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Starting from the theoretical mechanism of profit sharing between finance and the real economy, this paper reviews and analyzes the profitability of China's banking industry and makes a horizontal comparison with the banking industry of the United States, Japan, and Germany.

Based on the panel threshold model, it is found that there is a dual-threshold asymmetric effect between banking profit and the growth of real economy. When the net profit rate of the banking industry is lower than 0.491%, the increase in banking profitability will inhibit the growth of real economy due to profit grabbing; when the rate falls within the range of 0.491–0.801%, the increase in bank profitability is conducive to the growth of real economy.

Finance and the real economy are in the most comfortable symbiotic state; when the rate is higher than 0.801%, the continued increase in bank profitability will weaken the promotion effect of finance on the real economy, but bank profitability and the growth of real economy are still in a symbiotic state of positive promotion.

The promotion effect of China's bank profitability to the growth of real economy has shifted from the suboptimal state to the optimal range as a whole, which is attributed to the strong deleveraging and strict supervision of the Chinese government after 2016, the timely and decisive “stepping on the brakes”, pulling the financial sector back from the “illusion” caused by “self-circulated” profits and preventing it from harming the real economy.

This paper aims to investigate how human capital of rural migrant workers is regulated and manipulated at ten petrol stations in one Chinese coastal city. The research is based on ethnographic research with participatory observation at forecourts and interviews with managers and workers. This paper argues that human capital development is inhibited by patterns of discrimination, such as in the treatment of rural migrants in China’s coastal urban areas. Instead, human capital is developed as migrant workers learn to resist management rules by relying on social capital networks. This requires management to confront or acquits some control to workers, which itself may benefit employers in certain circumstances. There has been a tendency towards analysing non-financial capital in positivist frameworks within human resource management (HRM), in which human capital and social capital are seen in terms of their contribution to profits. There has also been a tendency within Chinese HRM to sometimes understand social networks in normative cultural terms, in which Chinese identities as being or seeking harmonies.

This paper, based on a qualitative research, shows that a more nuanced approach may be needed, one that understands tensions and countervailing forces. The research is based on ethnographic research with intensive participatory observation at forecourts and interviews with managers and workers.

The way human capital can be developed to restrict management prerogative, though this may benefit employer’s interests.

There has been a tendency towards analysing non-financial capital in positivist frameworks within HRM, in which human capital and social capital are seen in terms of their contribution to profits. There has also been a tendency within Chinese HRM to sometimes understand social networks in normative cultural terms, in which Chinese identities as being or seeking harmonies. This paper shows a more nuanced approach may be needed, one that understands tensions and countervailing forces.

Understanding young adults’ organic food purchasing behavior in the fresh food e-commerce platforms (FFEP) is crucial for expanding the global environmental product market. The study aims to investigate how specific characteristics of platforms and organic food information impact young adults’ perceived value, leading to their subsequent purchase intention.

Around 535 valid responses were collected through an online survey and then analyzed applying a two-stage structural equation model (SEM) and artificial neural network (ANN) approach.

Results of this research show that platform characteristics (including system quality and evaluation system) and product information characteristics (including organic label, ingredient information and traceability information) significantly affect young adults’ perceived utilitarian and hedonic value. The platform’s service quality has a strong effect on their perceptions of hedonic value, while the delivery system strongly influences their utilitarian value. Moreover, the perceived value, as a crucial mediator, plays a significant role in moderating the influence of platform and product information characteristics on the purchase intentions of young consumers regarding organic food.

Previous research has overlooked the credence attributes of organic food and particularities of online purchasing, focusing instead on general platform and product characteristics. This study addresses this gap by proposing a more appropriate model that integrates the characteristics of both the platform and product information. This offers theoretical and managerial implications for effectively stimulating organic food consumption among young adults in online environments.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how consumers’ trust is enhanced by e-commerce-based agribusiness companies. It also aims to shed light on the role of social commerce in improving consumers’ trust.

To achieve the research purpose, an in-depth multiple case study is performed. In this study, three cases in short food supply chain (SFSC) in China are selected, and they are all e-commerce agribusiness companies. They adopted common ways to build up, maintain and reinforce consumers’ trust.

It is revealed that the companies innovatively adopted social commerce, both online and offline, to overcome the trust problems usually faced by e-commerce companies. It is also shown that offline contact with potential consumers is an important first step for agribusiness e-commerce entrepreneurs to build up trust with consumers.

By adopting a multiple case study method, the research has limited generalizability to other types of SFSCs. Since the findings are from Chinese agribusiness e-commerce companies, the generalization to other sectors must be done with caution.

Some managerial implications are given as follows: first, offline contact with consumers could be realized through different channels. Taking advantage of existing social network or trying to find consumers in urban communities might be effective ways. Second, trust building with consumers is not an easy task, managers need to emphasize trust building, trust maintaining, as well as trust reinforcing with consumers. In agri-food sector, managers might need to specifically address the importance of food safety and quality so as to not lose consumer trust in one night.

The study has mainly two contributions: first, it has managerial implications for agribusiness e-commerce entrepreneurs, addressing the important role of social presence in building up consumer trust. Second, it contributes to social presence and social relations literature by providing new empirical evidence from e-commerce in agri-food sector and in developing countries.