Banks play the most vital role in the economy by acting as financial intermediaries and providing the necessary credit to fund consumption and investment, thereby effecting real economic activity. Banks have been in existence for centuries and while the core of their function remains the same, their business model has changed dramatically over the years. Most notably, banking internationalisation has gained prominence in the last three decades. This book offers a comprehensive understanding of the business model, challenges and benefits of international banks. It features banks that are global and highlights their overseas activities. It documents the recent trends in international banking activity and serves as a one-stop-shop for students and scholars. Furthermore, in the post-financial crisis of 2007-09 there has been a surge in the FinTech industry where banks have sought an opportunity to expand and compete, the core of which is the provision of services via the newly established online technology as well as the green finance initiative. The book brings together the issues and opportunities ahead as global banks respond to market and environment conditions in these arenas. The text will be a useful resource for students, researchers and scholars of banking, international finance and international economics as well as students wishing to pursue a professional career in banking. Given the vital role banks play in the economy, their structure and activities are of great interest to policy makers also.

This book repositions the groundbreaking Bretton Woods conference of July 1944 as the first large-scale multilateral North-South dialogue on global financial governance. It moves beyond the usual focus on Anglo-American interests by highlighting the influence of delegations from Latin America, India, the Soviet Union, France, and others. It also investigates how state and private interests intermingled, collided, and compromised during the negotiations on the way to a set of regulations and institutions that still partly frame global economic governance in the early twenty-first century. Together, these essays lay the groundwork for a more comprehensive analysis of Bretton Woods as a pivotal site of multilateralism in international history.

This unique work consists of a selection of key papers presented at the first Anglo-Japanese Comparative Law Conference, held at Jesus College, Cambridge in September 1996. The conference was organised under the auspices of the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies, University of London; the University of Tsukuba, Japan; and Murdoch University in Australia. The conference brought together a number of leading business lawyers from around the world, who discussed the impact of globalisation on commercial law. If trhe internalisation of trade and business has produced problems for lawyers, the impact of globalisation, particularly in such areas as the capital markets, has proved to be even more problematic. The implications for all those who operate in the commercial and financial sectors, and for those who advise them, of developments in the nature and character of the markets are increasingly significant. The publication will be of particular interest to academics, those involved in trans-national business, and legal practitioners.

Social media applications have emerged in the last 20 years to meet the different needs of individuals, and private sector and public organizations have not been indifferent to these technologies. Social media tools help public institutions and organizations communicate directly with citizens as well as enable two-way communication and enable citizens to participate in all stages from agenda setting to evaluation of policy processes. Central and local governments, which use innovative methods to involve citizens in this process, attach significance to the development of e-participation tools. Ensuring the participation of citizens in policy processes not only determines the wishes and priorities of citizens but also uses scarce resources effectively and efficiently. Global Perspectives on Social Media Usage Within Governments reveals the best practices of various countries regarding the use of social media by central and local governments according to public administration models. The book presents various case studies on the impact of public administration models on social media use in order to contribute to public administration and social media use. Covering topics such as climate action, knowledge behaviors, and citizen participation, this premier reference source is an essential resource for government officials, public administrators, public policy scholars, social media experts, public affairs scholars, students and educators of higher education, librarians, researchers, and academicians.

Safe assets constitute an essential component of the contemporary, international financial system and are vital to its stability. As they are perceived as risk-free assets, they are a special type of financial instrument. Although the vast majority of safe assets are issued by governments, due to the increasing interdependence of economies, resulting from the liberalisation of capital flows, financial openness and the ineffectiveness of the international monetary system, issues relating to their significance, creation and allocation are global. This book combines theoretical threads by systematising the concept and characteristics of safe assets against the background of alternative financial instruments with empirical analyses that present trends in shaping demand, supply, price conditions and various interdependencies in the financial markets. It shows the position and role of safe assets in the global financial sector, in the context of ongoing challenges, such as the evolution of forms of money and the processes of currency competition, the outbreak of financial and economic crises, the accumulation of foreign exchange reserves, financial innovations, the scale of securitisation and monetary integration. Although safe assets are not a new category of financial assets, they are inherently connected with the evolution of money. Thus, this book examines the determinants of their creation, motives of holding and the consequences of a shortage – all within the changing nature of the international financial system. Historical, political and institutional backgrounds are taken into account. This book will appeal to researchers, scholars and advanced students of macroeconomics, international finance and economics, investment analysis, financial economics and econometrics.

FinTech is an emerging field and most of the existing literature appears in the form of industry reports, consulting reports, working papers, and policy recommendations. Although FinTech has been widely discussed for many years, there is a paucity of literature on some categorizations of FinTech. This edited volume distinguishes itself by focusing on academic works of scholars with a different area of specialization in the FinTech field including technology, innovation and regulation. In particular, the book focuses on the laws and technologies necessary to comprehend the role of the legal system in technological innovations and will be helpful for regulatory policymaking. A practical compendium that explains concepts and follows through on applications in FinTech including its challenges and evolving nature, this book will be of interest to students, scholars, practitioners as well as regulators and policy makers.

In March 1999, New York University Salomon Center in assocIatIOn with the Department of Finance at NYU Stern held a one-day conference on the impact of real estate cycles on the real estate industry both from a domestic as well as an international perspective. The conference featured the leading research on this topic in the United States, Europe and Asia. Currendy, the real estate industry is at a critical point. New development projects around the world are being put on hold given recent developments in the international capital markets. The industry is hard hit by the decline in real estate investment trust (REIT) share prices and a shrink ing pool of capital for real estate ventures. This has unfortunately coincided with serious financial problems of very large hedge funds and other institutional investors in the market for commercial mortgage backed securities. There is need for new insights into the implications of U. S. and global real estate cycles on real estate secu rities including REITs and mortgage-backed securities as well as direct real estate investment. This global orientation is important given the high mobility of capital into the real estate, the increasing integration of real estate markets, and the proposed expan sion of real estate investment trusts (REIT) into international real estate. The process of globalization has resulted in increased competition between cities for the attrac tion of investment.

Recent decades have seen a rise in the significance of governance layers beyond the nation state and even Europe. Nonetheless, few efforts have been made thus far to systematically examine the EU’s interaction with global policy regimes. This book maps the relative importance of EU policies in the multi-level global governance system, in comparison with national and global activities. It provides a unique comparative analysis of the EU’s capacity for projecting its policies outward. Focusing on trade policy, agriculture, food safety, competition, social rights, environmental policy, transport, migration, nuclear non-proliferation, or financial regulation, each chapter contributes to a better understanding of the EU’s role in shaping global policies, the mechanisms it uses and the conditions leading to success or failure. The contributors’ comparative research highlights that policy export is a demanding phenomenon that faces severe limitations and frequently comes with drawbacks. Still, EU policy export played a key role in shaping the rules of the global trade regime and influenced global policy outcomes – at least to a minor extent or in technical aspects – in the majority of the covered policy areas. Overall however, this book reveals that the EU not only aims to export its policies, but interacts with its global environment in a number of distinct ways, including policy import and policy protection, to shield it from global pressures. Concluding with a comparison of all policies on the meta-level and relevant policy recommendations, this book will be of interest to students, scholars and practitioners of European politics, European public policy, global governance and international relations.