Orlando Arencibia Montero

Financial technology (fintech) innovations are transforming banking globally. Their adoption poses new opportunities and risks for Islamic banks with unique requirements. This study examines fintech’s implications for risk management effectiveness in United Arab Emirates Islamic banks. A conceptual model incorporates factors like fintech adoption, emerging capabilities, digital maturity, and IT security influencing outcomes. Primary data were collected via survey from nine UAE Islamic banks and analyzed using PLS-SEM. Results show that fintech adoption and capabilities positively impacted effectiveness, while digital transformation alone did not. The findings also show that the regulatory environment did not moderate relationships as hypothesized. The findings provide empirical evidence on optimizing risk management through responsible fintech enablement and oversight alignment in the UAE context.

La Descentralización Fiscal se ha convertido en una herramienta política, económica y social alrededor del mundo. Las transferencias de autoridad fiscal y recursos financieros a partir del gobierno central hacia los gobiernos subnacionales han forjado un camino seguro hacia el desarrollo. En el caso de Ecuador, a partir de la Constitución del 2008 se establecieron criterios para construir una nueva estructura política, administrativa y financiera, a través de la implementación de procesos descentralizadores. Por lo tanto, con base en la discusión teórica y empírica propuesta en la presente investigación, se ha planteado la hipótesis de que existe un impacto positivo de la descentralización fiscal en el desarrollo económico de Ecuador. Para el efecto, se ha realizado un análisis econométrico en Eviews 10, en un periodo de tiempo comprendido entre los años 2007-2015, sobre la base de un indicador económico propuesto para medir el crecimiento económico, denominado Valor Agregado Bruto, como variable dependiente, así también, un conjunto de indicadores considerados determinantes de descentralización fiscal, como variables independientes. Los datos obtenidos corresponden a 144 municipios, los resultados empíricos demuestran que existe un impacto positivo de la descentralización fiscal sobre el desarrollo económico de Ecuador.

The postwar Czechoslovakia needed to deal with a complex and urgent problem of rebuilding the destroyed industry after the Second World War. The complicated circumstances shortly after the war divided Europe into two antagonistic units. The former Czechoslovakia fell under the influence of the Soviet Union. Apart from the political and many other changes, the influence of this power also affected the style of the contemporary architecture. A new style called social realism (sorela) evolved and dominated also the culture and arts. The initial ornateness and exaggerated grandeur of the buildings gradually faded out due to economic reasons. The classical ornamental sorela is irregularly represented in many localities of the former Czechoslovakia. It takes form of discrete buildings or whole blocks. Among the most interesting and extensive units to house tens of thousands of citizens employed in mining and metallurgy, there are the buildings in Ostrava-Poruba and Havířov. The localities are nowadays conservation zones due to their significance.

Functionalist villa Tugendhat deserves to be one of the UNESCO heritage sites. The author of this building was a prominent German architect, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, who accepted the contract from Greta and Fritz Tugendhat. From today's perspective, this building is one of the most important pre-war works of this architect. The 1928 architectural design was subsequently very quickly completed and the construction was completed in 1930. The Tugendhat family lived in a villa until 1938. During World War II it was confiscated by German occupation forces. At the end of the war, it was used by the Red Army and later served for the state. During this period, this building did not avoid warfare or later destruction of both the building and parts of the facility. The importance of this building was recognized in 1969, when the villa was placed on the State List of Cultural Monuments. In the 80's was the first major renovation of the building, which is often criticized. The second, last reconstruction took place in the years 2010 - 2012. During these reconnaissance works there were also old, temporarily calming landslides, which were subsequently solved. For this reason, the site is suitable for geotourism as an example of architectural monuments versus geological subsoil.