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This paper aims to explore the influence of the COVID-19 outbreak and the Government's disease control measures on the stock returns and liquidity of Vietnam-listed companies in the financial services sector.

The authors have conducted a panel data regression analysis using data from 50 banking, insurance and finance companies listed in Vietnam's two biggest stock exchanges (HNX and HOSE) within the period from January 30th, 2020 to May 15th, 2021.

The regression results indicate that the daily growth in the total number of confirmed cases caused by COVID-19 has significant negative effects on the stock market returns and liquidity. Nevertheless, the Government's imposition of lockdown yields significant and positive outcomes on stock performance. In addition, the study reveals remarkable differences in returns of large-cap and small-cap stocks under the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The study indicates government and regulators should act more actively to limit the outbreak of the virus, improve investor confidence as well to support the financial services industry and deal with the outbreak of the pandemic later.

This is the first study to explore the influence of the COVID-19 outbreak and the Government's disease control measures on the stock returns and liquidity of Vietnam-listed companies in the financial services industry.

“The world needs science, science needs women” is the message given by UNESCO in the program for the development of women in science” (UNESCO, 2017). In Vietnam, women’s participation and achievements in scientific research is considered a great and important resource for industrialization and modernization. Even so, are there gender differences in scientific achievement in the social science research institutes in Vietnam? What factors influence the scientific achievement of female social researchers? The answers will be based on data from a 2017 survey with a sample of 756 researchers, of which 77.6% were female. The survey was conducted by the Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences, a leading, ministry-level national center for the social sciences in Vietnam. This chapter analyzed the scientific achievements of researchers through their position as principal investigators of research projects and their publications, and factors that may impact this. Bivariate and multivariate analyses of factors that may affect the scientific achievement of researchers found that gender differences in academic achievement in the social sciences in Vietnam was still prevalent. Female researchers’ scientific achievements were lower than those of their male counterparts. The contribution to science of Vietnamese female researchers was limited by many different factors; the most important were the academic rank of the researchers and gender stereotype that considered housework the responsibility of women.

The authors estimated the hidden overhead (capital diversion or wasteful use of capital) of Vietnam state-owned enterprises (SOEs).

The authors used a panel data set of 10,200 Vietnam SOEs observed over the period 2010–2018. The authors modeled and estimated the hidden overhead by using a stochastic production frontier. The hidden overhead parameter is modelled as the technical inefficiency in the production function.

Vietnam SOEs are very capital intensive. The hidden overhead (or the wasteful use of capital) is very high with an average rate of 69%.

Alternative estimation methods should be used to account for endogeneity in production inputs. Lack of comparison with the Vietnam private firms.

The paper proposes an original way to quantify hidden overhead (or capital diversion) in the Vietnam SOEs. The finding (a capital diversion rate of 69% on average) is astonishing. It calls for an urgent and profound reform of the Vietnam SOEs.

Refurbishing houses is considered a key measure to improve the energy efficiency of the built environment. However, little is known about the implementation and outcome of housing renovation for energy upgrades in the Vietnamese practice. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the energy performance of the current housing stock in Vietnam and the potential to reduce energy use in households.

The paper is based on a survey with 153 respondents in three major climatic regions of Vietnam. The survey focusses on building characteristics, environmental performance, energy performance and refurbishment activities. Data collected from the survey were statistically analysed to give insight into the current performance of the housing stock and its energy saving potential.

This paper concludes that building design and construction, particularly the building envelope, have a significant influence on the occupants’ comfort. However, the energy consumption in houses is not statistically associated with building design and indoor environment. It is suggested that financial status and occupants’ behaviour currently have a strong influence on the household energy use. The survey also showed that refurbishment improves the housing performance, especially if improving the indoor environment was one of the drivers.

There are very few studies on energy use in households in Vietnam, especially with regards to actual energy consumption. This paper brings insights into the actual energy consumption and reveals the “performance gap” in Vietnamese housing stock.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationship between organizational innovation and performance of firms in Vietnam.

Based on the literature review, the author proposed five hypotheses covering the relationships between different aspects of organizational innovation and firm performance. Data collected from a survey of 266 firms in Vietnam were analyzed to test the proposed hypotheses.

Two out of three aspects of organizational innovation, including “innovation in business practices” and “innovation in workplace organization,” are significantly positively associated with firm performance. However, there was no evidence to support the relationship between firm performance and the third organizational innovation aspect, “organizational innovation in external relations.” The results also show that the interaction terms among three aspects of organizational innovation do not have significant impacts on firm performance.

Firms in Vietnam should pay more attention to innovation in business practices and innovation in workplace organization since two aspects have clear positive influences on performance. Moreover, firms can perform each of the organizational innovation aspects independently or in parallel, as the implementation of organizational innovation in one aspect does not influence the impact on the firm performance of organizational innovation in other aspects.

This study provides important insights into the widely recognized yet little-researched relationship between organizational innovation and firm performance and concludes that organizational innovation has a positive impact on firm performance.

This study investigates the impact of board independence on firm risk of Vietnamese listed firms and the moderating effect of capital expenditure on this relationship.

This paper applies fixed effects and dynamic generalized method of moments (GMM) models to examine hypothesized associations between the proportion of nonexecutive directors and stock return volatility, as well as the moderating effect of capital expenditure. The robustness tests are implemented by applying alternative measures of overinvestment and firm risk.

The results show that the presence of nonexecutive directors on board increases firm risk. However, the combination of nonexecutive ratio and capital expenditure ratio has a significant negative impact on firm risk. The result is also confirmed by the difference between the monitoring role of nonexecutive directors in overinvesting and underinvesting firms.

The results imply that Vietnamese listed firms take stock return volatility into consideration before nominating and appointing nonexecutive directors into their board, especially in overinvesting firms. From another perspective, the shift toward having a majority of nonexecutive directors on boards can play a significant role in pursuing a stable or risky business strategy.

This paper investigates the influences of nonexecutive directors on firm risk in the context of Vietnam.

This study aims to estimate the pass-through rate of the increases in the excise tax and TCF tax on tobacco in Vietnam. This study seeks to shed light on how the tax burden is split between consumers and producers and inform policy discussions in the country. Using panel micro-level data collected from three waves of a nationwide retailer's survey, this study provides an evidence-based pass-through estimation for tobacco tax in Vietnam and contributes to the understanding of tax policy on smoking and smoking-related issues.

Following increases in the excise tax and TCF tax on tobacco in 2019, the differential effect of the tax hike on the “treatment group” (domestic cigarettes) versus the “control group” (illicit cigarettes) using a difference-in-difference (DID) analysis has been studied. The study utilized unique longitudinal retailers’ data on cigarettes prices in Vietnam from 2018 to 2019 to estimate the tax pass-through rate for some of the most popular factory-made cigarette brands.

This study found evidence of an over-shifting of cigarette taxes on smokers. Specifically, it discovered that the tax increase is absorbed more by low-priced brand smokers compared to premium brand users due to (1) the limited increase in prices under a pure ad valorem system and (2) the way the Vietnamese currency is denominated. Additionally, there is evidence of cushioning to mitigate price shock on consumers as the real prices increase gradually over the period of one year after the tax change.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to collect and analyze a unique panel micro-level data from three waves of a nationwide retailers’ survey, which captures the changes in marketing and pricing strategies of the tobacco industry in Vietnam before and after an increase in excise tax in 2019. The results of this study could be used as a reference for future policymakers in considering increasing taxes on tobacco.

Single-party regimes increasingly use Subnational Performance Assessments (SPAs) – rankings of provinces and districts – to improve governance outcomes. SPAs assemble and publicize information on local government performance to facilitate monitoring and generate competition among officials. However, the evidence are sparse on their effects in this context. The authors argue that built-in incentive structures in centralized single-party regimes distort the positive impact of SPAs.

The staggered rollout of the Vietnam Provincial Governance and Public Administration Performance Index (PAPI) created a natural experiment. Due to 2010 budget constraints, the first iteration of the PAPI survey covered only 30 of Vietnam’s 63 provinces before covering all in 2011. The PAPI team used matching procedures to identify a statistical twin for each province before randomly selecting one from each pair. The authors use randomization inference to compare the outcomes of these control and treatment groups in 2011.

Exposure to PAPI helped improve almost all aspects of governance; however, significant evidence of prioritization bias exist. The positive effects only persisted for the dimension of administrative procedures, which was the one area of governance that was prioritized by the central government at the time. Other dimensions only registered short-term effects.

Our study provides an examination of the impact of SPAs in a single-party regime context. In addition, the authors leverage the natural experiment to identify information effects causally. The authors also look past short-term effects to compare outcomes for five years after the treatment occurred.

This study investigates the circumstances under which a business to customer (B2C) marketplace chooses to implement green marketing to promote green product investment (GPI). It further identifies the optimal sales model approach for implementing green marketing under uncertainty about the effects of GPI.

We examine an e-commerce (EC) supply chain involving a manufacturer who determines the product’s greenness level and a B2C marketplace who can operate in either an agency or a reselling mode and engages in green marketing to promote sales of green products. Using the backward induction method, we develop an analytical model to drive the optimal decisions and profits under each sales model.

Our research demonstrates that high GPI uncertainty drives B2C marketplaces to adopt green marketing strategies. These initiatives not only prompt manufacturers to invest in eco-friendly products but also boost profits for all parties involved. Nevertheless, these benefits depend on the choice of a sales model between agency and reselling. Our findings offer a novel practical application into the relationship between GPI uncertainty and green marketing. When the GPI uncertainty is high, green marketing is profitable for the B2C marketplace regardless of which sales mode is adopted. However, when uncertainty is low, green marketing only benefits the B2C marketplace in the agency mode. Moreover, the interaction between GPI uncertainty and the referral fee exerts a moderating influence on the preferred sales mode for both the manufacturer and the B2C marketplace.

Our findings offer a novel practical application into the relationship between GPI uncertainty and green marketing. When the GPI uncertainty is high, green marketing is profitable for the B2C marketplace regardless of which sales mode is adopted. However, when uncertainty is low, green marketing only benefits the B2C marketplace in the agency mode. Moreover, the interaction between GPI uncertainty and the referral fee exerts a moderating influence on the preferred sales mode for both the manufacturer and the B2C marketplace.

Overall, our research contributes to a deeper understanding of the complex but beneficial interplay between GPI uncertainty, green marketing and sales mode selection in an EC supply chain.

This paper investigates whether and how the financial services offered by an e-commerce platform can help budget-constrained small- and medium-sized suppliers improve their corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance.

The authors examine a supply chain in which a budget-constrained supplier engages in CSR, produces a finished product and sells it on the marketplace of an e-commerce platform. This platform offers financial services to the supplier, choosing among three types of financing models: target rate of return, credit limit and CSR-linked financing. Using a Stackelberg game approach, the authors can drive the equilibrium decisions under each financing model.

The results reveal that all three financing models help improve the supplier's CSR investment as long as consumer sensitivity toward CSR exists. Moreover, the last one leads to the highest profitability of the overall supply chain and each member.

The findings shed light on the role of platform financing and how to design the most appropriate financing model to improve CSR for supply chain managers.