Editorial

Citation

Burton, B.M. (2012), "Editorial", Qualitative Research in Financial Markets, Vol. 4 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/qrfm.2012.40704aaa.001

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: Qualitative Research in Financial Markets, Volume 4, Issue 1

Welcome to the first issue of QRFM for 2012. I would like to take this opportunity to thank all those who have contributed to the journal’s establishment as a leading outlet for case study, survey, interview and related research in finance and financial markets. In particular, I would like to welcome the new members of the journal’s editorial board and Megan Beech at Emerald. In terms of the former, I am keen to expand the board further and I would be delighted to hear from anyone who is interested in getting involved.

The current issue contains five papers that address a wide range of topical issues, with the variety in analytical approach and geographical location reflecting the extensive and novel use of qualitative methodologies evident in submissions to the journal. The first paper, “Individual investor biases: a segmentation analysis,” by Shalini Sahi and Ashok Arora investigates Indian investor attitudes in a segmentation framework. The results reveal several novel patterns in investor attitude, notably that individual biases suggest four-way segmentation and that a group of apparently “biased” investors possess high levels of financial satisfaction, suggesting that the tendencies are inherent to human cognitive processes rather than representing “design flaws.” In “The influence of affect on stock price volatility: new theory and evidence,” Robert Olsen continues his investigation of “Affect” on individual perceptions and behaviour. The study employs survey evidence from the USA to suggest that volatility in “investor affect” may be markedly higher than the underlying volatility in asset prices, consistent with an inverse relationship existing between return and risk. The paper concludes by setting out possible implications of the evidence for market behaviour across differing political regimes in the USA. The third paper in this issue, by Lukasz Prorokowski, entitled “Assessment of cross-border implications of economic and financial information for the Central European emerging stock market of poland in times of the current financial crisis” illustrates the way in which quantitative research can usefully complement qualitative analysis. The study employs interviews with those close to Polish investments to investigate the apparent implications of a statistical analysis of the impact of crisis-related influences on the Warsaw stock exchange’s pricing mechanisms. In “The 2008 auction rate securities market collapse and US non-profit health systems,” Louis Stewart and Pamela Smith present three detailed case studies of municipal bond issuers who suffered in the wake of the recent collapse of the market for (tax exempt) auction rate securities in the USA. The findings of the investigation point to areas where treasurers in affected firms should try and anticipate difficulties - including identifying specific risk exposures. Whilst the costs of such endeavours are recognised, the study concludes that they must be factored in when the benefits of variable rate debt issues are under consideration. The final paper in this issue: “Literature of stock market integration: a global perspective,” by Neha Seth and Anil Sharma, provides a detailed review of a body of work that is of obvious critical importance as national economies emerge from the global downturn at varying rates. The study reviews more than 100 analyses of market integration and, while outlining and acknowledging their key findings and importance, suggests specific ways in which development of the work is needed.

As previously intimated, the next issue of QRFM is devoted to studies of Islamic Banking and Finance, reflecting the number and high quality of submissions made to the special issue edited by Omar Masood in 2011 (QRFM Vol. 3, No. 2). Islamic finance is of course an area of growing importance in the modern world and this has manifested itself with extremely high download figures for the papers contained in last year’s issue. This year’s volume promises to be of similarly widespread interest.

Bruce M. Burton