The global financial crisis has reignited interest in models of crisis prediction. It has also raised the question whether financial interconnectedness -- a possible source of systemic risk -- can serve as an early warning indicator of crises. In this paper we examine the ability of connectedness in the global network of financial linkages to predict systemic banking crises during the 1978-2010 period. Our results indicate that increases in a country's

We examine the causal impact of the 2002-2007 civil conflict in Cote d'Ivoire on children's health using household surveys collected before, during, and after the conflict, and information on the exact location and date of conflict events. Our identification strategy relies on exploiting both temporal and spatial variation across birth cohorts to measure children's exposure to the conflict. We find that children from regions more affected by the

Unlike the open competition economic sectors where tens, hundreds or even thousands of companies ‘struggle’ to provide consumers not only with services but also with special utility, the regulated markets (power supply, public transportation, public safety etc.) are dominated by a limited number of service providers. Sometimes the situation is pushed to the point where a few companies ‘control’ the market and set the prices. Although the

Developing businesses in compliance with the principles of sustainability has been a tough challenge in our century. A planned, integrated and properly coordinated orientation towards environment protection, involvement in activities of society and local communities, supporting and streamlining its own economic activities are the core elements whereby a business can obtain long-term harmonious development, a synergic evolution and a competitive advantage.

A key challenge in the 21st century is identifying how to satisfy consumers’ needs in the best manner possible, whilst ensuring companies’ financial profitability. Scientists play a major role in achieving this goal, as research methods, techniques and tools have continuously evolved. In the last two decades, the development of these instruments has seen an important boost, as neuromarketing methods and techniques added depth and accuracy to

One of the major themes in the contemporary society—greatly affected by hyper-competition, globalization and rapid change in the behavior of demand agents (buyers)—consists of theoretical debates and practical challenges raised in relation to the concept of brand. There seems to be no clear-cut distinction, both in theory and particularly in practice, between brand, producer’s brand, dealer’s brand, store brand or corporate brand. Therefore,

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to emphasize the important but neglected role of retail formats in the transfer and positioning decisions of international retailers. The paper examines the role of core and country-specific attributes of particular formats in determining retailers’ local positioning in inter-format competition. Design/methodology/approach – Focussing on three distinguished grocery formats (i.e. discounters, supermarkets,