The socio-economic environment of a country may significantly influence the size and working of the country’s financial markets in the long run. Keeping this in mind, this study aims to analyse the long-run and short-run impact of COVID-19 cases, deaths, stringency index, and vaccinations on the US stock market. Daily time series data ranging from 22 January 2020, to 30 April 2021, was considered in this study. The ARDL bounds test approach was employed to examine long-run and short-run relationships. Our statistical evidence suggests that, in the long run, confirmed cases and stringency have a negative and significant impact on stock markets, whereas vaccinations have a positive and significant effect on the stock markets. This indicates that any public health emergency adversely affects the stock markets, such as a pandemic outbreak. The government should ramp up the efforts towards vaccinating their citizens in the earliest possible timeline. Such actions of resurgence from the pandemic instil confidence in the market. Policymakers should be thoughtful about formulating contingency measures to effectively safeguard the population while preventing the deterioration in investor confidence.

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to examine the impact of economic growth, trade openness and manufacturing on CO2 emissions in India.Design/methodology/approachThe study employed autoregressive distributive lag (ARDL) bounds test approach and uses CO2 emissions, trade, manufacturing and GDP per capita to examine the relationship using an annual time series data from World Development Indicators during 1971 to 2016.FindingsResults depict that there exists a long-run relationship between CO2 emissions and other variables. Trade openness significantly reduces CO2 emissions, whereas manufacturing and GDP have a significant and positive impact on CO2 in the long run.Research limitations/implicationsThe findings of the study contribute to the body of knowledge by providing new evidence on the relationship between developmental metrics and the environment. These findings are critical for policymakers and regulatory bodies to focus on economic development without jeopardizing environmental degradation.Practical implicationsIn order to keep its commitment to sustainability, India needs to develop policies that encourage cleaner production methods and establishment of non-polluting industries. Simultaneously, it must disincentivize industries that emit CO2 by policy frameworks such as carbon taxes, pollution taxes or green taxes.Originality/valueNone of studies examine at how these environmental factors interact in India. Kilavuz and Dogan (2020) used the same variables, but their scope was limited to Turkey. As a result, the study is the first to examine this relationship for India, contributing to the body of knowledge on economic growth, manufacturing, trade openness and environmental concerns.

No abstract