Financial literacy as a moderator linking financial resource availability and SME growth in Ghana

The dissemination of sustainability reporting and integrated reporting is a key trend in the development of accounting systems under the influence of the concept of sustainable development. This statement is fair not only for developed countries, but also for developing countries. On the example of Ghana and Ukraine, a comparative study of regulatory requirements and conceptual frameworks for the compilation of sustainability reporting and integrated reporting has been conducted; the dynamics, size of reporting companies, their sectoral affiliation and the standards used are researched. It was proved that the basis for the promotion sustainability reporting and integrated reporting in these countries are regulatory requirements, as well as increasing the perception of CSR, the transparency and accountability of business, the practices of stakeholder participation and assurance the reliability of reporting for stakeholders.

Innovative marketing has given rise to practitioners’ and scholars’ attention in the 21st-century market. Given this, social media marketing has become the order of the day when accessing modern tools for marketing communication. However, the adoption of this innovation comes with its associated challenges, particularly, from a developing country perspective. Against this background, this study sought to examine the inhibitors characterized in the application of social media channels as an innovative tool for advertising and communication among SMEs (small and medium enterprises) in Ghana. For study results to be achieved, a quantitative research approach with a questionnaire of 650 was distributed among managerial staff of the fashion industry in the central part of Ghana of which 512 respondents were duly received and correctly filled for data processing and analysis. Results from the partial least square structural equation method (PLS-SEM), showed that despite the importance of innovation, lack of managerial skills/marketing expertise, perceived cost, regular systems/links upgrade, and financial constraints are significant inhibiting factors affecting the application of social media as advertising and communication tools among SMEs in developing economy. Interestingly, the findings further showed that ’company’s size’ as well as ’availability of social media channel/tool’ significantly control for the outcome variable (internet/social media) as a marketing communication tool.

Acknowledgment
This work is supported by Tomas Bata University in Zlin through; IGA/FaME/2019/002: The role of the institutional environment in fostering entrepreneurship, and further supported by IGA/FaME/2020/002 and IGA/FaME/2019/008. The authors are thankful to Prof. Jaroslav Belás, Prof. Boris Popesko, and Prof. Miloslava Chovancová for their guidance towards developing this manuscript.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is strongly committed to stimulating savings culture in the local community by providing financial literacy in financial planning, investments, and budgeting. Inculcating the savings and investment behavior among the people will help materialize one of the elements of Saudi Vision 2030. Tadawul, being the most liquid stock market in the Middle East and North Africa, offers investors the ability to grow their capital with confidence through facilitating trading in different securities such as equities, debt instruments, and Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs). There is a great scope for investors to invest in the companies listed in Tadawul All Share Index (TASI) due to its strong economic fundamentals. The present study aims to apply the CAPM in Tadawul listed stocks, which will help in understanding the systematic and unsystematic risk associated with stocks, understanding their actual and theoretical return on stocks. The methodology adopted is the analysis of secondary data for all listed stocks in Tadawul using the Bloomberg terminal. The financial valuation includes elements like beta, alpha, correlation and standard deviation, expected return and actual return. The practical value obtained from the study will help investors go for undervalued stocks with lower beta, higher expected annual return, and lower systematic risks. Thus, the result shows the predicting power in KSA market and the scope for long-term investments by the investors to boost their savings and investment behavior and materialize one element of Vision 2030.

Acknowledgment
This research was funded by the Deanship of Scientific Research at Princess Nourah bint Abdulrahman University through the Fast-Track Research Funding Program.