Arab Economic and Business Journal最新文献

The following paper aims at identifying whether several factors such as credit rating, liquidity, financial leverage, sales growth, company size, and average tax rates participate in determining the profitability of listed companies. This study adopted multiple regression analysis to measure the impact of the variables on profitability. The results have shown that the precedent variables explain 26.4% and 31.4% of ROA and ROE variations, respectively at a 5% significance level. Many researchers have deliberated about this subject; however, the uniqueness of this study is the assessment of credit ratings as a factor in explaining profitability of listed companies.

Intense competition and shifting loyalties in the Omani telecommunication sector are forcing companies to focus on service quality for increased customer satisfaction, customer loyalty, and organizational profitability. This study assesses the service quality for two major telecommunication companies – Omantel and Ooredoo – in the Sultanate of Oman using the SERVQUAL model and tests the effect of five SERVQUAL dimensions on the attitudinal loyalty of customers. The analysis of data using the partial least squared (PLS) based Structural Equation Modeling technique reveals a positive effect of reliability and assurance dimensions on attitudinal loyalty. However, the outcomes do not reflect any significant effect of tangibles, responsiveness, and empathy on attitudinal loyalty. The multi-group analysis does not reveal any significant difference between the Ooreedoo and Omantel customers pertaining to the effect of the SERVQUAL dimensions on attitudinal loyalty. Whilst the study reveals the significance of reliability and assurance dimensions in affecting attitudinal loyalty of telecom customers for the long-term profitability, it also indicates the possibility of tangibles, responsiveness, and empathy in affecting behavioral loyalty to prevent customers’ switching in the short-run. By positioning their service quality focus on reliability and assurance, telecom companies can secure a higher attitudinal loyalty and profitability in the long term.

We present the concept of multi-specialization for those building careers, which refers to workers becoming very familiar with two or three fields of knowledge. This requires a compromise between individual capacity and individual learning needs and also means that workers will need to maintain or achieve higher levels of productivity, ensuring or enhancing social welfare. Taking into account the differences between this concept and the traditional concepts of single-field specialization, we were able to uncover and highlight several positive possible results that many workers expect to experience when adopting this work perspective and, at the same time, to hear their concerns. A questionnaire and a set of interviews allow us to understand the individual experiences of those studied in this context.

The present study is conducted to find out the difference between the two areas of banking, that is, Islamic and conventional banking with respect to profitability, efficiency and liquidity. The secondary data from banks of each banking sector is taken for assessment. Ratio analysis and one sample t-test is applied to determine the characteristics of study respondents and regression analysis is applied to examine the difference in term of significant factors that influence customer trust of Islamic banks and commercial banks. The results of the study oppose many previous findings as the analysis shows that there is significant difference between the both types of banking for the variables under study. Moreover, influence of return on asset is more on customer trust for the study period (2013–2017) for the Islamic bank as compared to the conventional banking. The study also examines the significant factors that are important for growth of Islamic banking.

The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of social engagement, the concern for sustainable tourism, the exemplarity of public power on responsible behaviour of tourist, and the effect of the responsible behaviour on the choice destination. A 544 questionnaires were completed and structural equation modeling with AMOS was used to test the hypothesis. The findings highlight a positive effect of the determinants studied on responsible behavior of the tourist. It is only the concern with sustainable tourism what has no significant effect on the responsible behavior. Otherwise, the effect of responsible behavior of tourist on the choice of destination is positive.

It has been known with time that no single transmission mechanism is enough to understand the monetary policy stance of that country. The objective of this paper is combine two transmission channel, interest rate and exchange rate so as to construct monetary condition index (MCI) for the gulf countries, namely Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates, so as to forecast its impact on CPI and GDP and to suggest policymakers regarding the monetary policy of the gulf countries. For this purpose, the paper applies Principal Component Analysis and Vector Auto-Regression method to construct MCI and to analyze its impulse response on CPI and GDP. This paper concludes that MCI can be used as an indicator to predict CPI and GDP of Bahrain and Qatar in long run and as an indicator to predict the GDP of Oman in medium and long run but it cannot be used as an indicator to predict CPI and GDP of Kuwait and KSA. Furthermore, this paper also concludes that strong monetary policy is needed to strengthen their economic condition.

This paper tends to the effect of celebrity support to jewelry advertisements on the conduct of consumers, in particular on Lebanese females. The investigation is drawn closer from the point of view of the customer. It studies celebrity endorsement from pristine idea, speculations, efficiency, and presence in the jewelry industry. It additionally looks at customer perception, decision making process, and demeanor as all influenced by celebrity support. Underlying explicative models relating the latter factors are exhibited. Attractiveness of celebrity endorser infers advertisement recall and is sought to be associated to the consumer's intention to purchase. The relationship between the credibility of celebrity endorser and both consumer mark inclination and mentality is also examined. impact on customer's behavior relevant to advertisement recall and intention to buy. Mark inclination and mentality of the consumer are found to be negatively influenced by celebrity endorsement.

This study is aimed to explore the gender effects in the intention to adopt Islamic mobile banking. Data was analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM) methodology on 243 participants from Pakistan. In the findings, researchers identified two different models for intention to adopt Islamic mobile banking. It is inferred that males are more task driven and desire for personality, value and status, so their intention is significantly impacted by perceived usefulness and perceived self-expressiveness. Whereas, females have found lack of IT knowledge and trust, therefore, their intention is significantly impacted by perceived credibility. Further, the perceived financial cost was found of no concern for both males and females and social norms influenced the adoption but there existed no significant gender differences. Managerial and practical implications along with limitations and future research suggestions of the study are also discussed.

This study aims to clarify the mediation role played by the knowledge management processes in improving the organizational performance through the investment in the intellectual capital. In order to achieve this goal, we have suggested a model for the companies of the telecommunications sector in Algeria (which includes three operators: Mobilis, Djezzy and Ooredoo) wich is based on investment in intellectual capital with a view to improve their organizational performance in the context of the knowledge management.

To reach this goal, we have used the structural equations modeling according to the PLS-PM approach as a way to solve the issues of this study. The analysis of results shows that the human capital and relational capital have a positive and significant effect on improving knowledge management processes, which contribute effectively in developing the organizational performance. In addition, we found a positive contribution of structural capital but it was limited. Therefore, the study recommended that these companies must be improving their level of investment in structural capital through the development of the systems of creation and sharing of knowledge, which is reflected positively on organizational performance.

The paper aims to analyze the current account of the Saudi economy using an intertemporal modeling and tested by the structural VAR methodology. By deriving the long-run current account to GDP ratio, we analyze the impacts of global and local shocks on the current account. Considering that the Saudi economy is linked to international demand for oil products and domestic demand on consumer goods and technological products, the variances in the current account and output are inevitably influenced by international shocks. The findings indicate that the long-run impact of local shocks on the current account variance exceeds by 3.92 percent its impact on the output variance, reflecting the explanation power of local dynamic shock on the current account growth. Most of the previous papers suggest that the local impact dominates the international one (Souki and Enders, 2008), and few papers advocate that the global impact exceeds the domestic effect Hoffmann (2013). The shocks analysis on the Saudi current account exhibits the relative dominance of the global markets shocks, but local and mainly supply shocks have significant impacts on the current account, referring to a dual local and global influence.