UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS AND BUSINESS FACULTY OF FINANCE AND BANKING GRADUATION THESIS Lecturer: PhD. Le Hong Thai Student: Lo Huong Quynh ID card: 18061201 Class: QH-2019 TCNH - Luat Ha Noi - October, 2023 UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS AND BUSINESS FACULTY OF FINANCE AND BANKING GRADUATION THESIS Lecturer: PhD. Le Hong Thai Student: Lo Huong Quynh ID card: 18061201 Class: QH-2019 TCNH - Luat Ha Noi - October, 2023 DECLARATION I hereby declare that this graduation thesis is my own work, with the support of my supervisor, and has not copied the work of others. This is my own research work.
The data and secondary information used in the thesis are sourced and clearly cited. This statement is entirely my responsibility. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First of all, I would like to send my sincere thanks to VNU University of Economics and Business for creating a quality and effective learning environment for me to learn and train myself throughout over 4 years. I would like to express my gratitude to my parents and my sisters.
Without their understanding and great encouragement over the past few years, I would not have been able to complete my studies as well as graduate thesis. Finally, I am extremely grateful to my thesis supervisor - Dr. Le Hong Thai for his valuable advice, constant support and patient teaching throughout my thesis work. His immense knowledge and plentiful experience encouraged me throughout my academic research as well as in my daily life.
His encouragement and comments had significantly enriched and improved my work. Without his motivation and instructions, the thesis would have been impossible to be done effectively. Sincerely! TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARA TION. 000 nọ nọ Họ.
HC HH HH. 0000010 100009090 4 TABLE OF CONTENTS. 000900900900 5 LIST OF ABBREVTA TIONN. 0 000000001000400010050050000000090 7 LIST OF EIGURES.0400000060060000000 9 LIST OF TABLES.
Research ObJ€C{IV€S. HH HH HT re 13 1. Research Questions TT n. - - G5 Họ Họ re 14 1.
Structure of the thesis. eee ec 5 5 5 1 3 9199191201 TH TH HH HH HH HH TT ch ni 14 CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL BASIS AND LITERATURE REVIEW.- - -- c1 vn 1H11 111 11H TH TH HH HT HH re 16 2.-- 6 5 2E E1 1991191 1231 91191 91111 1v nh ng ng rệt 16 2. The history of sustainable development. The definition of sustainable deveÏopImeIn(.
The dimension of sustainable deveÏopImenn(. Sustainable development goals. - -- - +11 E999 9 9v ng ng ng nến 19 2. The definition of sustainable development ØOaÌs.
The content and classification of sustainable development goals. The definition of fintech. The role of FInf€CH. Literature RÑ€VICW.- ác HT TH TH TH TH HH HH HH ke 37 2.
The determinants of sustainable deveÏopImefn(. The impacts of Fintech on sustainable deveÏopImen(.- ---- «+ +5 << +++ss+seesses 38 CHAPTER 3: MODEL SPECIFICATIONS AND DA TA. Model SD€CIÍICAfIOTNS.-- -- G1111 HH HH re 43 3. Data and sample OV€TVICW.-- G1 HH HH re 44 CHAPTER 4: EMPIRICAL RESUL T.-- «+ 1 nh TH TH HH HH ni 49 4.
2101111111011 11 ST ng g5 0kg 51 4. The effect of Fintech on sustainable development ØOaÌS. The effect of Fintech on individual sustainable development gøoals. Robustness and sensitivity CH@CKS.- -- + 111g ng HH nh 58 4.
Using the alternative proxy of FIntech. Using additional control variables .- --- - c + + 331911318911 911311 811 11v nh ngư 63 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSIONN. Summary of key research T€SUÏS. Limitations and directions for future research.
--- 5 5s +2+*23 + ESsEsEEsrskrskrekrrkrske 71 LIST OF ABBREVIATION Abbreviations Full name SDGs Sustainable Development Goals MDGs Millennium Development Goals GDP Gross Domestic Product Fintech Financial Technology UNDP United Nations Development Programme UN The United Nations SDG 1 Sustainable Development Goal 1 SDG 2 Sustainable Development Goal 2 SDG 3 Sustainable Development Goal 3 SDG 4 Sustainable Development Goal 4 SDG 5 Sustainable Development Goal 5 SDG 6 Sustainable Development Goal 6 SDG7 Sustainable Development Goal 7 SDG 8 Sustainable Development Goal 8 SDG 9 Sustainable Development Goal 9 SDG 10 Sustainable Development Goal 10 SDG 11 Sustainable Development Goal 11 SDG 12 Sustainable Development Goal 12 SDG 13 Sustainable Development Goal 13 SDG 14 Sustainable Development Goal 14 SDG 15 Sustainable Development Goal 15 SDG 16 Sustainable Development Goal 16 SDG 17 Sustainable Development Goal 17 WHO World Health Organization ILO International Labor Organization The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate UNFCCC Change ANS Adjusted net savings ratio Al Artificial intelligence loT Internet of Things SMEs Small and Medium Enterprises ATM Atutomated Teller Machine WDI World Development Indicators LIST OE FIGURES Figure 2.2: 17 Sustainable Development Goals LIST OE TABLES Table 3. Variable Explanation and Data SOUTC€S.-- 5 <1 11201 TH HH kh 49 Table 4.G <5 3 93019191 91g nh ng rh 50 Table 4.1: The impacts of ATMs on sustainable developmen.2: The impact of ATMs on Individual Sustainable Development Goals .1: The impacts of SIS on sustainable development .2: The impact of SIS on Individual Sustainable Development Goals .1: The effects of ATMs, urban and inflation on sustainable development goals .2: The effects of SIS, urban and inflation on sustainable development øoals. Research background Since the beginning of the 20th century, the prosperous development of industry has converted a variety of resources and energy into high-value products that improve the quality of human life in many fields (Mann, 2012). However, along with the improvement in the quality of human life comes a serious deterioration of the environment due to toxic waste from production activities and the gradual depletion of natural resources from unsustainable human economic activities.
When the dangers of environmental pollution and energy crises were recognized in the 1980s, sustainability became one of the world's development drivers around the end of the 20th century (Pisani, 2006). The growing interest in sustainability is followed by the continuous development of principles, technologies and government strategies aimed at building sustainable processes and products. As a result, sustainable development has gradually become a prominent economic topic for many countries over the past decades. Sustainable development was first defined by the United Nations in the Brundtland Report (1987) as “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs".
Nowadays, the concept of sustainable development is often associated with Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) published by the United Nations - a set of 17 interconnected goals adopted by world leaders since 2015. SDGs establish a comprehensive plan to address key challenges such as poverty, hunger, health, education, gender equality, clean energy, climate action, sustainable cities, peace and cooperation. These goals are built on the close connection between three aspects of sustainable development including economy, society and environment, with sustainability at the centre (Schleicher, 2018; Swain, 2020). Because sustainable development is considered as one of the most important socio- economic goals in many countries around the world, studying the factors that promote sustainable development is extremely important for both policymakers and researchers.
11 Previous research have documented many determinants of sustainable development, including per capita income (Koirala and Pradhan, 2019), trade openness (Xu et al., 2020), energy efficiency (Kaimuri and Kosimbe, 2017; Karintseva et al., 2021), natural resource rents (Koirala and Pradhan, 2019), inflation (Marinakis and White, 2022), financial development (Pardi et al., 2015), technological innovation (Alola et al., 2021), governance quality (Bogers et al. Especially, the significant development of Fintech has impacted most socio-economic activities in many countries around the world, boosting economic growth (Koren and Tenreyro, 2013; Sahay et al., 2015; Ulucak, 2020; Wang et al., 2019), facilitating financial development (Arner et al., 2020, Zhou et al., 2022; Ahmed and Huo, 2020; Cao et al., 2021; Chu et al., 2022), improving business efficiency (Cui et al., 2022; Yong et al., 2021; Soni et al., 2022), and promoting renewable energy (Arner et al., 2020; Croutzet and Dabbous, 2021). Therefore, Fintech is considered to greatly influence the country's sustainable development (Abdulla et al. Fintech refers to financial innovation created through technology that develops new business models, processes or products which can have a dramatic impact on financial services, organisations and markets (Financial Stability Board, 2016).
Fintech is a general term referring to a combination of various technological means applied in the financial sector, such as blockchain, artificial intelligence, security, Internet of Things and cloud computing (Awais et al. Recent studies show that Fintech in general and Fintech tools in particular have an important impact on sustainable development goals through three aspects of sustainable development: economics, society and environment. Regarding the economic aspect, Fintech is shown to make important contributions in promoting national GDP growth and improving circular economic activities (Pizzi et al., 2021), and enhancing corporate sustainability performance (Jabbour et al. 2020; Khan et al.
2021; Ali et al., 2022; Tang et al. In addition, Fintech also exhibits significant impacts on social issues in such a way that it promotes investment in corporate social responsibility (Liu et al., 2021), enhances financial education and human rights (Andrew Hicks, 2021), and reduces inequality as well as asset discrimination (Catherine Su, 2023). Furthermore, a number of studies have shown that the development of Fintech has multi-dimensional 12 impacts on the environmental outcomes by channelling green financial investment (Guang- Wen and Siddik, 2022; Mosteanu and Faccia, 2020), promoting renewable energy solutions (Croutzet and Dabbous, 2021) while simultaneously causing waste energy (Li et al., 2023), depleting natural resources and polluting the environment (Feng ef al., 2022, Tao et al. On the other hand, other studies explore deeply the direct effects of some Fintech tools on individual sustainable development goals.
For example, Blockchain helps improve goals related to the economic and social aspects of sustainable development (Mooi, 2023). AI is most applied in SDG 3 and SDG 7 (Singh et al; 2023) and machine learning has many dramatic contributions in strengthening SDG 7 and SDG 15 goals (Zhu et al. However, the above studies only focus on the individual effects of Fintech tools on a few sustainable development goals or certain aspects of sustainable development without comprehensive research on the impact of Fintech on overall sustainable development. Therefore, comprehensively studying the effects of Fintech on overall sustainable development with 17 sustainable development goals of the United Nations is extremely necessary in the context of Fintech growing strongly worldwide.
Thus motivated the research topic "Exploring the impacts of Fintech on achieving Sustainable Development Goals: A panel analysis" is chosen. Research objectives This thesis aims to achieve the following research objectives: e To provide a comprehensive theoretical foundation of sustainable development as well as their aspects and the determinants of sustainable development. se To assess the impact of Fintech on the progress towards achieving sustainable development goals. « To propose some policy recommendations for the effective implementation of Fintech tools for achieving sustainable development goals.
Research questions The study focuses on answering the following two research questions: « How does Fintech impact the progress towards achieving the sustainable development goals? e What policy recommendations should be proposed to promote the positive impacts of Fintech for achieving the sustainable development goals? 1. Research scope e Scope of time: 2000 - 2022. e Scope of space: 180 countries e Scope of content: the impact of Fintech on the progress towards achieving the sustainable development goals. Research contribution This thesis aims to contribute in two main aspects.
From the theoretical perspective, this research systematises issues related to sustainable development as well as sustainable development goals (the definitions, characteristics, aspects) and provides an overview of fintech and their impacts on achieving sustainable development goals. From the practical point of view, this research provides empirical evidence on the positive influence of Fintech on the progress towards achieving sustainable development goals through quantitative methods. Besides, this study analyses the impact of Fintech on the individual sustainable development goals. Therefore, some recommendations and solutions can be proposed to boost the effective implementation of Fintech for achieving sustainable development goals.