This study explores how global economic policy uncertainty (EPU) shocks comove with stock returns (SR) of eight African countries—Botswana, Ghana, Kenya, Morocco, Namibia, Nigeria, South Africa, and Zambia. The study employed daily data from December 2010 to December 2019 using wavelet coherence analysis. The results showed that global EPU comoves with most of the SR of African markets and was concentrated in the longer term, especially during the period between 2011 and 2019, although not substantially. The findings indicate that short-term investments in African stocks are less susceptible to global economic policy uncertainty. It is recommended that foreign investors could hedge agaist policy uncertainties by investing in stock listed in African Stock exchanges while appropriate country-level policies are deployed to manage long-term effect of EPU.

This paper employs the threshold cointegration methodology to assess the long- and short-run dynamics of asymmetric adjustment between economic policy uncertainty (EPU) of China-India, China-Japan, China-Korea, India-Japan, India-Korea, and Japan-Korea pairs using monthly EPU data ranging from January 1997 to April 2020. The relationship between the EPU pairs is examined in terms of Engle-Granger and threshold cointegrations. The findings provide evidence of long-run threshold cointegration and that the adjustments towards the long-run equilibrium position are asymmetric in the short run for the China-India and India-Japan EPU pairs in M-TAR specification with nonzero threshold values. Also, the results suggest a unidirectional causal relationship between China-India, China-Japan, and India-Korea EPU pairs in the long and short run using the spectral frequency domain causality approach. However, a bidirectional causal relationship between China-Korea, India-Japan, and Japan-Korea pairs exists in the long and short run. Therefore, the findings provide some clues to economic policymakers within the Asian subregion for possible policy uncertainty synergies and spillovers among the Asian countries.

The aim of this study was to investigate service quality delivery of rural banks in emerging economies from the customers' perspective. This study employed descriptive design. A questionnaire designed by the researchers was used to obtain data from 382 customers, using convenience sampling technique. Data were presented and analyzed using descriptive statistics which included frequencies, percentages, means and standard deviation. The study found that customers want rural banks in Takoradi to establish more convenient branches i.e. sub branches, outlets and further extend banking hours to resolve overcrowding at the banking halls. It was therefore recommended that management of these rural banks in Takoradi, Ghana should liaise with stakeholders to establish more branches in its catchment areas to ease the frequent congestion in the banking halls.

The purpose of this study was to analyse financial performance and liquidity trends of banks in the financial sector of Ghana. A review of literature on performance and liquidity was conducted owing to the challenges the banks are confronted with. The study analysed 180 annual reports of the banks during the periods 2006-2015. The analysis revealed that banks were relatively liquid in most of the study periods except in the years 2013 and 2014, where the average liquidity was 1.54 and 1.41 respectively. The highest liquidity of 2.183 was recorded in 2011, which indicates that Gh¢ 2.183 of current assets available covers Gh¢ 1 of current liabilities. The financial performance of the banks was fairly intermittent during the study periods. The lowest financial performance of the banks was recorded in the year 2006. An average financial performance of 6.74% and 0.83% for return on equity (ROE) and return asset on (ROA) respectively was recorded in 2006. While the year 2014 recorded the highest financial performance of 24.23% for return on equity and 4.57% for return on asset owing to favourable economic conditions in the country in that year. The study recommends that bank managers should adopt effective liquidity management to ensure the banks are operating profitably. Since it has been empirically proven that high liquidity rates will provide for better financial results.

This study sought to examine the reporting quality of financial institutions in Ghana after adopting International Financial Reporting Standard (IFRS) as its official national reporting standard. Using a fixed effect logistic regression, the study compares the earnings management of banks and insurance firms before and after IFRS adoption on reporting quality. The data used was drawn from 51 financial institutions made up of 23 universal banks and 28 insurance companies observed over the period 2003 to 2014. The empirical results indicate that financial institutions exhibit more earnings management during the post-adoption era which is interpreted as a decline in the quality of financial reporting among financial institutions in Ghana. The results documented in this study add to the dearth of literature and contributes to the debate on IFRS adoption and its related impact on reporting quality (earnings management) among financial institutions from the perspective of an emerging market. The study is unique in the sense that it includes the insurance industry where the literature is largely silent especially, on the impact of IFRS adoption by countries on the African continent. Furthermore, unlike previous studies, this paper considers both listed and non-listed firms.