Mustafa Raza Rabbani

Purpose: This study aims to investigate the dynamic connectedness and risk transmission among FinTech, clean energy, Islamic, and traditional financial assets, with particular emphasis on their behavior under varying market conditions and crisis periods. Design/methodology/approach: This study uses conditional autoregressive value-at-risk, frequency connectedness, and wavelet local multiple correlation techniques to capture tail risk dynamics and time-frequency spillovers across asset classes. The analysis is conducted across multiple investment horizons, including daily, weekly, and monthly frequencies. Findings: The results reveal a high level of interconnectedness across all asset classes, as indicated by a substantial total connectedness index. Short-term spillovers dominate over medium- and long-term dynamics, suggesting rapid transmission of shocks. The findings further indicate that connectedness patterns intensify during periods of economic and geopolitical stress, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russia–Ukraine conflict. Islamic FinTech and Sukuk markets exhibit strong intraclass linkages and significant spillover effects with other financial assets. In addition, certain assets emerge as net risk transmitters, offering potential hedging and diversification benefits during crisis periods. Practical implications: The findings provide valuable insights for investors and portfolio managers to optimize asset allocation and design effective hedging strategies. Policymakers can benefit from understanding the propagation of systemic risk to enhance financial stability frameworks, particularly in Islamic financial systems. Originality/value: This study contributes to the literature by jointly examining FinTech, clean energy, and Islamic and traditional financial assets within a unified framework using advanced tail risk and frequency-domain methodologies. It offers novel insights into the evolving interconnectedness of Islamic and global financial markets.

Purpose: This study aims to examine the dynamic relationship between conventional, Islamic and ESG stock returns, and various financial, non-financial and policy-related uncertainties. Additionally, the study examines the hedging potential and interconnectedness of these indices under varying market conditions. Design/methodology/approach: The study uses a novel method of quantile coherency, introduced by Baruník and Kley (2019), which facilitates in-depth analysis of the dependence structure across quantiles and frequencies. It enables the identification of co-movement patterns among stock returns and uncertainty measures in both standard and extreme market conditions. Additionally, this study uses impulse response functions and dynamic conditional correlation (DCC)-GJR-GARCH approaches for robustness. Findings: The results indicate a positive connection between the returns of these stock indices and non-financial uncertainty, particularly in the extreme low and high quantiles over yearly periods, highlighting the effective hedging capability of different stock indices against geopolitical risks. Regarding policy-related uncertainty, the authors observe a significant positive correlation between these stock indices and economic policy uncertainty, particularly at the monthly frequency during bearish market conditions. Furthermore, most conventional, Islamic and ESG stock returns exhibit a negative correlation with financial uncertainties, indicating a lack of effectiveness in hedging against crude oil volatility and implied stock volatility. The robustness of these findings is checked by time-varying correlation (DCC-GJR-GARCH) analysis. Originality/value: The results have significant implications for investors, portfolio managers, and policymakers, particularly those seeking to construct a portfolio suitable for all market conditions. This study is among the first to apply quantile coherency analysis to explore how Islamic, ESG and conventional stock markets respond to a broad spectrum of uncertainties.

The topic of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) controversies has gained momentum among shareholders, creditors, and other stakeholder groups. However, prior literature in this field is silent on how ESG controversies influence managers' decisions regarding goodwill impairments. Against this backdrop, this research empirically examines the association between ESG controversies and goodwill impairment losses, considering the interacting role of corporate investment opportunities (IOS). Drawing on sociopolitical and signaling theories, we formulate and test our hypotheses using Tobit and Logit regression models with a panel dataset obtained from the Refinitiv Eikon database to analyze European firms between 2008 and 2022. Results confirm that ESG controversies are positively and significantly related to both the decision and the magnitude of goodwill impairments. Notably, this positive relation is less pronounced for firms with greater investment opportunities, suggesting that managers in these firms are less likely to impair goodwill during controversies, perhaps to communicate private information on firms' future performance. These results are robust in terms of an alternative measure of IOS and endogeneity. Our results enrich the discourse on the economic implications of corporate controversies, thereby helping to address a critical knowledge gap in ESG literature.

As green finance increasingly depends on comparable climate-related information across borders, rising regulatory fragmentation and geopolitical strain may alter how climate risks are reflected in market communication. This study examines how ESG-specific uncertainty (ESGUI) shapes firms’ market-perceived climate change exposure in a global sample of non-financial firms from 25 countries over 2002–2023. Using fixed-effects panel regressions complemented by dynamic two-step GMM estimators, we document a robust negative association between ESGUI and climate-related disclosure and attention in earnings calls, indicating that heightened uncertainty dampens the prominence of climate issues in market participant discussions. Employing the Paris Agreement as a policy breakpoint, we further show that firms’ responses to ESG uncertainty differ before and after 2015, highlighting the role of international policy coordination in shaping information environments. Heterogeneity analyses indicate that the dampening effect of ESG uncertainty is stronger for firms with higher trade exposure and for firms operating in emerging economies, underscoring the importance of cross-border integration and institutional constraints under fragmented regulatory regimes. Overall, the findings provide new evidence on how ESG uncertainty transmits into climate-related information flows under strained globalization, with implications for information comparability, investor decision-making, and the effectiveness of green finance.

Purpose : This study investigated the spillover effect and dynamic interconnectedness among green, clean, and sustainable markets. It identified the markets that are key transmitters and receivers, and it offered insights for investors and policymakers to optimize portfolio strategies and regulatory measures. Design/Methodology/Approach : The study employed the DY and BK models to analyze time frequency spillovers. Using the daily data, spillover was assessed across three time horizons that is short term (1–4 days), medium term (4–10 days), and long term (more than 10 days) to understand risk transmission. Findings : The results revealed that clean energy markets were the strongest transmitters of shocks, particularly in the medium and long terms; whereas, sustainable markets came out to be the largest receiver of shocks, with the highest vulnerability in the long term. Green Bonds (GB) and Carbon markets exhibited moderate spillover. Short-term spillover offered diversification opportunities; however, long-term spillovers were significant for risk mitigation. Practical Implication : Investors are recommended to balance their exposure between high-transmitting (clean energy) and high-receiving (sustainable market). This helps to optimize the risk-adjusted returns. GB are suitable for hedging as short-term spillovers offer better diversification opportunities. Originality/Value : The study contributed to existing financial research by analyzing volatility spillover among green, clean energy, and sustainable markets. Markets choose and use advanced econometric tools to provide a time–frequency-based risk assessment to investors and policymakers.