Zoltan Gal (p)

The effect of foreign direct investment (FDI) on the host economy has attracted much research. Despite the literature is inconclusive it seems to agree that any positive effect of FDI on growth is largest in developed countries. However, in spite of this FDI is considered a panacea for the fundamental problems of economic growth in emerging transition countries including CEE where FDI became main source of investments from the 1990s. Post-socialist transformation is characterized by high dependency on FDI channeled by foreign MNCs into Central and Eastern Europe. The main aim of the research is to analyze the impact of FDI on growth, gross fixed capital accumulation, wealth creation (GNI per capita) on both macro-level and subnational level in CEE. Since the outbreak of the crisis, not only FDI inflows decreased but also the role of foreign capital in promoting economic growth have been revised. The research relies on the analysis of a panel dataset containing time series data for the period 1990/95-2016/18 on Visegrad 4 countries. OLS regression and Granger test were used to statistically verify our presumptions. GDP growth rate, Gross Fixed Capital Formation, GNI per capita, export and import, employment and savings rate are selected as dependent variables; FDI inflows/stocks, banking/portfolio investments used as independent variables, and control for (financial, technology and infrastructure development) and institutional variables. Our preliminary results do not find strong correlation between GDP growth and FDI. Domestic savings and other development indicators are the most important factors for endogenous growth. Concerning the causality the paper would like to test (Granger) whether the FDI generate higher growth or higher level of development is explanatory factor.

It also examines the territorial impact of FDI on the overall economic growth as well as on regional disparities across selected regions. It compares the regions with deeper integration into global value chains through MNCs and examines regional disparities generated by the spatially selective FDI. We argue that positive impact of FDI on regional performance to a large extent depends on the degree of embeddedness of MNCs in the regional economy and the socio-economic conditions of the given region. The overall growth effect and spillovers of FDI can not be confirmed even in regions being the most attractive for international firms.

Anna Mishura (p), Svetlana Ageeva

In the past two decades, Russia has seen a decrease in the number of banks, both as a result of the concentration and consolidation processes taking place in the banking industry throughout the world, and as a result of the Central Bank’s "cleaning" policy.
As a result, there is a weakening of the positions of medium, small and regional banks, which leads to a reduction in the number of regional banks in favour of large interregional banks with extensive office networks and head offices mainly in Moscow.
Studies in financial geography indicate that the geographically centralized financial system may hamper financial development and sufficient lending in regions away from financial centres.
The significant distance between the local office and the head office of the bank creates problems of control, motivation of local managers and information asymmetry between the head office and the local office of the bank, which can reduce the effectiveness of remote bank branches. As a result, banking networks tend to open more branches in the vicinity of the head office, and fewer branches in remote regions or countries. The fact is the evidence of the important role of distances in the sector and raises the question of the consequences of the concentration of head offices of banks in one financial centre for such large country like Russia. At the same time, different banks and types of banks may have a different strategy for the spatial distribution of their offices. The presence in the locations of a sufficient number of banking offices is still a significant factor, especially for the households and small firms, despite the development of remote financial services technologies.
Based on the information available on the Central Bank of Russia website on the availability of bank offices in Russian regions we analyse how the number of bank offices in the region depends from the characteristics of the banks and the regions where the offices are located and from the distances between banks' headquarters and regions.
The purpose of the study is also to identify differences in this regard between different categories of banks, especially between private banks, subsidiary banks of foreign structures and banks with different types of state participation.
Estimation is made using Poisson regression method used to estimate the gravity models of interregional trade.

Svetlana Bekareva (p), Anna Getmanova, Ekaterina Meltenisova (p), Anna Mishura

A modern Russian financial market is characterized by some features that reflect general trends on financial markets. On the Russian financial market some new types of traditional financial intermediaries and innovative fintech companies have appeared; banks put into practice new digital technologies and started working in new types of business; Bank of Russia as a super-regulator follows a policy of strong regulation. All these factors influence level of competition on the financial markets.
Historically, on the Russian financial markets banking sector plays a key role providing access to many types of the financial instruments for the customers, but the situation has been changing. Nowadays different financial intermediaries are active on the financial service markets such as ones of payment, investment, and loan services. Moreover, the Russian Federation regions have their peculiarities because of their economic specialization, opportunities of economic development, and the central bank’s regulation policy. As a rule, competition on a regional financial market is less tough than in general.
The subject of the investigation is the financial market of Novosibirsk region, Siberia, the Russian Federation. Statistical sources are official government databases and Bank of Russia statistics.
The goal of our investigation is analysis of level of competition on key segments of the regional financial market. To get this goal we have worked out the following problems: 1) singled out the most developed segments of financial markets according to the financial services for the region; 2) determined structure of financial intermediaries in the region; 3) found out and made a case for using some indices to assess a competition level; 4) made comparative analysis of the competition levels for the different financial market segments for the last five years, and analysis of the factors influenced them.
We conclude that by now the type of competition on the key segments of the regional financial market is monopolistic competition; and the banking sector dominates.