This article analyzes how trade openness and political stability affect foreign direct investment (FDI) in 25 Asia-Pacific countries from 1990 to 2020. This study employs the dynamic system Generalized Method of Moments to mitigate the heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation issues. We also perform the Johnson–Neyman test to examine whether trade openness moderates the relationship between political stability and FDI. Our findings show that trade openness positively affects FDI, while political stability has a negative effect. Noticeably, the Johnson–Neyman test indicates that Trade Openness moderates the relationship between political stability and FDI in Asia-Pacific nations. Trade openness and its moderating role remained robust before the 2008 financial crisis. The impacts of trade openness and political stability on FDI persist in non-tax-heaven countries. Our findings align with market-seeking, efficiency, resource-seeking, and regulatory risk theories. Finally, these findings are helpful for policymakers to attract FDI projects sustainably across the Asia-Pacific region.

This study examines the relationship between foreign direct investment and total factor productivity on economic growth in 90 middle-income countries. Because middle-income countries often face particular challenges in achieving sustainable economic development. Investigating how FDI and TFP contribute to or hinder economic growth in these countries can provide insight and help policymakers make policy decisions. We employ the dynamic system Generalized Method of Moments to analyze an unbalanced sample with 2714 annual observations from 1990 to 2020. The empirical results show that a percentage increase in foreign direct investment will increase economic growth in middle-income countries by 9.3%. In addition, Total Factor Productivity also has a positive relationship with economic growth due to improved labor quality and production innovations. Furthermore, the results indicate that Total Factor Productivity empowers the positive nexus between Foreign Direct Investment and economic growth. In addition, the main findings are also robust even though we employ alternative economic growth proxies. These findings support economic growth and industrialization theories but do not support labor market dynamics theories. Finally, this study contributes practical suggestions for sustainable economic development in middle-income countries.

This paper aims to explore which macroeconomic factors affect the volatility of the automakers stock prices by employing a multifactor model. The study uses quarterly panel data of 39 automakers quoted on the stock exchanges in the 11 countries. It studies the effects of 19 macroeconomic variables from January 2000 to December 2017, and proposes the mixed-effect model constructed based on employing genetic algorithm and AIC criterion, and compares its explanatory power with the existing multifactor model (El Khoury, 2015 El Khoury, R. M. (2015). Do macroeconomic factors matter for stock returns? Evidence from the European automotive industry. International Journal of Monetary Economics and Finance, 8(1), 71–84. doi: 10.1504/IJMEF.2015.069170 [Crossref] , [Google Scholar] ). This paper suggests that the proposed model can shed more light on explaining the variability of stock prices of the quoted automakers. The findings show there are positive linkages between automaker's stock return volatility and explanatory variables such as stock market development, GDP and unemployment. Conversely, an inverse linkage between the dependent variable and money supply and IPI was found. The study demonstrates that selected macroeconomic factors can also be used as predictors.

This study used a researcher self-constructed corporate governance index as a proxy to measure the firm-level corporate governance compliance and disclosure with the 2002 Pakistani Code of Corporate Governance, to examine the relationship between corporate governance and cost of capital. We found a negative and significant association between the Pakistani Corporate Governance Index (PCGI) and block ownership with the firm-level cost of capital. On average, better-governed Pakistani listed firms tend to be associated with a lower cost of capital than their poorly governed counterparts are. As an emerging market, good corporate governance practices are mainly related to minimise corporate failure and assist firms in attracting capital at a lower cost.

This study examines the impacts of powerful CEOs and state ownership on commercial banks’ corporate social responsibility (CSR) in Vietnam, a transitional market in Asia. Given the differences between emerging and developed markets in terms of their institutions and governance, it is essential to explore the impact of CEO power on CSR disclosure in emerging markets. This study collects data from 37 Vietnamese commercial banks from 2010 to 2020. We employ a dynamic system Generalized Method of Moments to overcome endogeneity and heterogeneity issues. The findings show that powerful CEOs negatively reduce CSR programs. CEO power tends to focus less on CSR investments because CSR expenses reduce the operating free cash flow. Meanwhile, our findings indicate a positive relationship between state ownership and CSR developments. This study reports a moderating role of state ownership in empowering powerful CEOs to develop CSR programs in commercial banks. We also perform a robustness test to confirm the persistence of our main findings across subsamples by CEO ages. Our robustness test results indicate that CEOs have the lowest motivation to improve CSR when their ages are from 40 to 60. Our findings align with agency theory, stakeholder theory and prior literature. Finally, our study contributes practical implications for management and policymakers to develop CSR programs sustainably.