in this respect is the fact that starting with the second sub-period, the response of investors in the Bitcoin market supports, in a moderate manner, the postulate of the efficient market hypothesis when favorable events are addressed. Moreover, our findings reveal that during the pandemic period, the efficiency of Bitcoin has increased, thus turning this stressful period into an advantage for this cryptocurrency. This improved market efficiency is also supported by the abnormal trading volume analysis.

Donald Trump’s victory in the 2016 presidential election was a political surprise to almost everyone, domestically and internationally. This paper investigates international investors’ reaction to this apparent global political surprise. Employing an event study methodology, we test the three widely known behavioral hypotheses concerning international investor reaction to this unexpected news, that is, the Overreaction Hypothesis (OH), the Uncertain Information Hypothesis (UIH), and the Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH). The study results show that most of the indexes initially reacted unfavorably to the announcement of Trump’s win; however, subsequent stock index returns exhibit corrective upward patterns consistent with the predictions of the OH, except for the Latin American and France markets. The reactions of the other indexes appear to be favorable and in line with the prediction of the UIH. These findings suggest that in most countries under study, investors could utilize contrarian strategies to generate abnormal returns, as evidenced by price reversal following the arrival of the surprise. JEL classification: G14, G15.

This paper investigates the impact of board diversity on the performance and riskiness of banks across Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries. We emphasize identifying features of the board structure that could increase performance and lower the possible losses of banks. Using a unique, hand-collected dataset of 156 banks from CEE countries during 2005-2012, we assess whether banks with more female directors or chairwomen display lower risk and higher performance. The analysis first shows that banks with a chairwoman and a higher proportion of females among the members of a bank's board record a higher level of profitability and tend to have a lower level of credit losses. Additionally, the results suggest that the higher proportion of females among members on bank boards, on average, the higher the level of bank stability during the financial crisis of 2008. Our results also reveal that the regulatory framework in the host-country affects the relationship between board gender diversity and bank performance and risk.