The essence of administrative and territorial reform and decentralization reform in Ukraine is to move away from a centralized model of government in the state, ensure the ability of local self-government and build an effective system of territorial power organization in Ukraine based on the principles of subsidiarity, omnipresence and financial self-sufficiency of local self-government. The purpose of the article is to identify areas for improving the effectiveness of the administrative-territorial reform in Ukraine based on assessing the results of its financial decentralization component. Peculiarities of changing the territorial basis of local self-government in Ukraine investigate the necessity of moving from a voluntary amalgamation of territorial communities to the stage of their formation according to clearly defined criteria and providing opportunities for the development of such communities in the future. It focuses on the need to consolidate areas and change the system of interaction of the subregional level with the amalgamated territorial communities at a basic level.

This study aims to examine the effects of different factors influencing on financial distress. The population of this study includes industrial companies listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange. Samples were processed by choosing 69 companies for three years of information which leaves us to have 150 observations. The sampling technique uses purposive random sampling and data is analyzed using PLS. The results show that firm size and liquidity negatively affect the financial distress while leverage positively affects the financial distress. In addition, institutional ownership moderates liquidity towards financial distress, firm size negatively affects liquidity, and liquidity does not mediate the effect of firm size on financial distress. The conclusion of this research is that management teams can avoid financial distress if they are able to manage liquidity ratios and leverage well, both ratios must be maintained so that they would not exceed firms’ financial abilities. Companies with big amount of total assets have an advantage in competition since it is not overshadowed by the condition of financial distress and they can easily gain stakeholders’ confidence. Institutional ownership in this study seems to encourage management to take risks related to company liquidity to generate profits by utilizing long-term debt in financing its operations.

One of the leading industries that affect economic growth in Indonesia is the palm oil industry. The role of this industry depends on the level of exports from European Union countries. Based on the COVID-19 pandemic situation, international trade activities are hampered and could affect industry performance from a stock perspective. Therefore, this study aims to explore the impact of the COVID-19 cases that occurred in the European Union and related macroeconomic variables on the stock performance of the oil palm industry in Indonesia. This research also examines the impact of COVID-19 on certified sustainable companies and companies that are not certified. Panel regression was applied in this study with Eviews 11 Software.This research's observations are 13 palm oil companies in Indonesia which are listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX) from March 2, 2020, to August 31, 2020. This study's results reveal that the world CPO prices and market capitalization affect the activities shares of palm oil companies in Indonesia.Meanwhile, from the grouping of certifications within companies, the impact of COVID-19 in the European Union was more substantial on companies that were certified as sustainable. Based on these results, The COVID-19 case in the European Union must be a concern for palm oil companies in Indonesia.

This paper was conducted to determine the importance of applying the features of responsibility accounting in Jordanian shareholding companies in limiting occupational fraud from the point of view of internal auditors and external auditors. It focuses on comparing their opinions and attitudes towards this issue. The study used a questionnaire that was designed and distributed to a random sample of 98 internal auditors who were shareholders of the firms and 93 external auditors who audited the accounts of the companies. The data collection tool included paragraphs about the seven features of responsibility accounting represented like dividing the organizational structure of the company into responsibility centers, and the existence of a system of delegation to the managers of responsibility centers with their powers in the shareholding. Statistical analysis of the data was performed using the SPSS statistical package. It was found that there is a role to adopt and apply all the features of responsibility accounting in Jordanian shareholding companies from the point of view of both internal and external auditors in limiting occupational fraud. The study recommended the adoption of an accounting system in companies that are in line with responsibility accounting given their role in limiting occupational fraud. The study also sheds light on the importance of external auditors giving attention to reviewing and evaluating the organizational environment and administrative procedures in the company to ensure that they are consistent with integrity and honesty.

The financial world has grown significantly in the last five years, where insurance companies, finance companies, lending and borrowing between page users will increasingly grow along with technological developments. This should be an important concern for auditors because of the increasing number of transactions in digital and cyberspace, the audit methods or procedures must keep abreast of the times. This study hypothesizes the function of technology can help the performance of the auditor. Data collection is done by distributing questionnaires to auditors who work at the Public Accounting Firm (KAP). The analysis technique used is multiple linear regression. The results of the study will be presented after the data collection process is complete.

The advantages of an integral approach to assessing the competitiveness of retailers are substantiated, which allows obtaining a more thorough and versatile informative base for making further managerial decisions to ensure the development of trading business. A new approach to the integral evaluation of the competitiveness of retailers is developed. The list of functional and structural components of competitiveness was substantiated: marketing,financial and investment, material and technical, intellectual and personnel,innovation, logistic and social. It is proposed to use the methodological sequence of competitiveness assessment, which involves the alternate passage of the following stages: construction of an evaluation hierarchy, identification of the levels of the criterion importance, definition of a set of “local vectors” by evaluation criteria, conducting comparative evaluation of competing enterprises, hierarchical synthesis of alternative options for ensuring competitiveness. The methods of an expert survey are used to form an information and analytical base. Using the Saaty’s analytic hierarchy process and the Delphi method of an expert survey, a matrix of pairwise comparisons of the criteria of the retailers’ competitiveness is formed. The Gallup Institute methodology is used to form the sample of enterprises. A matrix of rating positions of the socially-oriented retailers is developed to enable evaluation.On the basis of the obtained results – analytical support of the policy(regarding the competitiveness level, state of security and coefficients of weight of its functional and structural components), the strategic principles of managing the competitiveness of socially-oriented retailers. A matrix of strategic decisions on managing the competitiveness of socially-oriented retailers is developed.

Information and Communications Technology (ICT) has played overwhelming roles in the economic and social development of nations and continents in the last two decades. This study aims to explore the impact of mobile telephone and broadband use on economic growth in G7 countries using annual data covering the period of 2000-2017. We performed Pedroni cointegration, Kao cointegration, fully modified ordinary least squares (FMOLS), dynamic ordinary least squares (DOLS), and panel Granger causality tests to investigate the causal and long-run effects. The empirical findings reveal that (i) mobile telephone and broadband use contribute to economic growth in the long-run; (ii) changes in mobile telephone and broadband use significantly lead to a change in economic growth.

The study investigates the perceptions of external auditors and loan officers regarding external auditor's independence in Palestine. Data were gathered using a questionnaire developed by the author and include 5 main issues related to the perception of external auditor’s independence. The sampling population identified for this study consists of external auditors working in domestic and international audit firms and financial statement users mainly loan officers in Palestine. The sample included 79 auditors and 76 loan officers. The findings revealed that there are significant differences in the perceptions of external auditors and loan officers in relation to provision of non-audit services, auditor’s economic dependence on a single audit client, and long relationship between an auditor and a client. The results revealed mixed results about the effect of presence of active audit committee on independence of the external auditors. Furthermore, acceptance of significant gifts from the client was considered an important factor that may influence auditor independence by loan officers and external auditor and thus significant differences between the two respondent groups were found in relation to acceptance of significant gifts from the client. These findings can be useful to policy makers and professional auditing bodies in Palestine on setting new regulations or strengthening existing ones to enforce auditor’s independence in Palestine.

The need to improve public administration of import dependency was characterized (in the example of Ukraine) and the signs of its influence and interconnection with ensuring the state’s economic security are characterized. The methodological sequence of import dependency evaluation is substantiated. Using Hotelling’s method of transformation (the method of principal components), the multiplicative form is presented and the integral index of import dependency of the country’s economy is calculated. Harrington’s interval scale is used to summarize the results of the integral evaluation of import dependency. The results of the evaluation have confirmed the high level of import dependency of the Ukrainian economy and clear tendencies for its strengthening, which is critically threatening to the country’s economic security. Using the tool of multivariate dynamic regression modeling, a statistically significant correlation between the level of import dependency and the country’s economic security is established. The economic and mathematical descriptive model of state management of the state’s economic security is formed, which is embedded in a methodical approach to strategizing the state policy of import substitution. The purpose of the state management of import substitution, the parameters of ensuring the country’s economic security agreed with it, the strategic priorities of the state policy of import substitution and the indicators of their implementation are determined.

Prior theoretical and empirical studies have suggested that political influence affects the application of corporate governance and firm performance enormously. However, several fundamental questions remain to be answered. To fill this knowledge gap,the study's main objectives are examining the direct impact of political connection on firm financial performance in Pakistani non-financial listed companies and the moderating effect of director's financial expertise on political connections and firm financial performance. The study utilised panel data of 220 firms from 2008 to 2017 and used panel corrected standard error regression analysis. The results show that political connection negatively impacted firm financial performance, and director financial expertise as a moderator strengthened the relationship between political connections and firm financial performance. This study's results supported political economy theory in that weak judicial systems and unstable political systems have immense effects on investor’s rights. The study contributes to extending the existing literature on political connection by providing evidence of the impact of politically connected firms on firm performance in an emerging market. The study also deliberates on how the director’s financial expertise contributes towards the relationship. The findings could be generalised to other countries with similar degrees of development and culture.