Journal of Business & Financial Affairs

The Banking (Amendment) Act of 2016 enacted by the Kenyan Parliament was envisioned with the intentions of stabilizing lending and deposit taking transactions by financial service providers such as banks. However, the emerging reality is of a banking industry living through the significant effects of this Banking (Amendment) Act of 2016. The effects have resulted in opposing conversations with those in support of continued implementation of the Act and those calling for its repeal. Some of these effects are positive such as protecting customers from exploitation by greedy financial institutions. Other effects are negative such as declining capacity for banks to give loans and decrease in the ability of customers to borrow. In the face of these effects the banking sector has realized the unsustainability of the Act. The sector is calling for its repeal with several suggested ways forward such as diversifying funding sources for various economic activities. However, whether one is in support of the Act or calling for its repeal, the reality is that the Kenyan banking space has undergone a serious disruption. This calls for sustainable ways forward in regulation, customer protection and cultivating growth of the banking industry.

This study examined the determinants of borrowing capacity of small holder farmers in Cross River State, Nigeria. A total of 455 farmers were randomly selected through a stratified random sampling technique. The study data was collected by well-structured questionnaire. Statistical tools such as simple descriptive statistics (table, frequency, percentage and mean) and a multiple regression analysis were used to examine the data. The results indicate that 60% of the farmers source their credit from informal financial sector while the mean borrowing capacity of the farmers was N550,500. The regression’s result demonstrated that the determinants of the farmers borrowing capacity included asset value, debt outstanding, and value of equity in asset, educational index, farm size and family size. The study further revealed that the major problems facing farmers are high interest, lack for collateral, short repayment periods, among others. Therefore, it was recommended that small holder farmers should increase their financial asset and Real estate purchases, while financial services providers should carefully study the determinants favorable for lending to small holder farmers in order to increase agricultural financing.

In the United States, microenterprises, critical segment of the small business population, accounts for 110 million small businesses that source new jobs. Despite the increase in the number of created businesses in the USA, more than 70% of microenterprise business owners are unsuccessful after 2 years. The multiple case study included 6 participants living in Houston, Texas, and intended to explore business strategies microenterprise event management owners used to succeed in business beyond 2 years. The conceptual framework that grounded the study was the 5-stage small business growth model and the 5-stage of the evolution of entrepreneurship theory. The data collection process consisted of interviews resulting in transcripts, review of company documents, and interview observations notes. The data analysis process while triangulating the data consisted of creating thematic codes, and clustering keywords, and ideas from the data. Development of visual aids assisted with organizing information, synthesizing, and generating new ideas. Text, word, and matrix coding queries were conducted and summarized for a cross-case analysis as relating to the interview questions. Thematic analysis and cross-case analysis revealed 3 major themes: customer relationship management, education/work experience, and promotional activities. Implications for social change include encouraging entrepreneurial and small business development programs to develop innovative curriculums that microenterprise business owners may benefit from to increase more business opportunities. An increase in microenterprises may help provide more employment opportunities that meet the needs of local communities and improve socioeconomic conditions.

It is clear to any objective observer that in the coming decades – likely by the year 2050 – the use of hydrogen for energy will be a central global phenomenon – facts on the ground demand it, facts under the ground demand it and consumers demand it (the latter being the most important). When a Business Model is driven by consumer demand, the products, as well as the model, must be as responsive as those consumers expect.

Hydrogen will be increasingly needed for automobiles, and this is probably the largest application in terms of quantity of gas used, but it is also sorely needed for many other applications; industrial but not only large-scale industrial (the coming decades will also see a large increase in individual manufacturing via printing technologies, as well as greater emphasis on nanotechnologies, and hydrogen is also very important to both of those).

However, there are two impediments which must be addressed: scaling up and Green Hydrogen (or at least, significantly “greener”) both of those terms are described below.

This article addresses these two central issues, as well as other less central, issues needed to support that effort. The project herein described is an actual project (not theoretical) in process of being built. Caveat: Specific Product names are not used to prevent ethical violations.

Purpose: The concept of dividend policy has been widely researched by scholars, however, a consensus on the factors that determine dividend policies among firms has not been yet established as findings differ depending on the industry and sector. This study aims to contribute to the stock of literature already available by observing the major factors that affect dividend decisions of banks listed on the Ghana Stock Exchange (GSE).
Methodology: The study employed secondary data extracted from published financial statements of the listed banks over a 10 year period. Data was also extracted from the 2015 Ghana Banking Survey Report and the 2015 Bank of Ghana annual financial report. The study was conducted on seven banks which were currently listed on the GSE. A panel data framework constructed from secondary data of the banks by using Ordinary Least Squares model to estimate the regression equation.
Findings: The findings of the study showed that Returns on Asset (ROA) which represents profitability ratio was significant and a positive predictor of dividend payment among listed banks on the GSE. Other significant determinant of dividend payments include free cash flow, the leverage level of the banks, the banks ratio of non-performing loans to total administered loans (NPL/TA), the average level of inflation and Bank of Ghana’s policy rate (BPR). Number of bank branches (BBR) was found to have no significant relationship with Dividend payment by banks.
Study Contribution: The study revealed that NPL/TA and BPR has negative and strong influence on dividend payment among listed banks on the GSE. No relationship existed between BBR and DPS hence the number of branches owned by listed banks does not affect their dividend payments. Banks must therefore improve their credit risk administration to improve profitability in order to maintain sustainable payment of dividends. Bank of Ghana must also maintain lower BPR since high BPR will negatively affect payment of dividend.
Recommendations: The study recommends that, future studies should include more independent variables, more banks and as well increase the years for the time series data. Future studies can also consider and compare the determinants of dividend payments among banks in Africa.

This writing provides a philosophical discussion on the effect of monetary policy through the metaphysical analysis of money and its circulation. Unlike most writings on this subject, this writing focuses on the circulation of money at its face value instead of its buying power or market value, which is under the influence of conservation law. The goal of this writing is to lay out some basics for metaphysical analysis upon the physical nature of money circulation.

The relationship between the presence of women on corporate board and firm performance has attracted a growing research interest in corporate governance literature. In this study we analyse this topic in Italy, a country that has recently introduced the gender quota law 120/2011. We investigate this topic using regression analysis on a sample of 705 Italian listed companies after the introduction of the gender quota law. Our findings highlight that the presence of women on corporate board does not influence firm performance. Many explanations and managerial implications may be deduced from these results, as shown in the paper.

Financial analysis is one of the evaluative criteria that have drawn the most attention and importance when measuring the performance of organizations or analyzing the corporate strength of the businesses. Particularly believed that the fiscal power will extend the business lifecycle. This opens the path to the intensive use of financial analysis in assessments and the easy collection of relevant data resting on measurable parameters.

The method most widely used in the financial evaluation of organizations is the ratio analysis. By performing a ratio analysis, important information can be gained about the financial status of the enterprises. That information may include liquidity, indebtedness and profitability. For example, Banks perform ratio analysis and evaluate the business’s structural condition to assess the risk and decide whether to give loans to a requesting organization. Although these analyses provide useful information it may not provide concrete evidence of financial competency. There is a need for further analysis to identify these.

In this study, Financial competency is considered to be the part of an enterprise competency assessment model. It is a nested architecture identifying the financial competency in 6 layers from the least up to the most concrete competency. Each layer has several criteria including financial ratios mentioned above. This paper describes the model and concentrates on financial competency procedures. The model proposed also highlights some remedies for the enterprises to increase their competency to upper levels. Note that, as the financial competency has a more numerical foundation than the other component of the competency model, an evaluation structure using the ratios most commonly used in the literature has been adopted in this part of the model.

This study investigates the underlying factors contributing to the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) adoption in Nigeria. The diversity of responses to IFRS adoption is a phenomenon that requires empirical investigation to understand the reasons why some companies adopt IFRS other do not. Previous studies have investigated preparers of financial statements’ compliance with IFRS. However, there is a dearth of research on the influence of cultural factors on IFRS adoption. Little has heretofore been done to examine cultural variables as determinants of IFRS adoption. This study applies a self-administered survey instrument to elicit data from four major cities in Nigeria. The analysis involves applied logistic regression to estimate the relationship between the covariates and the companies’ decisions to adopt IFRS. The results indicate companies’ professionalism, transparency, flexibility, secrecy, uniformity and statutory control are significant factors impacting IFRS adoption at different magnitudes. For example, a company that considers IFRS will increase the level of financial statements transparency is more likely to maintain some levels of secrecy. The study identifies that IFRS adoption can only be successful when accountants develop the relevant technical expertise in IFRS requirements prior to the implementation. Consequently, there is a need for more practical training in IFRS accounting valuation, recognition, measurement and disclosure of financial information to users of financial statements.

Strategic thinking and applications to the business sector started in the 1960s as a result of the escalation of competition and conflict between large companies, especially companies that are called ballistic or multiple nationalities. This competition called the different companies to develop their potential and strengthen and stabilize their positions in local and international markets. Thus, companies have adopted effective productive and marketing policies to ensure their survival continual growth in line with consumers’ demands and market development and competition.
Moreover, the need for strategic alliances and partnerships was prompted by the increase the scarcity of resources and the difficulties companies faced in securing and maintaining access to those resources’ whether in raw materials and production requirements, or in qualified human resources and the combining of expertise and technical and managerial capacity, or any other financial resources or information.
Thus, competition and limited resources available made it necessary for companies, especially big ones, to think of adopting comprehensive strategies that enable them to deal with different variables of the environment based on determining the strategic direction of those companies in the long future. Moreover, companies started to concentrate widely on the environmental variables, outside the companies’ domains, on the grounds that variables can make it difficult for companies to influence. Thus, companies find themselves struggling to adapt to work with the variables they can’t alone control, due their limited ability to influence them.
In 1980s companies suffered greatly as a consequence of competition and conflict, market expansion, maintaining the local market, or securing continual core resources that they needed, especially those target markets, and those resources of interest to all companies alike. Moreover, the scientific and technological development which happened near the turn of the millennium, coupled with the huge turbulence in the field of innovation and creativity, made companies move from focusing on strategies of “selling what could be produced” to adopt strategies such as “producing what can be sold”. Consequently, companies started harsh wars among themselves. This made companies spy on each other (industrial espionage) so that they can find out the innovations and development of their competitors, in order to keep up with competition.
Alternatively, the end of the last century and the first decade of this millennium, economists and strategists adopted a different approach and started to, instead of focusing solely on competition, reduce the frequency of conflict amongst them and advocate the development of cooperation between companies, rather than competition. Thus, strategic alliances and partnership, particularly amongst large companies, emerged and became the norm. Additionally, it should be taken into account that innovation is becoming at the forefront of the management policies and alliances to improve their competitiveness and standing worldwide.

Purpose: We examined the association between the efficiency of working capital and firm value for a sample of 49 firms registered on Karachi Stock Exchange for a period of 2004-2016. Additionally, the effect of financing constraints on this association is also examined.
Design: Linear and Fixed Effect regression analysis is used to capture the effect of working capital management on firm value. We follow the model which was developed by the Fama and French and use by Pinkowitz et al. and Wasiuzzaman.
Findings: We find that working capital efficiency is important for the firms as it affects the firm value and it improves firm efficiency by reducing the investment in working capital. Further, better management of working capital and firm value association is true for financially constrained firms. While, in case of unconstrained firms it the relationship insignificant.
Originality: To the best authors’ knowledge, this is very first study on working capital and firm value in context of Pakistan. Hence this work adds valuable contribution in the scarce literature on working capital management and firm valuation relationship.

The article reveals the issues of the experience of improving the mechanism for financing export capacity building programs in South Africa, the dynamics of GDP growth in PPP in South Africa, billions of US dollars, the main trading partners of South Africa, the main export commodity items of South Africa, and the list of priority export support programs in South Africa.

Audit productivity, tax investigation and criminal penalty can play a major role in improving voluntary taxpayer’s compliance by impacting taxpayer behavior. The study has attempted to examine the impact of audit productivity, tax investigation and penalty on improving voluntary taxpayer’s compliance by using secondary macro data. To analyze the data the descriptive statistics and inferential statistical analysis method was employed. The descriptive result of the study shows that there were lack of sufficient personals in the authority, low performance of audit coverage, increasing performance of audit productivity, inconsistent result of tax investigation and penalty. The Pearson correlation and multiple regression result shows the level of voluntary tax compliance is significantly related with audit productivity, tax investigation and penalty. The study concludes that since the contribution of audit productivity, tax investigation and penalty on improving voluntary tax payer’s compliance is significant among other measures, revenue authorities of the region and other concerned parties should give more emphasis on the role of tax auditors, tax investigators and tax penalty officials by fulfilling the required staff and qualifications to improve voluntary tax payer’s compliance and thereby increasing regions revenue through tax.

Project Managers have multidimensional responsibilities that ominously have impact of the success of the Project. In this study, has been conducted to judge the impact of Cultural differences on the Project success especially in Pakistani and Chinese contexts through mediating role of Managerial actions. The data were collected from 103 respondents, who are employees of 04 Multinational Telecom Vendors/operators. This study provides a new though to researchers to further explore the impact of Pakistani and Chinese Cultural differences on Project Success.

This paper analyses both empirical and theoretical evidences on competition and mission drift. The main objective of the paper is to pin-down whether competition leads to mission drift. A Comprehensive empirical examination on competition and mission drift has been conducted. To understand the theoretical foundation of the relationship between competition and MFIs’ mission, a theoretical model has also seated. The paper suggests that competition helps MFIs to keep their mission of serving the marginalized poor people in such a way that competition pushes MFIs towards the unmet market demand. The analysis also finds that the results are mixed, and it is difficult and ambiguous to disentangle the phenomena of mission drift which has occurred due to competition.

The work developed on this paper aims to exploit the adaptive nature that investors perceive risk and return, emphasizing the effects that context has on decision-preferences. Based on the concepts developed on the Adaptive Market Hypothesis and The Context Theory, the empirical analysis dissecting stock returns of Brazilian companies identified that investors adjusts and adapts its risk/reward expectations based on the broad market context. The methodology used in this paper measure and ranks the Brazilian listed securities by their respective F-Score, a fundamental measurement developed by Piotroski. The findings of this paper indicate that undervalued firms consistently and significantly outperforms overvalued firms, incurring in significantly lower risk.

The object of this paper is to study the theory of the finance and the Islamic banks through their concepts and logics of functioning. We focus on the analysis of the banking performances, in particular in terms of profitability which has a big interest to allow the banks to arrest the factors which act on their profitability and of offering them so better control levers of action, control and forecast. What requires a definition of the internal and external determiners of the profitability of Islamic banks? We suggest approaching this question from the specification and from the estimation of a model which integrates at once organizational, exogenous and macro-financial measurable aspects. The empirical analysis was focused on the determiners of the Islamic banking performance. Our study which concerned 10 Islamic banks in 10 various countries showed essentially that the profitability of asset constitutes the main explanatory variable of the banking performance. The performance is positively correlated with CTA and negatively with ASITA. Concerning the externals factors, the profitability is weakly explained by the rates of inflation and growth.