Waheed Akhter

Impact of Muslim Holy Days on Asian stock markets: An empirical evidence

Abstract This study investigated the impact of Muslim Holy Days on daily stock returns of Asian financial markets for a period of 2001–2014. These markets include Pakistan, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey. The study has tried to isolate the effect of Gregorian calendar anomalies from Muslim Holy Days to certify that the documented effect is actually a result of Muslim Holy Days rather than Gregorian calendar anomalies. Pooled fixed/random effect Panel Regression is used to check the underlined effect. The results reveal that Eid-ul-Fitr is the only Holy day, which has significant positive effect on stock returns of Asian markets, while all other Holy Days have no effect. Friday is the only Gregorian calendar anomaly, which exists in Asian markets. These results provide support to the fact that both Islamic and Gregorian calendar anomalies exist in Asian markets.

Determinants of Takāful and conventional insurance demand: A regional analysis

Abstract In this study, we focused on analysing and differentiating the determinants of conventional insurance and Takāful demand across ASEAN and Middle East Regions. We used panel data econometrics on a sample of 14 Asian countries having both conventional insurance and Takāful over the period 2005–2014. We applied fixed and random effect regression models to assess the impact of macroeconomic and demographic factors on conventional insurance and Takāful demand. Income and financial sector were found to have significant positive impact on insurance demand across all regions. On the other hand, dependency ratio was found to be negatively affecting Takāful demand across all regions while inflation shows positive impact. Urbanization was found to be significant positive impact on both conventional insurance and Takāful demand. Financial sector development positively triggers the insurance and Takāful demand across ASEAN region, while it triggers conventional insurance demand only in Middle East Region. Education shows negative impact on Takāful demand across both regions while it shows positive impact on insurance demand in Middle East. The study recognises the key role of urbanization and education in creating awareness to enhance Takāful demand in large populated countries of ASEAN and South Asia.

Investigating the impact of Shari’ah perception on customer switching intentions: A study of Takāful and conventional insurance

Abstract The core objective of this paper is to examine the relationship between the Shari’ah perceptions and the customers’ switching intentions in both Takāful and Conventional Insurance. In today’s world, most of the businesses are focusing on customer retention rather than the customer acquisition. However, our current knowledge of insurance systems is unable to address the crucial issues of target achieving marketing tactics. Takāful is firming its roots in Muslim communities across the globe. As per customer satisfaction been considered as an important factor of customer switching, we have gone further and investigated the mediating role of customer satisfaction to customer switching intentions. The sample size of 400 customers of major life Insurance and family Takāful companies was taken using convenient sampling method. Mediation analysis was performed to test the mediating role of customer satisfaction in Family Takāful and Life Insurance. The impact of Shari’ah perceptions in life insurance and family Takāful was found significant. Furthermore, customer switching intentions were partially mediated by customer satisfaction. This study has some important implications for the insurance/Takāful practitioners and policymakers. It urges the Insurance/Takāful operators to maintain and develop strong long-term relationships with the customers to reduce their switching intentions. For Takāful practitioners, there is a need to develop clear understanding of Takāful in the minds of customers as well as general public.

Service quality and the moderating effect of Shari’ah perception on client satisfaction: A comparison of Islamic and conventional microfinance in Pakistan

Abstract Microfinance is an emerging concept which is improving the socioeconomic status of customers. This study assesses customer satisfaction of clients of Islamic and conventional microfinance providers using a sample of 578 clients i.e. 289 from each side. Akhuwat and Kashf (Islamic microfinance) and RCDS and DAMEN (conventional microfinance) are selected. The correlation, regression, ANOVA, and interaction tests are used for testing the relationship of Shari’ah perception as moderator between service quality and client satisfaction. The results indicate that Shari’ah perception acts as a strong moderator in case of Islamic microfinance whereas it is a weak moderator in case of conventional microfinance. The study concludes that Shari’ah perception is playing a vital role in enhancing the customer satisfaction in Islamic microfinance. It has important implications for policy-makers and Islamic microfinance providers to design Shari’ah awareness programs to enhance the Shari’ah perception of low income population.

Factors affecting employee job satisfaction: A comparative study of conventional and Islamic insurance

Abstract This paper attempts to investigate the factors that affect job satisfaction of sales agents from Islamic (Hereafter; Takāful) and conventional insurance of Pakistan using Herzberg two-factor motivation theory. Using multi-stage stratified random sampling, we received a total of 318 usable responses (185 from family Takāful and 133 from life insurance). A multiple regression and hierarchal regression model including 11 hygiene–motivational factors were used to examine job satisfaction in the presence of moderating factor Shari’ah perception. The outcomes regarding Herzberg two-factor theory were entirely distinctive between those two direct sales groups with the presence of moderating variable Shari’ah perception. Without moderating the effect of Shari’ah perception, family Takāful and conventional life insurance full-time direct sales agents demonstrated that hygiene factors and motivational factors were both more effective indicators of job satisfaction in Pakistani context. While checking the moderating effect in the presence of moderating variable Shari’ah perception, family Takāful sales agents are satisfied with hygiene factors where the motivators are not significantly affected by Shari’ah perception. On the other hand, conventional life insurance sales agents have no concern with Shari’ah perception.