Analyzing the Nexus Between Geopolitical Risk, Policy Uncertainty, and Tourist Arrivals: Evidence From the United States

Environmental impacts of international tourism: examining the role of policy uncertainty, renewable energy, and service sector output

The contributions of the tourism sector and its development to economic growth are widely recognized across the economies. However, development in this sector also has its impacts on environmental quality and sustainability. In addition, elevated economic policy uncertainty also has repercussions on the environment. The objective of this study is to examine the impact of international tourism on environmental sustainability while considering EPU, renewable energy consumption (REC), and service sector output (SSO) in the model estimated based on panel data from 17 economies. Having the heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation issues in the panel data, the author used multiple econometric methods (pooled OLS with Drisk/Kraay standard errors (DKSEs), GLS, PCSE, and quantile regressions) to examine the relationship between international tourism and environmental sustainability. DKSEs address the common issue of heteroskedasticity and GLS also accounts for both heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation. PCSE method corrects these errors. Finally, quantile regression estimates the relationships between variables at different points of the distribution. The results show that international tourism and EPU adversely impact environmental quality and sustainability by increasing GHG emissions. The findings show that increased GHG emissions from international tourism and EPU harm environmental sustainability. Furthermore, SSO and REC significantly reduce GHG emissions and enhance sustainability. Nevertheless, the tourism sector should adopt sustainable practices like using eco-friendly lodging, conserving energy and water, and utilizing renewable energy (RE) to reduce negative environmental impacts. Conserving biodiversity and regional cultures while minimizing waste and resource use is also essential. Tourists should embrace eco-friendly practices such as choosing green hotels, conserving energy and water, and supporting environmental causes while adhering to regulations to reduce emissions. The study recommends establishing uniform trade laws that support green technology and RE to reduce EPU. The findings stress the need for international collaboration to promote eco-friendly tourist practices and minimize the sector's environmental impact.

The dynamic volatility nexus of geo-political risks, stocks, bond, bitcoin, gold and oil during COVID-19 and Russian-Ukraine war

We investigate the dynamic volatility connectedness of geopolitical risk, stocks, bonds, bitcoin, gold, and oil from January 2018 to April 2022 in this study. We look at connectivity during the Pre-COVID, COVID, and Russian-Ukraine war subsamples. During the COVID-19 and Russian-Ukraine war periods, we find that conventional, Islamic, and sustainable stock indices are net volatility transmitters, whereas gold, US bonds, GPR, oil, and bitcoin are net volatility receivers. During the Russian-Ukraine war, the commodity index (DJCI) shifted from being a net recipient of volatility to a net transmitter of volatility. Furthermore, we discover that bilateral intercorrelations are strong within stock indices (DJWI, DJIM, and DJSI) but weak across all other financial assets. Our study has important implications for policymakers, regulators, investors, and financial market participants who want to improve their existing strategies for avoiding financial losses.

Geopolitical Risk Evolution and Obstacle Factors of Countries along the Belt and Road and Its Types Classification

As a great practice of building a community of shared future for mankind, the Belt and Road Initiative is facing geopolitical risk brought by great power games, regional conflicts and terrorism. It is an important mission of geopolitical research to scientifically deal with the geopolitical risk along the Belt and Road. This study systematically constructs the geopolitical risk assessment index system and analyzes the spatiotemporal evolution, obstacle factors and risk types of geopolitical risk of countries along the Belt and Road by using the entropy weight TOPSIS model, obstacle degree model and minimum variance method. The research results showed that: (1) From 2005 to 2020, the polarization of geopolitical risk in countries along the Belt and Road was very significant, and the overall trend of geopolitical risk tended to deteriorate. (2) The Middle East and Eastern Europe were the most important geopolitical risk zones along the Belt and Road, and Afghanistan, Iraq, Russia and Ukraine were the main high geopolitical risk centers, with significant risk spillover effects from these centers. (3) Terrorism and close relations with the United States were the most important obstacle factors for geopolitical risk in countries along the Belt and Road, and military intervention politics, trade dependence degree and foreign debt burden were important obstacle factors for geopolitical risk in countries along the Belt and Road. (4) Geopolitical risk along the Belt and Road can be divided into sovereign risk dominant type, sovereign and military risk dominant type, sovereign and major power intervention risk dominant type, and sovereign and military and major power intervention risk jointly dominated type, among which sovereign and military and major power intervention risk jointly dominated type was the most important geopolitical risk type. In order to scientifically deal with geopolitical risk in countries along the Belt and Road, it is necessary to strengthen geopolitical risk awareness, pay attention to the dominant geopolitical risk factors, strengthen the control of regional geopolitical risk spillover and formulate reasonable risk prevention and control scheme based on geopolitical risk types.

Dynamics and Co-movements Between the COVID-19 Outbreak and the Stock Market in Latin American Countries: An Evaluation Based on the Wavelet-Partial Wavelet Coherence Model

The COVID-19 outbreak and the global uncertainty it causes produce an apparent panic in stock markets. Efforts to explain the economic spillover effects of COVID-19 can guide authorities to design a control policy against the financial impacts of pandemics. The paper examines the effects of the COVID-19 cases on the stock markets in the emerging Latin American countries of Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru. The paper employs a continuous partial wavelet methodology to observe lead-lag relations between the daily variables of new COVID-19 cases and the stock market index for each Latin American country. Brazilian new COVID-19 cases led the Bovespa (BVSP) index to decline during the whole period, except February and June 2020, at one month-two month-frequency band. The wavelet and phase difference analyses indicate that, except for Brazil, COVID-19 cases did not affect the stock market indexes adversely during the whole sample period but did affect the stock exchange markets negatively during some sub-sample periods of the entire sample of each country. Dynamics of Latin American stock exchange markets in the short and long run can be explained by some other parameters of real and financial sectors and COVID-19 cases.

Assessment of innovative strategies to improve the tourism sector in Iran

In the present study, an expert empirical analysis was carried out to assess the innovative strategies to improve the employment rate in the tourism small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) of Iran. The methodology of this paper was extended based on two qualitative and quantitative techniques, namely strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats and quantitative strategic planning matrix. Within this context, three strategies were chosen based on the sum of total attractiveness scores to increase more creation of new jobs and employment positions in tourism SMEs. Two aggressive and competitive strategies were entitled as 'developing financial support to create the new job and employment positions using tourist's finances' and 'defining smart skills and technologies to improve tourism SMEs toward the pandemic impacts' in addition to a conservative strategy of 'providing training support and education technology in the tourism SMEs. Results revealed that the contribution of total direct (indirect) employment to gross domestic product could be anticipated to equal 5.34% (14.86%) in the status quo (2020) by an enhanced rate of 1.97 (2.09) times compared with 2015. Ultimately, technological approaches were described under the innovative strategies to enhance new jobs and employment creation in the tourism SMEs of Iran.