The Central European Review of Economics and Management

Green finance and renewable energy investments

2025-03-20T07:45:19+00:00

Aim: This study examines recent green finance developments to evaluate how institutional, economic, and policy factors affect renewable energy investments globally. It employs a comparative approach to identify key success drivers and barriers influencing the effectiveness of green finance in promoting renewable energy across different national contexts.

Research Methods: The study systematically examines green finance impacts on renewable energy investments through a literature review, thematic analysis, and case studies. It reviews peer-reviewed articles (2015–2025). Prioritizing qualitative research, it analyzes policies, institutional frameworks, and outcomes. Comparing successful cases (e.g., Singapore, China) with failures (e.g., Middle East & Central Asia, Latin America) provides key insights.

Findings: The findings depict a varied global scenario for green finance. Successes like Singapore’s Green Bond Grant Scheme and China’s Green Finance Pilot Zones showcase how strong regulations and blended financing boost renewable energy. In contrast, challenges in Africa (weak policies), Southeast Asia (high costs), and Latin America (political instability) emphasize the importance of tailored strategies to overcome structural obstacles.

Originality: This study provides a unique comparative analysis of regional green finance initiatives, examining successes and failures. Unlike previous research, it identifies key factors and barriers, offering practical recommendations for policymakers. Addressing region-specific challenges enhances understanding of global green finance and supports sustainable development.

Implications: The study underscores the necessity of strong regulations, blended finance, and regional collaboration for green finance success. Addressing weak governance, financing gaps, and political instability is crucial to scaling renewable energy investments and achieving sustainability goals globally.

Limitations: Limited quantitative analysis; future research should explore hybrid financing models.

Keywords: Green finance, renewable energy investments, sustainable development, Climate Finance.

JEL: G23, Q01, Q42, Q56.

Analysis of Value-at-Risk (VaR) of Naira against BRICS Currencies

2025-05-14T12:14:07+00:00

Aim: This study investigates foreign exchange market dynamics by forecasting and analyzing the Value-at-Risk (VaR) for the Nigerian Naira against BRICS currencies utilizing daily data from January 1, 2010 to December 31, 2024.

Design/Research methods: The five BRICS currencies (BRL, RUB, INR, CNY, and ZAR), were analyzed to explore the impact of foreign exchange market dynamics on the Nigerian Naira against BRICS currencies. The value-at-risk methodology was implemented plus the Monte Carlo simulation. The calculated VaR95% quantifies potential losses, emphasizing the importance of managing downside currency exchange risks in a volatile financial market at both the 95% and 99% confidence thresholds. The robustness of the Monte-Carlo simulation (MCS) and historical simulation (H-S) results validates the conditional variances and the corresponding value-at-risk estimates for the Naira exchange rate in relation to each currency of the BRICS derived from the variance-covariance model. GJR-GARCH model reveals critical insights into the valuation and volatility risk associated with the Naira exchange rate against BRICS currencies.

Findings: The valuation of the Naira/Real rate has significant vulnerabilities to changes in oil prices, external debt, and changes in money supply; the results show that the Naira/Rubble exchange rate had significant and negative responsiveness to changes in output growth, crude oil prices and external debt levels; valuation of the Naira/Rupee exchange rate is significantly responsive to the vulnerability of trade balance, external reserves, foreign debt, monetary policy rate, and crude oil prices; valuation of the Naira/Yuan exchange rate has significant vulnerabilities to changes in oil prices, output growth, external debt, and CBN policy rate; valuation of the Naira/Rand has significant vulnerabilities to changes in external reserves, financial healthiness and external debt levels.

Originality / value of the article: The study findings are robust explanation of asymmetric risk identified by VaR with policy advice for the CBN to strategically rebalance its exposure to BRICS currencies by using risk-weighted analysis instead of just trading volumes. Also, the study contributed to prediction of possible losses associated with unfavorable Naira currency fluctuations when trading particularly with the BRICS, and so emphasized the necessity for the adoption of VaR-based stress testing to national foreign exchange reserves and financial institutions. Conclusion: Given the asymmetric risk, the CBN should intentionally rebalance its exposure to BRICS currencies by using risk-weighted analysis instead of just trading volumes. For example, the CBN ought to look at establishing more local currency settlement agreements with the BRICS countries. This could reduce exposure to the volatility of the US dollar and dependence on it.

Keywords: Variance-Covariance methodology, Monte-Carlo Simulation (MCS), Historical-Simulation (H-S), BRICS currencies, VaR, Naira Exchange Rate

JEL: B23, D25, C17.

Navigating risks in multi-stage translations for sustainability communication in the age of Artificial Intelligence

2025-05-20T06:56:07+00:00

Aim: In teaching and science, texts are translated from different languages. In this context, the present study investigates the potential distortions and systemic risks that arise when a source text on energy transition and sustainability is translated multiple times across different languages and by different agents, including professional translators and AI-based translation models. The research aims to analyze how these translations impact meaning, tone, and factual integrity, particularly in the context of complex topics like energy transition and related systemic risks. By comparing multiple versions of a text across English, Polish, and German, the study assesses the implications of translation-mediated communication in sustainability discourse.

Design / Methodology: First, an English source text was created, summarizing two scientific articles on the urgent need for energy transition and related system risk of such a transition. This text was translated into Polish by AI (text A) and by two professional translators (text B and C). The analysis of complexity (using Jasnopis) showed that the Polish texts were more complex (7/7, 7/7 and 6/7) for respectively texts A, B and C, than the English original text (O, 5/7). Text C was selected for translation into German by AI and by two professional translators. For comparison, the English source text was translated into German. The complexity of these translations was compared to the source text and the Polish versions. Afterwards, linguistic and semantic comparisons were carried out, evaluating shifts in meaning using cosine similarity (TF-IDF) and Levenshtein distance (edit distance). Furthermore, changes in emphasis, severity, and emotional tone across translations were analyzed.

Findings: This study shows that multi-stage translations in sustainability communication introduce significant distortions, affecting meaning, tone, and emphasis. AI translations tend to neutralize urgency and emotional intensity, while human translations introduce biases, either amplifying or softening risk perceptions. Additionally, differences in sentence complexity and terminology shift the focus of sustainability discourse. These findings highlight the risks of translation-mediated miscommunication in critical topics like energy transition and systemic risks.

Research limitations: The article presents a case study based on a small sample of translations. The results should be the basis for a more detailed research, comparing a larger group of AI translation and professional translations due to translator’s bias, language-specific issues and the complexity of sustainability related notions.

Originality / Value: This research contributes to the sustainability communication discourse by focusing on the risks of multi-stage translations, where small wording changes can lead to significant distortions in meaning of notions and key-concepts, where miscommunication can impede decision-making and stakeholder involvement.

Keywords: translation accuracy, sustainability communication, multi-stage translation, systemic risks in translation, AI vs. human translation, computational linguistics, language education.

JEL: Q54, Z13, O33, C63.