• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.8 no.9
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• pp.189-199
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• 2021

This study attempts to examine the relationship between corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure and earnings management practices in the context of Saudi Arabia after mandatory IFRS adoption. It is carried out on an unbalanced panel of 277 observations over the period 2017-2019. For this purpose, CSR disclosure is measured by Bloomberg ESG scores, while the residuals from the modified Jones model are considered for earnings management. As control variables, we have retained the firm performance, market-to-book ratio, firm size, financial leverage, board independence, ownership concentration, managerial ownership, and lagged discretionary accruals. Using the system GMM estimator in the dynamic panel, the results show a positive association between CSR disclosure and earnings management practices, thus supporting the perspective of agency theory. Managers engage in socially responsible activities beforehand to conceal their wrongdoing and convince stakeholders that the organization is transparent. They probably use ethical codes as a tool to achieve their own goals rather than the firm's goals. Our contribution is the use of recent data (2017-2019) taking into account the mandatory adoption of IFRS in Saudi Arabia. Additionally, to our knowledge, this study is the first to address CSR disclosure and earnings management practices using GMM system estimates.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.8 no.3
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• pp.1171-1180
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• 2021

This study aims to investigate the impact of the multimarket contract on risk-adjusted profitability. Risk-adjusted profitability is measured in terms of risk-adjusted return on assets. This study employs dynamic panel data of 27 commercial banks in Vietnam using the GMM estimator to test the multimarket contact hypothesis in the Vietnamese banking sector. The results show that there is a negative impact of multimarket contact on the profitability of banks. Multimarket contact, deposit to asset ratio, non-interest income to total income, GDP growth rate, Worldwide Governance Indicator (WGI), and operating cost to assets are the major determinants of risk-adjusted profitability of commercial banks. Our main findings show that Vietnamese banks' focus to increase the multimarket contact may lead to lower profitability and there is evidence that supports theory predictions, since the average number of contacts among banks, bank size, and capitalization are positively related to risk-adjusted profitability. The study has policy implications for commercial banks in that they should not only focus on interest as a source of income and diversify their income source from non-interest income as well since it helps to improve risk-adjusted profitability for them.

• International Journal of Computer Science & Network Security
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.181-187
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• 2021

The purpose of this study is to examine empirically the short- and long-run determinants of entrepreneurial activity in a sample of 15 the Middle East and North African economies between 2006 and 2018. More specifically, four groups of determinants are considered in the analysis, namely economic, demographic, business environment, and institutional. Given the autoregressive feature of the entrepreneurial activity process, a dynamic panel data model is estimated using the system GMM estimator. Findings reveal that unemployment, trade openness, population density, and economic freedom are the main drivers of new business creation in the short-run, while the cost and number of procedures to start a new business negatively affect entrepreneurship. In the long-run, the same findings hold true. Moreover, education and political stability and the absence of violence/terrorism positively affect entrepreneurial activity. Policy recommendations are accordingly designed.

• Journal of Convergence for Information Technology
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• v.7 no.6
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• pp.159-166
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• 2017

In this paper, we have experimented to improve the verification performance of speaker change detection on broadcast news. It is to enhance the input noisy speech and to apply the KL distance $D_s$ using the SNR-based weighting function $w_m$. The basic experimental system is the verification system of speaker change using GMM-UBM based KL distance D(Experiment 0). Experiment 1 applies the input noisy speech enhancement using MMSE Log-STSA. Experiment 2 applies the new KL distance $D_s$ to the system of Experiment 1. Experiments were conducted under the condition of 0% MDR in order to prevent missing information of speaker change. The FAR of Experiment 0 was 71.5%. The FAR of Experiment 1 was 67.3%, which was 4.2% higher than that of Experiment 0. The FAR of experiment 2 was 60.7%, which was 10.8% higher than that of experiment 0.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.7 no.7
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• pp.59-72
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• 2020

This paper examines whether lending structure can lower credit risk by employing econometric techniques of panel data for the Vietnamese banking system at the bank level used by economic sectors from 2011 to 2016. New light is being shed on assessing the impact of each industry's debt outstanding on credit risk. Adopting findings from previous studies, we assess credit risk from two different sources, including loan loss provision and non-performing loan. Moreover, we also focus on observing lending structure in many different aspects, from concentrative levels to the short-term and long-term stability levels of lending structure. The Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) estimator was applied to analyze the relationship between concentration and banking risks. In general, the results show that lending concentration may decrease credit risk. It is interesting to observe that the Vietnamese commercial bank lending portfolios have, on average, higher levels of diversity across different sectors. In particular, the increase in hotel and restaurant lending contributes to decrease credit risk while the lending portfolios of banks in agriculture, electricity, gas and water increase credit risk. This study suggests the need for further analysis and research about portfolio risks in lending activities for maintaining efficiency and stability in the commercial banking system.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.6 no.3
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• pp.67-79
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• 2019

This study examines the impact of corporate governance on capital structure decisions based on a large panel of Chinese listed firms. Using the system Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) estimator to control for unobserved heterogeneity, endogeneity, and persistency in capital structure decisions, we document that the ownership structure plays a significant role in determining leverage ratios. More specially, we find that managerial ownership has a positive and significant impact on firms' leverage, consistent with the incentive alignment hypothesis. We also find that managerial ownership only affects the leverage decisions of private firms in the post-2005 split share reform period. State ownership negatively influence leverage decisions implying that SOEs may face fewer restrictions in equity issuance and may receive favourable treatments when applying for seasoned equity ¿nancing, thus use less debt. Furthermore, our results show that while foreign ownership negatively influences leverage decisions, legal person shareholding positively influences firms' leverage decisions only for state controlled firms. We also find that the board structure variables (board size and the proportion of independent directors) do not influence firms' capital structure decisions. Our findings suggest that recent ownership reforms have been successful in terms of providing incentive to managers through managerial shareholdings to take risky financial choices.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.8 no.10
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• pp.373-383
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• 2021

This article aims to examine the one-way relationship between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and the financial performance of Vietnamese commercial banks, mainly focusing on the moderating role of ownership structure. Net interest margin (NIM), return on assets (ROA), and return on equity (ROE) are selected to represent the financial performance of the bank. CSR was measured using a multi-method approach that included both quantitative and qualitative methods. Corporate Social Responsibility Expenditure (CSRE) was estimated using financial data. The Corporate Social Responsibility Disclosure (CSRD) index was created using the content analysis method. Using a sample of Vietnamese commercial banks from 2012 to 2019 to perform regressions in the dynamic panel models with the two-step system generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator, the results show a positive effect of both CSRE and CSRD on the financial performance of the bank. Empirical evidence shows that the positive relationship between CSRE and financial performance is more robust in statecontrolled banks than non-state-controlled banks. In contrast, the positive impact of CSRD on the financial performance of state-owned commercial banks is weaker than that of private banks. Finally, the paper points out the limitations and proposes future research directions.