Purpose: This paper has used account-level data of corporate and retail borrowers, assessed their credit risk through the risk-neutral principle and examined its implication on loan pricing. Design/methodology/approach: It derives the capital charge and credit risk-premium for expected and unexpected losses through a risk-neutral approach. It estimates the risk-adjusted return on capital as the pricing principle for loans. Using GMM regression, the article has assessed the determinants of risk-based pricing. Findings: It has been found that risk-premium is not reflected in the current loan pricing policy as per Basel II norms. However, the GMM estimation on RAROC can price risk premium and probability of default, LGD, risk weight, bank beta and capital adequacy, which are the prime determinants of loan pricing. The average RAROC for retail loans is more than that of corporate loans despite the same level of risk capital requirement for both categories of loans. The robustness tests indicate that the RAROC method of loan pricing and its determinants are consistent against the time and type of borrowers. Research limitations/implications: The RAROC method of pricing effectively assesses the inherent risk associated with loans. Though the empirical findings are confined to the sample bank, the model can be used for any bank implementing the Basel principle of risk and capital assessments. Practical implications: The article has developed and validated the model for estimating RAROC, as per Basel II guidelines, for loan pricing that any bank can use. Social implications: It has developed the risk-based loan pricing model for retail and corporate borrowers. It has significant practical utility for banks to manage their risk, reduce their losses and productively utilise the public deposits for societal developments. Originality/value: The article empirically validated the risk-neutral pricing principle using a unique 1,520 retail and corporate borrowers dataset. © 2022, Emerald Publishing Limited.

Organizations rely on algorithms to exercise mechanized control over workers – referred to as algorithmic control (AC). The use of algorithmic control has evolved into a commonplace with platform-based work in the gig economy, where independent workers are paid for completing a given task (or “gig”). The gig economy is on a steep rise after the onset of the pandemic because employers are more concerned about smaller pieces of jobs being taken up by temporary labor, thereby saving on the investment in full-time resources. Motivation among the gig workers has always been debatable, especially with the onset of AC on the gig workers. This research is an attempt to analyze the disruption of the motivation of gig workers through digital platforms taking self-determination theory (SDT) and social exchange theory (SET) of motivation into consideration. Grounded on the theory of SET and SDT, this chapter explains the underlying characteristics of algorithmic control affecting employee motivation in the gig economy. This is a conceptual framework for the disruption of motivation of the gig workers through the IT-enabled checks on the progress of the gig workers. The future avenues of this research may gather deeper insights on the well-being of gig work and its subsequent impact on family-life integration. This chapter uniquely explores the lesser researched phenomena in the gig economy and highlights the gray side of algorithmic control on gig workers’ motivation. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

To prevent the pandemic spread of human-to-human transmitted diseases such as COVID-19, governments commonly resort to countrywide or regional lockdown strategies. Such lockdowns, whenever and wherever implemented, curtail the movement of persons and vehicles, and drastically alter traffic conditions. This study focuses on the effect of drastic and sudden changes in the traffic conditions, during the COVID-19 lockdown in the State of Maharashtra in India, in March–June 2020, on the numbers of motor vehicle accidents (MVAs), and the resultant fatalities and injuries. Content analysis of police-reported first information reports (FIRs) of MVAs is performed, and these lockdown trends are compared with archival data from corresponding previous (normal) periods. The statistical analysis shows that, during the lockdown, while the total number of MVAs fall drastically, they are more severe and have a much higher fatality rate per MVA. Also, the pattern of vehicles involved in MVAs, and resultant pattern of fatalities, also changes during lockdowns. The paper explores the reasons for these changed patterns and provides suggestions to reduce these negative externalities of pandemic related lockdowns. © National Academy of Sciences: Transportation Research Board 2021.

Nonperforming assets in any banking system have stressed the economic health of nations. Resultantly, literature has given considerable impetus to predict failures and bankruptcy. Past studies have focused on the outcome of failures, while, there is a dearth of studies focusing on ongoing firms in bad shape. We plug this gap and attempt to identify underlying communication patterns for firms witnessing prolonged underperformance. Using text mining, we extract and analyze semantic, linguistic, emotional, and sentiment-based features in non-numeric communication channels of these poor-performing firms and their peers. These uncovered patterns highlight the use of vocabulary and tone of communication, in correspondence to their financial well-being. Furthermore, using such patterns, we deploy various Machine Learning algorithms to identify loser firm(s) way ahead in time. We observe promising accuracy over a time window of five years. Such early warning signals can be of critical importance to various stakeholders of a firm. Exploration of writing style-related features for any firm would help its investors, lending agencies to assess the likelihood of future underperformance. Firm management can use them to take suitable precautionary measures and preempt the future possibility of distress. While investors and lenders can be benefitted from this incremental information to identify the likelihood of future failures. © 2023 by Emerald Publishing Limited.

The human brain is known to process information using fast and intuitive processing (System I) and deliberative or reflective processing (System II). Both these systems work simultaneously and complementarily to aid decision-making and preference construction. The attraction effect is a choice anomaly that occurs when consumer preference between two alternatives polarizes toward one of the alternatives upon the inclusion of a third (asymmetrically dominated) option. Past studies have shown that suppression of System II magnifies the attraction effect and, thereby, concluded that the attraction effect is a result of System I. In our experimental studies, contrary to these past studies, we find a robust attraction effect when the reflective processing (System II) is induced using a priming procedure. We rule out several possible alternative explanations of our findings and discuss potential research implications. © 2022 Elsevier Inc.

Purpose: This study estimates the impact of changes in the mutual fund distributor incentive structure on distributor-advised mutual fund flows. The authors employ two recent major policy interventions by the Indian self-regulatory authority and the financial market regulator – one partial ban and another complete ban on upfront commissions – paid to mutual fund distributors on distributor-advised mutual fund flows. Design/methodology/approach: The authors use novel distributor-level data across the 198 largest distributors in India between 2013 and 2020 and a series of pooled panel random-effect generalized least squares models with robust standard errors to explore the effect of changes of distributor commissions on distributor assets-under-management (AUM), gross sales, commissions and changes (%) in the number of investors in alternate investment avenues like portfolio management services (PMS). Findings: Changes in the incentive structure have a significant negative effect on mutual fund flows at an aggregate level and within MF distributor categories. A significant diversion of investor funds toward PMS is noted, which paid higher upfront commissions to distributors during the same period. Practical implications: The authors posit that these two developments are not mutually independent and that both fall out of the aforementioned policy changes by Securities and Exchange Board of India and Association of Mutual Funds in India. The study findings have implications for all stakeholders in the Indian mutual fund industry and, by extension, for Indian and global alternative investment avenues. Originality/value: This study is the first to explore the effects of these two major policy interventions by regulators on mutual fund flows in India. © 2022, Emerald Publishing Limited.

An exponential demand increase for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) has contributed to a looming waste crisis. Circular economy has been increasingly seen to counter this crisis, further scaled-up by operationalizing Industry 4.0 disruptions around the triple bottom line. As a core pillar of circular economy, this study addresses LIB recycling and explores its key drivers. The drivers are identified and evaluated using Delphi study and multi-criteria decision-making methods. The proposed integrated methodological framework is further tested with data involving multiple stakeholders. The findings underscore the most profound causal drivers: institutional incentives supporting LIB recycling, availability of reliable technology, and strengthening coordination among actors in a supply chain using Industry 4.0. Interestingly, the highest-ranking causal drivers of LIB recycling were retrieved not from the existing literature but from the expert pool. The findings also reveal some counterintuitive results, such as practitioners prioritizing environmental factors over economic ones instead of the widespread convention of their preferences toward economic goals. The study thereby offered some helpful policy levers, which when empirically strategized with Industry 4.0 should enable stakeholders make more informed decisions in shaping an emerging industry such as LIB recycling. © 2023 Elsevier Ltd

Purpose: With the increasing prevalence of social media in everyday life, scholars have argued the need of exploring enterprise social media (ESM) for workplace outcomes. This study investigates the relationship between ESM use and organizational learning capability (OLC) by focusing on the mediating role of informal learning (INFL) and the moderating role of social capital (SC). Design/methodology/approach: The paper developed and tested a mediated moderated model explaining the impact of ESM on OLC. The study used temporally separated data of 281 respondents collected in two waves from firms in India that use organizationally facilitated ESM platforms for internal workplace communication. Findings: An analysis of temporally separated two-wave data indicates that INFL mediates the relationship between ESM use and OLC. Also, SC is found to moderate the effect of ESM use on INFL, and INFL mediated the moderation effect of SC on relationship between ESM use and OLC such that the relationship will be stronger when employees have a higher rather than lower level of SC. Research limitations/implications: The study theoretically contributes and extends the literature on ESM and learning in organizations. The study provides important practical implications to support and institutionalize learning at work. The results of the study provide evidence that ESM are not just networking tools but a platform for learning. Findings of the study suggest that ESM can be one such tool to promote and capture employee INFL. The results also show that SC plays a critical role in predicting the extent to which employees learn informally using ESM, thereby building OLC. This result suggests that organizations should make conscious and concerted efforts to build employee SC. The above findings also have interesting implications for learning and development (L&D) and information technology (IT) managers who wish to implement technology for collaborative purposes. Originality/value: Addressing the underlying processes that explain how ESM positively influence OLC was highlighted as a critical research gap that needs attention. The paper is novel in its approach as it provides empirical evidence for the relationship between ESM and its impact on employee outcomes, an area pertinent in today's digital economy, however, received sparse attention by management scholars so far. It also provides empirical grounds toward a meaningful shift in the social media discourse – transition from being traditionally viewed primarily as “a networking platform” to “a learning platform”. © 2022, Emerald Publishing Limited.

Recent years have seen a growing focus on sustainable shipping and logistics from both the academia and business worlds. The emerging impetus towards sustainable freight shipping is accompanied by the surfacing of a novel category of threats recognized as sustainability risks. Sustainability risks could be triggered by numerous technological challenges in freight shipping and act as impediments to sustainability engagements. Despite the availability of abundant literature in the freight domain, studies examining sustainability risks in freight shipping are scarce. This study aims to understand and investigate sustainability risks in freight shipping from the perspective of theory of planned behavior (TPB). Furthermore, studies considering the impact of temporal orientation during risk analysis are virtually non-existent in the literature. This study attempts to address these gaps in the literature in the following ways: First, this study identifies sustainability risks associated with freight shipping and signifies the need to manage these risks to facilitate sustainable shipping; Second, this study investigates the influence of temporal dimension on sustainability risks; Third, this study performs the profiling of sustainability risks from economic, environmental, and social perspectives for short-term and long-term time frames. To address involved complexities, uncertainties, and preconceptions, a novel analytical model combining D-Number theory and intuitionistic Fuzzy Set theory is developed. We found that most of critical factors in all scenarios are triggered by an underlying social and technology-driven feature and not a financial one. Under the umbrella of TPB, we inferred that in the case of sustainability aspects, technology adoption provides the perceived behavioral control and lays the foundation for sustainable development. This study also offers implications for managers, policy-makers, and investors. © 2023 Elsevier Ltd

Online reviews play a significant role in shaping consumer purchase decisions. Accordingly, emergence of fake reviews has proliferated as an instrument to manipulate customers’ buying preferences. Such manifestation, however, lacks theoretical grounding and remains under researched due to two notable challenges: first, absence of conceptual underpinnings between consumers’ writing style and recommendation behavior. Second, little knowledge about the role of product characteristics underlying fake reviews and their influence on nudging product preferences. Through the lens of environmental psychology, this study uses an empirical investigation utilizing natural language processing (NLP) to uncover latent product-specific features underlying customer reviews and their impact on persuading buying preferences. As a major finding, we observe that characteristics underlying fake reviews, as opposed to genuine ones, fail to influence product recommendation or discouragement. Accordingly, we suggest firms permitting fake reviews on their portals to be aware of the limited economic advantages of such practices. © 2023, The Author(s).

Neuromarketing literature has grown remarkably in recent years. Although the field has generated a diverse body of knowledge, we still find a dearth of studies classifying the existing literature into research themes and further presenting known and unknown aspects of Neuromarketing from a business and management viewpoint. To bridge this gap, the present study conducted a systematic literature review of Neuromarketing from 2011 to 2021, with a sample of 100 peer-reviewed articles. Based on rigorous review and thematic analysis of 41 relevant research articles, four research themes were identified – 1) Phenomenon, 2) Application, 3) Bright side, and 4) Dark side of Neuromarketing. Further, a theoretical framework of neuromarketing effect on consumer behaviour was presented. Future research thrust areas in theory, application, methodology, and evidence were identified. © 2022 Elsevier Inc.

Purpose: This study examined the impact of the Glasgow Climate Pact on the abnormal returns of global clean energy stocks. Further, this study examines which country-specific and firm-specific variables drive the cumulative abnormal returns (CARs) of clean energy stocks. Design/methodology/approach: The authors used the event study method and cross-sectional multivariate regression model. The clean energy stocks in this study are limited to 81 constituent firms of the S&P Global Clean Energy Index across 17 nations. The final sample includes 80 firms and the sample period ranges from January 26, 2021, to December 07, 2021. Findings: The study finds that the Glasgow Climate Pact negatively affects the stock returns of clean energy firms. Moreover, the climate change performance index (CCPI) positively impacts cumulative abnormal returns (CARs), signifying that clean energy investors react positively to firms in nations with good CCPI scores. The environmental, social and governance (ESG) measure for the shorter window (−1, +1) exhibited a negative relationship with CARs. The firm-specific variables (BTM, stock liquidity, size and past returns) exhibit a negative relationship with CARs in different event windows. Research limitations/implications: The authors use the CCPI as a proxy for the stringency of environmental policies in any nation. The authors extend the existing literature by employing firm-specific variables and supporting previous findings. Their findings have policy implications for clean energy investors, policymakers and other market participants. Practical implications: Climate risks impact the global financial market, so the findings have implications for global regulatory bodies. Currently, there are bankruptcy cases due to climate risks. Because financial markets must play a critical role in shifting the economy toward a green one, regulators can use the cross-sectional drivers of this study to shape policy. It is also critical for regulators to reduce stock price volatility in the event of the implementation of environmental regulations and improve environmental disclosures by publicly traded companies. Furthermore, governments are interested in researching the effects of environmental regulations to protect stakeholders' interests. These regulations significantly impact emerging markets because they lack the same solid institutional frameworks as developed markets. Originality/value: The authors provide evidence that firms with better ESG scores and larger firm sizes have experienced fewer abnormal returns, as these firms have stable financial and non-financial fundamentals. This timely study on the ongoing regulatory shift in environmental policy will help investors, policymakers, firms and other stakeholders make relevant decisions. © 2022, Emerald Publishing Limited.

The literature is unsettled on the simultaneous existence of Competition-Stability and Competition-Fragility phenomena in the banking system. Our study has extended the debate where we have incorporated accounting-based information along with 2-SLS system equation modeling to further explore linkages between competition, systemic risk, and stability prevailing in the Indian banking system. The study revealed that for Indian banks competition and systemic risk are inversely related. Systemic risk build-up occurs during the business growth cycle, and it spillovers onto the banking system during the economic down-cycle. The article finds that while a healthy competition would support the overall stability of banks, a fierce competition exerts competitive pressure on the banking system, and hence it negatively contributes to the bank’s stability. It has supported the financial fragility hypothesis and envisages that increased capital restricts competition, and aggressive loan creation increases fragility. © 2023 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

The current study explores the interlinkage between corporate social, environmental performance (CSP) and financial performance of a firm, mediated by its global exposure and corporate governance. We conduct a dynamic fixed effect 2SLS-IV analysis on a comprehensive multi-country data-set and find that financial performance is not significantly impacted by CSP but there is a positive influence when it is mediated by lower internationalization. We also find that a more independent board lowers such value-destroying managerial activities, while the presence of women directors on board, dampens that positive influence of low internationalisation in strengthening financial performance through higher CSP. © 2022

Purpose: The current study aims to analyze the linkage among bank competition, liquidity and loan price in an interconnected bank network system. Design/methodology/approach: The study employs the Lerner index to estimate bank power; Granger non-causality for estimating competition, liquidity and loan price network structure; principal component for developing competition network index, liquidity network index and price network index; and panel VAR and LASSO-VAR for analyzing the dynamics of interactive network effect. Current work considers 33 Indian banks, and the duration of the study is from 2010 to 2020. Findings: Network structures are concentrated during the economic upcycle and dispersed during the economic downcycle. A significant interaction among bank competition, liquidity and loan price networks exists in the Indian banking system. Practical implications: The study meaningfully contributes to the existing literature by adding new insights concerning the interrelationship between bank competition, loan price and bank liquidity networks. While enhancing competition in the banking system, the regulator should also pay attention toward making liquidity provisions. The interactive network framework provides direction to the regulator to formulate appropriate policies for managing competition and liquidity while ensuring the solvency and stability of the banking system. Originality/value: The study contributes to the limited literature concerning interactive relationship among bank competition, liquidity and loan price in the Indian banks. © 2023, Emerald Publishing Limited.

This study presents a comparative analysis of under-pricing and short-term performance of IPOs issued during the COVID-19 pandemic period and the pre-pandemic tranquil decade (2009 to 2019) in a cross-country setup. We find evidence of higher underpricing of IPOs issued during COVID-19 which, however, gets corrected shortly. Factors, such as underwriter reputation, percentage of the net proceeds to the company, new shareholder participation, industry affiliation of the issuing firm and the severity of the pandemic in respective countries seem to affect these patterns. Our results are robust and remain mostly unaltered through a series of robustness tests. © 2023 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.

The business value of investments in information technology/information system (IT/IS) has been the subject of active research over several decades. Even though a plethora of similar studies analyzing the impact of promised IT/IS investments on firm performance exists, the results, largely inconclusive, mostly concentrate on the developed countries. In this backdrop, and with an expected manifold rise in IT/IS investments in India in the coming years, an assessment of the relationship between investments and firm performance can be noteworthy. The study explores this important issue by analyzing the impact of IT/IS investments on the firm's performance in India based on data of around 6500 IT/IS investments during 2000-2016. We deploy a series of univariate and multivariate analyses and complement those with several robustness tests. Our principal findings indicate that IT/IS investments on the average in India have been mostly unsuccessful in impacting firm performance positively, in line with "productivity paradox"phenomenon previously documented in the U.S. and other markets. We substantiate our principal results using several robustness tests. We offer several possible explanations of our results spanning across both IS as well as finance literature and discuss the implications of future investment prospects for firms. The results highlight the need for adoption of caution by firms operating in emerging economies like India while considering future IT/IS investment decisions. These suggestions are likely to serve as a good reference point in other emerging economies as well. Copyright © 2023 owner/author(s).

In today's competitive business environment, ensuring the sustainability in long-run remains a key challenge for business organizations. Using fossil fuel-based technologies for in carrying out operating activities may put organizational sustainability at stake. Until now, researcher have not paid much attention to explore these issues. Consequently, following the recommendations of natural-resource-based view current study attempts to identify the issues & sub-issues concerning fossil-fuel usage by businesses and solutions to mitigate the effect of these. To understand the priority order of these identified issues and respective sub-issues, BWM (Best Worst Method) is employed. Further, current work uses VIKOR (VlseKriterijumska Optimizacija I Kompromisno Resenje) to explore the ranks of the proposed solutions considering the issues under consideration. Current analysis indicates “Legislation” to remain the most important issue followed by “Environment.” Further, ‘Sensitising and training employees towards usage of fossil fuel-based technologies with no wastage or minimum wastage’ is observed as the most workable solution in the short-term. The solution “Switching to renewable energy sources” is ranked on the second position. Findings of current study carry significant informational content that may assist organizations in developing the strategic framework to achieving long-term sustainability. © 2023 Elsevier Ltd

This study aims to propose an integrative framework on data analytics in medium and small enterprise (MSME) with an in-depth systematic review of existing literature evidenced through empirical case studies. An exclusive systematic review on data analytics in MSME was conducted on published literature from 2010 to 2021 and examined 42 relevant research studies. Based on thematic analysis of 42 research articles, four broad themes were identified – drivers, inhibitors, analytics adoptions, and outcomes and consolidated in an integrative framework. The integrative framework was substantiated by evidence of two case studies from IT and manufacturing sector respectively. The unique approach synthesised the existing knowledge, proposed a framework for MSME, evidenced through case study and offered a scope to move forward and reflect backward in the research domain. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.

Purpose: Good earnings quality (EQ) provides reasonable assurance as to the reliability of future cash-flow generation capability of the borrowing firms and thereby mitigates the credit risk of the banks. Against the backdrop of the stressed-assets problem in public-sector banks in India, adversely impacting the public finance system, this paper aims to explore the role of EQ of the borrowers in obtaining bank credit and the ways to mitigate the problem. Design/methodology/approach: Using a sample of listed 3,486 non-financial and non-government firms, the authors apply Jones (1991) model to estimate their EQ. Then, the authors conduct Hausman’s (1970) test and find the existence of a two-way relation between bank finance and EQ. The authors adopt a two-stage least-square regression model to test the nature of the association between the two after controlling for firm and industry-level characteristics. Findings: The empirical results suggest that there exists a two-way negative association between EQ and bank finance implying that the Indian firms tend to report abnormal accruals to enhance tangibility for enjoying higher credit limits and easier access to bank finance. Also, the poor EQ is associated with earnings volatility, adversely impacting the credit quality. The findings are consistent. Practical implications: The study highlights the role of EQ in mitigating credit risk and addressing adverse selection problems in granting credit by practicing bankers. Originality/value: The findings of the study enrich the literature on EQ, capital structure, agency theory and public finance in several ways and have significant ethical and policy implications in bank-finance-led economies. © 2021, Emerald Publishing Limited.