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The aim of the study was to examine the differences in the perception of the use of selected principles by CSR managers and owners of Micro, Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (MSMEs) in the V4 countries. The results of our research show that CSR strategies are most used by entrepreneurs and managers of MSMEs in Hungary, Poland and Slovakia. They are the least used in the Czech Republic. The sectoral comparison within the V4 countries highlighted interesting findings. When considering the moral and ethical implications of decision-making, no significant differences were found between the sectors. Differences were found in the perception of the CSR concept and its use in business. The CSR concept was mostly used in tourism and agriculture, to a lesser extent in construction, retail, manufacturing and services. Managers and entrepreneurs understand the link between CSR and gaining reputation and business opportunities and that CSR helps build a competitive advantage. The size of the company affects whether the company can be classified as CSR-oriented. Compared to medium-sized enterprises, micro-enterprises are 45% less likely and small enterprises are 33.5% less likely to be perceived as CSR-oriented. Compared to companies from Slovakia, companies in the Czech Republic are 41% less likely to be perceived as CSR-oriented. Hungarian companies are 70% more likely to be perceived as CSR-oriented compared to companies from Slovakia. Companies run by women are more inclined to apply CSR principles than men.

Abstract. For a long time China was viewed as a typical host country in international capital flows. Long-term rapid economic growth and trade surpluses produced quick accumulation of capital in China which has led to increasing capital flows abroad from public and private companies. When amid the global economic crisis of 2008-2009 domestic investment declined in many economically developed countries, Chinese investments stepped into their domestic investment markets to fill the void. The aim of this paper is to document the growth of Chinese investment in Europe, and to identify the main factors behind this growth. Анотация. Долгое время Китай воспринимался на мировом рынке капитала исключительно как типичная страна-реципиент инвестиций. Однако стремительный экономический рост и значительный профицит торгового баланса обеспечили накопление в КНР значительных финансовых средств и сделали возможным рост государственных и частных инвестиций за рубежом. Когда мировой финансовый кризис 2008-2009 гг. привел к сокращению объема внутренних инвестиций во многих экономически развитых странах, китайские инвестиции стали массово приходить в эти страны. Целью статьи является определение масштабов китайских инвестиций после мирового экономического кризиса и факторов, сделавших возможным значительный рост инвестиционной активности КНР. В статье также проанализировано географическое распределение китайских инвестиций в Европе, особое внимание уделено центральноевропейскому региону.

This paper aims to examine the trends of Chinese high-tech acquisitions in the EU countries, describe the policies that these acquisitions prompted on the level of member states and the EU, and analyze the effects of these policy responses. The results of the research review clearly show an increasing number of takeovers of European companies in the high-tech sectors, especially in the big member states such as Germany, France, or the UK. This created a backlash from the European policymakers that led to an introduction of tighter screening regimes in many EU member states and the creation of a common EU framework for FDI screening and its strategic management. At this point, it is hard to evaluate the complete effect of this new framework, but it must be concluded that 82 percent of the Chinese strategic acquisitions made in 2018 would fall under at least one criterion of the new EU framework. The findings of this paper provide sound recommendations for the EU countries and their public authorities targeting to control Chinese outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) and limit the acquisition of local companies in sensitive industries. On the other hand, the coming recession may put at least a temporary halt on Chinese acquisitions of the European companies. Acknowledgment This paper is the partial result of the GAAA – Grantová agentura Akademické alliance grant project No. GA/6/2019 – Strategic Performance Management of Companies and Multinational Corporations in the Context of Globalization and Sustainability.

The paper applies a variant of the gravity model to test whether there is a positive link between the size of trade flows and the extent to which they follow the pattern of comparative advantage. Using UNCTAD's 2016 trade data for every country in the world, and 255 merchandise items, we show that countries trading more with each other tend to follow the patterns of comparative advantages more than countries with smaller mutual trade flows. While smaller trade flows can be easily influenced by business decisions of individual companies or one-off trade contracts going against trade pattern predictions, this is not the case with larger flows. We also find signs that holding trade volume constant, more distant countries trade less than geographically proximate countries, in line with predictions from comparative advantage. The results are valid for the whole database of all country pairs in world trade, but the goodness of fit increases with the number of items these country pairs trade in. The paper is the first insight into the topic and can be expanded to a higher level of disaggregation and more variables in future research.