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Volume II, Issue 1(3), 2026
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Mergers and acquisitions are noteworthy corporate strategic measure that assists the merged entity in external growth and afford it competitive advantage. The study tries to evaluate methodically the consequence of merger of United Western Bank along with Industrial Development Bank of India in 2006 and subsequent merger of IDBI bank with LIC of India in 2019 on their financial performance in terms of different financial parameters for the period from 2004-05 to 2024-25 dividing the entire period into two phases. Most of the financial indicators of Industrial Development Bank of India (IDBI) after undergoing merger with United Western Bank (UWB) in 2006 and LIC of India in 2019 exhibit noteworthy progress in their outfitted performance during post-merger period.
Post-merger regression analysis suggests that impact of management quality, capital adequacy and sensitivity to interest rate risk on profitability (ROA) parameter have improved much in comparison with entire study period’s regression analysis (both pre- and post-merger taken together) in both mergers. It can be inferred from the regression analysis that merger of these above two banks and subsequently with LIC has significant impact on earning capabilities of the Bidder Bank (IDBI) in terms of creating synergy through augmented managerial efficiency and subsequently by capital adequacy and non-interest income related sensitivity.
© The Author(s) 2026. Published by RITHA Publishing. This article is distributed under the terms of the license CC-BY 4.0., which permits any further distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited maintaining attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and URL DOI.
Article’s history: Received 22nd of December, 2025; Revised 17th of January, 2026; Accepted for publication 27th of January, 2026; Available online: 2nd of February, 2026; Published as research article in Volume II, Issue 1(3), 2026.
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Why do some developing countries sustain coherent institutional trajectories over long periods, while others cycle between reform, crisis, and incomplete recovery? Conventional measures of institutional quality emphasize levels of democracy, governance, or rule of law, yet they struggle to explain why countries with similar scores exhibit sharply different patterns of institutional persistence and rupture. This article advances a structural perspective on institutional stability, conceptualizing institutions as interdependent subsystems whose coherence, or misalignment, shapes long-run developmental trajectories.
To operationalize this framework, the article introduces the Institutional Regime Stability Index (IRSI), a dynamic measure that captures the persistence of coherent institutional configurations rather than static institutional levels. Using comparative data for nine Latin American countries between 1900 and 2024, the analysis identifies three recurrent patterns of institutional development: resilient coherence, adaptive stability, and recurrent misalignment. Higher IRSI values are systematically associated with lower GDP growth volatility and greater capacity to attract foreign direct investment, linking institutional coherence to economic risk and policy credibility. By reframing institutional stability as a property of systemic coherence, the IRSI offers a new comparative lens for analysing development and institutional change.
© The Author(s) 2026. Published by RITHA Publishing. This article is distributed under the terms of the license CC-BY 4.0., which permits any further distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited maintaining attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and URL DOI.
Article’s history: Received 5th of January, 2026; Revised 10th of February, 2026; Accepted for publication 22nd of February, 2026; Available online: 6th of March, 2026; Published as research article in Volume II, Issue 1(3), 2026.
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Government fiscal health is intrinsically linked to the cyclic regularity of national economic activity. However, fiscal management can be stabilised if the underlying governance framework maintains consistency in economic and social policy implementation. This study analyses the fiscal management of the South Korean government with a specific focus on the composite index of business indicators. The research explores the important role of strategic policy alignment in maintaining fiscal sustainability, evaluating production activity performance in the context of national finance. The study utilises longitudinal trends from South Korea to assess how fiscal management adapts to business cycle indicators. Findings suggest that proactive and consistent policy governance reduces the need for disruptive fiscal adjustments during economic downturns. The research provides actionable insights for policymakers regarding the integration of business cycle signals into long-term national financial governance.
© The Author(s) 2026. Published by RITHA Publishing. This article is distributed under the terms of the license CC-BY 4.0., which permits any further distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited maintaining attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and URL DOI.
Article’s history: Received 7th of January, 2026; Revised 2nd of February, 2026; Accepted for publication 17th of February, 2026; Available online: 6th of March, 2026; Published as research article in Volume II, Issue 1(3), 2026.
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This study investigates the complex relationship between migrant remittances and sustainable economic development in Nigeria by disaggregating progress into Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and the Human Development Index (HDI). Adopting a longitudinal lens from 1994 - 2023, the research unpacks the "Remittance-Development Paradox" using an Auto-Regressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) model. Empirical results reveal a statistically significant long-run negative effect of remittances on the composite Economic Development Index (ECD) and HDI, suggesting that dollar inflows have failed to catalyse sustainable human capital gains. While foreign direct investment shows positive developmental potential, the paradox persists due to structural inefficiencies and consumption-heavy remittance patterns.
The findings challenge the traditional narrative of remittance-led prosperity and emphasize the need for sustainability-focused policies that redirect inflows into productive social investments. The study provides a critical research agenda for aligning financial inflows with the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in sub-Saharan Africa.
© The Author(s) 2026. Published by RITHA Publishing. This article is distributed under the terms of the license CC-BY 4.0., which permits any further distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited maintaining attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and URL DOI.
Article’s history: Received 3rd of February, 2026; Revised 21st of March, 2026; Accepted for publication 29th of March, 2026; Available online: 7th of April, 2026; Published as research article in Volume II, Issue 1(3), 2026.
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This paper develops an adaptive Hamilton-filter framework for detecting speculative bubbles in exchange rate markets. With the reformulation of the traditional bubble-crash model through a binary transformation, the proposed approach expresses bubble dynamics within a nonlinear regime-switching structure and derives recursive estimates of bubble continuation probabilities. Unlike conventional explosive root tests, the method provides real-time, time-varying conditional probabilities of speculative regimes.
The empirical application focuses on the USD - Iranian Rial exchange rate over the period 2000–2020, examining six episodes of heightened volatility. Bubble detection results are compared with ADF, SADF, and GSADF tests, showing that the proposed filter effectively identifies multiple rational bubble episodes consistent with macroeconomic and policy developments. Additional analysis of tradable and non-tradable goods prices suggests that external-sector imbalances significantly contribute to exchange rate explosiveness. Overall, the findings demonstrate that the adaptive Hamilton-filter approach offers a robust and economically interpretable tool for real-time bubble monitoring and exchange rate risk assessment.
© The Author(s) 2026. Published by RITHA Publishing. This article is distributed under the terms of the license CC-BY 4.0., which permits any further distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited maintaining attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and URL DOI.
Article’s history: Received 11th of February, 2026; Revised 24th of March, 2026; Accepted for publication 31st of March, 2026; Available online: 7th of April, 2026; Published as research article in Volume II, Issue 1(3), 2026.
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The overarching research question that the article sought to address is “How is the social-economic value of cooperatives recapitulated in the typical sub-Saharan African rural contexts?” The recapitulation would improve the analytical understanding of the core social-economic values of cooperatives in rural contexts of Sub-Saharan Africa as it is generally observed that the public social-economic establishments such as credit facility systems, social protection programs, inter alia, are generally and phenomenally unimpressive in most Sub-Saharan African’s villages. Such gap renders the socio-economic dilemma for the rural Sub-Saharan communities. In this case, cooperatives, as community member-based institutions, are the alternative socio-economic mechanisms for scores of people almost exclusive in rural Sub-Saharan Africa. Thus, having mitigative impact on the vagary of poverty, bearing in mind that poverty is a “predominant phenomenon” across the spectrum of villages of Sub-Saharan Africa.
© The Author(s) 2026. Published by RITHA Publishing. This article is distributed under the terms of the license CC-BY 4.0., which permits any further distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited maintaining attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and URL DOI.
Article’s history: Received 16th of March, 2026; Revised 29th of April, 2026; Accepted for publication 9th of May, 2026; Available online: 15th of May, 2026; Published as research article in Volume II, Issue 1(3), 2026.
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This paper analyses the determinants of youth graduate unemployment in Tunisia by combining classical econometric methods (logistic regression) with three machine learning algorithms (Random Forest, XGBoost, RBF-kernel SVM) applied to an original survey of 1,200 Tunisian graduates. The econometric results reveal that female gender, belonging to the engineering field, and education-employment mismatch both vertical (overqualification) and horizontal (field misalignment) are the most significant determinants. The machine learning analysis confirms the predominance of gender and uncovers non-linear interactions: the protective effect of engineering is significantly attenuated for women, revealing that the gender gap persists even in high-demand fields. A feature importance plot derived from XGBoost quantifies each variable's contribution, making the transition from predictive modelling to policy governance more transparent. XGBoost and SVM offer the best predictive performance, outperforming logistic regression on F1-score and AUC-ROC. These findings call for targeted policies against gender discrimination, differentiated reform of the university curriculum, and improved recruitment transparency.
© The Author(s) 2026. Published by RITHA Publishing. This article is distributed under the terms of the license CC-BY 4.0., which permits any further distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited maintaining attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and URL DOI.
Article’s history: Received 19th of March, 2026; Revised 24th of April, 2026; Accepted for publication 6th of May, 2026; Available online: 15th of May, 2026; Published as research article in Volume II, Issue 1(3), 2026.
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This article examines the effects of financial development on multidimensional poverty in 35 Sub-Saharan African countries over the period 2006–2020. Using two-stage least squares and instrumental-variables quantile regression, the results show that financial development reduces multidimensional poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), and that this effect varies across the distribution of multidimensional poverty. The results also indicate that countries receiving higher levels of FDI are likely to see their multidimensional poverty decline as a result of financial sector development. However, the effects of financial development and FDI on poverty are influenced by institutional quality. Corruption limits their impact, thereby exacerbating poverty.
These findings confirm the central role of financial development and FDI as levers for improving the living conditions of vulnerable populations in developing countries. These findings thus call on policymakers to encourage FDI and stimulate financial sector development in order to reduce multidimensional poverty in SSA. They also recommend prioritizing improvements to governance and anti-corruption mechanisms. Public authorities should improve transparency in the allocation of funds and foreign investment, strengthen the independence of oversight institutions, and ensure the effective enforcement of contracts. These improvements to the institutional framework would help channel financial flows and FDI towards productive and inclusive sectors, thereby ensuring a more equitable redistribution of growth gains and an effective reduction in poverty.
© The Author(s) 2026. Published by RITHA Publishing. This article is distributed under the terms of the license CC-BY 4.0., which permits any further distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited maintaining attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and URL DOI.
Article’s history: Received 4th of April, 2026; Revised 19th of May, 2026; Accepted for publication 29th of May, 2026; Available online: 5th of June, 2026; Published as research article in Volume II, Issue 1(3), 2026.
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The state of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, implemented four behavioural experiments aimed at improving tax compliance. This study contributes to the literature by examining multiple behavioural tax programs, providing a longitudinal assessment of citizen engagement. It highlights changes in citizen engagement in the Tax Education Program, focusing on the evolution of new subscribers and their relationship with the implementation of innovative projects. We estimate time-series regression models for new subscribers between November 2012 and May 2023, including specifications with and without structural breaks. The key moment corresponds to the launch of Devolve-ICMS and Receita Certa, with a 635% increase in new subscribers. Inflation showed a small negative impact. The results suggest that reductions in the value of rewards and low-value incentives negatively affected engagement, while initiatives providing direct and visible financial returns to citizens, reinforcing perceptions of fairness and reciprocity, had particularly strong effects on engagement.
© The Author(s) 2026. Published by RITHA Publishing. This article is distributed under the terms of the license CC-BY 4.0., which permits any further distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited maintaining attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and URL DOI.
Article’s history: Received 21st of April, 2026; Revised 31st of May, 2026; Accepted for publication 9th of June, 2026; Available online: 15th of June, 2026; Published as research article in Volume II, Issue 1(3), 2026.
