{"title":"Labor protection policy and firm markup: Evidence from the implementation of the China social insurance law","authors":"Zhiwei Yang , Jiahui Yang , Wei Wang","doi":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107623","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107623","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The implementation of China’s Social Insurance Law (SIL) has led to changes in the standardization of social insurance premium collection and administration and the establishment of an important labor protection policy. This study examines the effects of SIL on Chinese firms’ markup. This study employs a difference-in-differences model using China-specific data to analyze the contribution of social insurance premium collection to firm markup following the SIL implementation. Our findings indicate that enhancing managers’ long-term philosophy and optimizing capital allocation contribute to this effect. Furthermore, our heterogeneity analyses reveal that the relationship between SIL and markup is more pronounced among non-state enterprises, central and western regions, and industries with low fiscal pressure. Our findings offer policymakers valuable insights into how labor protection policies influence markups in emerging market countries.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":12167,"journal":{"name":"Finance Research Letters","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 107623"},"PeriodicalIF":7.4,"publicationDate":"2025-05-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144167358","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Dynamic connectedness between oil shocks and BRICS stock markets","authors":"Walid Mensi , Rim El Khoury , Sang Hoon Kang","doi":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107601","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107601","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study explores the dynamic relationships between oil shocks and the BRICS stock markets (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) using a novel R<sup>2</sup> decomposed connectedness framework to quantify both contemporaneous and lagged spillovers. It differentiates between the immediate and delayed effects of demand, supply, and risk-driven shocks. Our findings show that total connectedness is heterogeneous over time and dependent on economic events, with contemporaneous effects more pronounced on average. Risk shocks emerged as primary volatility transmitters during global crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic, influencing markets almost immediately. Lagged spillovers are observed, indicating delayed market responses to the initial shocks. The role of BRICS nations as net receivers or transmitters is shaped by their economic characteristics and shocks. This study highlights the need for tailored policy responses to manage the impact of oil price volatility on emerging markets, considering both immediate and long-term effects.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":12167,"journal":{"name":"Finance Research Letters","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 107601"},"PeriodicalIF":7.4,"publicationDate":"2025-05-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144177645","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"When geopolitical risks hit the supply chain: Impacts on credit default swap market","authors":"Yin-Siang Huang","doi":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107622","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107622","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study examines the impact of cost-weighted geopolitical risk exposure in the supply chains of U.S. firms. Using a Difference-in-Differences (DiD) framework centered on the Russo-Ukrainian War, we find that treated firms experience a significant increase in credit default swap (CDS) spreads. In addition, these firms exhibit higher default probabilities and lower credit ratings, reflecting heightened financial vulnerability. These findings underscore the need for incorporating supply chain geopolitical risk metrics into credit risk assessments by policymakers and financial analysts, especially during periods of geopolitical uncertainty.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":12167,"journal":{"name":"Finance Research Letters","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 107622"},"PeriodicalIF":7.4,"publicationDate":"2025-05-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144167353","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Where to draw the line in prudential policy? Insights into banking stability and risk tolerance","authors":"Petr Jakubik , Bogdan Gabriel Moinescu","doi":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107609","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107609","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study estimates the natural rate of bank defaults, the threshold below which systemic banking crises are unlikely, using a threshold model based on bank default rates and macroeconomic indicators. Analyzing global data from major crises over the past 40 years, we identify a critical default rate of 0.25 %, equivalent to one default per 400 banks annually. Aligned with a 'BBB' rating, this benchmark supports the calibration of supervisory risk tolerance frameworks. Moreover, the study provides a replicable, data-driven approach to prudential policy design, linking acceptable bank failure frequency to key macroeconomic variables, especially inflation indicators.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":12167,"journal":{"name":"Finance Research Letters","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 107609"},"PeriodicalIF":7.4,"publicationDate":"2025-05-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144167342","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The impact of wildfire smoke on carbon-intensive stocks","authors":"Tatiana Salikhova","doi":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107620","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107620","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>We show that carbon-intensive firms experienced significant negative cumulative abnormal returns when the historically unprecedented haze from Canadian wildfires reached the New York City area in June 2023. Our findings cannot be explained by energy price shocks, negative productivity effects of air pollution, aversion to highly polluting industries, or concurrent political events. Our results indicate that firsthand exposure to wildfire haze possibly altered the beliefs of non-institutional investors, leading them to discount carbon-intensive stocks.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":12167,"journal":{"name":"Finance Research Letters","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 107620"},"PeriodicalIF":7.4,"publicationDate":"2025-05-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144168030","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Cybersecurity governance and corporate innovation: evidence from China","authors":"Jing Xu","doi":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107619","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107619","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Cybersecurity governance is a momentous pillar for firms to cope with digital risks in the digital era. This paper combines machine learning and text analysis to measure firm cybersecurity governance level and empirically examines its impact on corporate innovation. The empirical results suggest that cybersecurity governance significantly promotes corporate innovation through channels such as improving corporate reputation, reducing precautionary saving, and increasing risk-taking preference. Moreover, the promotion effect is more significant in small, non-state-owned firms, high-tech intensive industries, and firms located in regions with high digital economy development level. This study provides empirical evidence and decision-making references for firms and authorities to proactively carry out cybersecurity governance.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":12167,"journal":{"name":"Finance Research Letters","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 107619"},"PeriodicalIF":7.4,"publicationDate":"2025-05-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144167349","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Non-response bias in expectation surveys: Different perceptions and expectations of financial matters from “early quitters”","authors":"Ruichen Huang","doi":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107624","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107624","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study demonstrates that non-response bias drives selective sample attrition in expectation surveys that require consecutive household responses. Examining 160,842 responses from 20,963 respondents in the Survey of Consumer Expectations (SCE) from June 2013 to April 2024, I show that 66.1 % of respondents who quit the consecutive survey before the completion of 12 tenures—the early quitters—only contributed 44.6 % of total responses. On average, they are 3.2 years younger, have a 5.14 % higher proportion of females, and exhibit lower numerical ability and education level than other respondents. I construct a regression model to demonstrate that early quitters possess significantly different perceptions and expectations regarding personal, household, and national financial and economic matters when responding to SCE. Notably, the early quitters have more positive expectations regarding changes in their financial situation for the next year. They exhibit more negative perceptions of changes in loan difficulty in the U.S. over the past year and hold more pessimistic expectations for changes in loan difficulty in the U.S. for the next year. They anticipate a higher probability of an increased unemployment rate in the U.S. for the next year. All the above results are irrespective of whether the regressions are unweighted or weighted. The non-response bias renders the survey data ungeneralizable, and the weighting applied by SCE does not solve this bias.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":12167,"journal":{"name":"Finance Research Letters","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 107624"},"PeriodicalIF":7.4,"publicationDate":"2025-05-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144167350","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Does biodiversity attention affect risk spillover in the AFHF sectors?—Evidence from Chinese stock markets","authors":"Min Zhang, Guorong Chen, Jing Deng","doi":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107522","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107522","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study constructs a China Biodiversity Attention Index (BAI) and examines its impact on the spillover effects among agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry, and fishery (AFHF) sectors. Using the quantile connectivity approach, we estimate cross-sector risk spillovers among these sectors. The findings reveal that increased attention to biodiversity following the release of the Kunming Declaration reduces the total spillover effects among these sectors. Furthermore, employing the GARCH-MIDAS model, we demonstrate that attention to biodiversity mitigates the total spillover of the AFHF sectors during extreme upward movements; however, its impact on the risk spillover of the four specific sectors varies.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":12167,"journal":{"name":"Finance Research Letters","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 107522"},"PeriodicalIF":7.4,"publicationDate":"2025-05-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144134442","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"China’s financial reform and high-quality export development: A dual-margin perspective","authors":"Yuanming Ren , Xinyu Zhan , Jingyi Gao","doi":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107612","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107612","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study explores how China’s distinctive financial reforms shape firm-level export dynamics along the extensive and intensive margins. Using integrated firm-bank matched datasets and instrumental variables based on Postal Savings Bank of China reforms, we find that optimizing banking sector structure significantly promotes firms’ exports along the extensive margin, while restraining growth along the intensive margin. These effects are driven by alleviating financing constraints and boosting innovation, particularly for small and medium enterprises. The results highlight the critical role of joint-stock and city commercial banks in driving export upgrading. This research offers policy insights for developing countries on coordinating financial reforms with export growth.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":12167,"journal":{"name":"Finance Research Letters","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 107612"},"PeriodicalIF":7.4,"publicationDate":"2025-05-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144137819","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The attention of the Fed","authors":"Nathan Goldstein","doi":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107561","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.frl.2025.107561","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This paper proposes a simple measure of the Fed's inattention to incoming information, based on the persistence of disagreement between the Fed and professional forecasters. I document a substantial degree of persistent disagreement over time and across variables, typically exceeding half. At a short horizon, there is also evidence of a significant attention advantage of the Fed over professional forecasters. Both the level of attention and the attention advantage are cyclical and tend to increase during periods of monetary easing, thus highlighting the state dependency of the information channel in monetary policy.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":12167,"journal":{"name":"Finance Research Letters","volume":"82 ","pages":"Article 107561"},"PeriodicalIF":7.4,"publicationDate":"2025-05-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144137817","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}