The Journal “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” considers publication ethics a significant issue in the editorial and publication policy. The Editorial Board, the Editorial Office and External Reviewers adhere topublishing ethics principles and world-recognised high standards of scholarly publishing. In our Code of Conduct, we use the recommendations provided by the Committee on Publication Ethics. As a publisher, we use guidelines such as Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing and Code of Conduct and Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors.

1. Web-site

The scientific journal “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” has a website that provides all necessary information about the journal according to ethical and professional standards.

The website describes in detail all elements of the editorial and publication policy, presents instructions for authors, members of the Editorial Board, and External Reviewers, describes in detail the submission procedure for manuscript consideration, the cost of publication and the system of discounts. It contains information about the co-founders and the publisher of the journal, the editorial team and provides contact information of the Editorial office, full data on members of the Editorial Board and External Reviewers, indexing databases and aggregators of content, software products used to check for plagiarism, regularly updated news, information on partnerships and cooperation, and services provided.

All issues of the journal are open access on the website since its inception. The page of each article contains information about the authors, an abstract of the article and a list of references, dates of receipt of the manuscript, its acceptance and publication, a counter of downloads and views of the article from the site. A reader can download the full text of the article without any restrictions from the article page on the journal’s website.

The journal’s website has English and Ukrainian versions.

The site contains buttons for quick and convenient contact with the Editors-in-Chief and the Editorial Team, as well as online payment.

The Editorial Office of the journal regularly takes all necessary measures for the constant operation of the site, ensuring cyber security and data preservation.

In the “Aims and Scope” tab on the website, the key areas of research, the results of which can be published in the journal, the target audience, subject areas and categories, as well as their classifications and other important information, are clearly defined (see below).

The print and electronic ISSNs of the “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” journal are displayed on the website (ISSN – 2521-1250 (print); ISSN – 2521-1242 (online)).

2. Title of journal

The journal “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” has a unique title that cannot be confused with other journals. This information is clearly stated on the website of the “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” journal.

3. Peer-review process

The journal “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” supports the double-blind peer review model. Manuscripts are reviewed by members of the Editorial Board (the list and detailed information about them are presented at the link), as well as External Reviewers (the list of which is also presented on the website at the link).

Reviewers are selected based on their research interests which must align with the article’s theme. Referee reports are sent to the authors and contain the reviewers’ opinions on the acceptance/rejection/revision of the manuscript and recommendations to the authors. The journal’s website describes the review process and its stages, possible reasons for rejecting an article (Peer review process), and detailed explanations of the principles of reviewers’ work and recommendations for their actions in various cases (Guidelines for Reviewers).

4. Journal ownership and management

Sumy State University (Ukraine) and Academic Research and Publishing UG (i. G.) (Germany) are Co-Founders of “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks Journal”. Academic Research and Publishing UG (i. G.) is a Publisher of “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks Journal”.

5. Governing body

Journal editors, co-founders and the publisher cooperate and distribute duties and responsibilities in accordance with the publication policy of the journal.

For the coordination of all management processes of the journal “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks”, the Council of Co-founders has been formed. It consists of six authorized representatives of co-founders of the journal (three from each of the co-founders). Its staff is listed on the website of the journal.

The Co-founders Council is responsible for approving the editorial policy of the journal; listens to the reports of the Editors-in-Chief regarding the journal activities, program goals and make decisions on these issues; decides on publication issues, changes in the staff of the co-founders; makes changes to the Editors-in-Chief of the journal, considers other organizational issues related to the management of the journal’s activities. Decisions are made Co-founders made through open voting by most of the members of the Council participating in the meeting.

As per the key principles of the WAME, co-founders and the publisher are authorized to hire and fire editors and members of the Editorial Board but only for substantial reasons, particularly, making unreasonable decisions, violating the journal’s editorial policy or personal conduct (e.g., criminal acts, ethical violations, dishonest fulfilment of duties) that is inconsistent with trust.

The main provisions of the journal’s Editorial Independence can be found on the website.

The Editors-in-Chief, Section Editors, members of the Editorial Board, External Invited Reviewers, and the Editorial Office of the “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” journal are involved in the journal’s activities. Members of the Editorial Board and External Reviewers are specialists in fields that correspond to the journal’s aims and adhere to standards of publication ethics. The lists of Editorial Board and External Reviewers are regularly reviewed. The full names, affiliations, research interests, links to the scientific profiles of the members of Editorial Board and External Reviewers are represented on the journal’s website. Responsibilities of Editors-in-Chief, Section Editors, members of the Editorial Board, Managing Editors, Technical Editors, as well as a button for quick and convenient contact with the Editors-in-Chief can be found on website: Guidelines for Editors and Guidelines for Reviewers

6. Editorial team/contact information

The full names and affiliations and contact information of all members of Editorial Board, Editorial Office, as well as theEditors-in-Chief, Managing Editors, Technical Editors, Proof-readers, Graphic Designers and Web manager, are indicated on the website of the journal.

The journal’s website also provides complete contact information of the Editorial Office (address, phone, fax, e-mail). This link also has a button for quick contact with the journal editors.

The website presents information about the “ARMG Publishing” as an interinstitutional center of Sumy State University, which is responsible for the publication of the journal by one of the co-founders – Sumy State University.

7. Copyright and licensing

The policy for copyright is clearly described at the website of the journal. All papers are published under an open access Creative Commons CC BY license, which allows for the use, distribution and reproduction of the article in any medium, as long as the original work is properly cited. The CC BY license permits both commercial and non-commercial reusing. If the authors used the previously published information (text, figures, tables, etc.) they should receive the permission for its using and republishing, as well as put the correct link to the original source. It should be done prior to submitting the paper.

The “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” is an open access journal. Detailed information about the journal’s policy regarding open access can be found on the journal’s website under the Open access statement and reference metadata tab.

All citation data in articles are active and real and they are structured and open according to Creative Commons licenses. Authors should avoid using any form of citation manipulation in accordance with the guidelines COPE Guidelines on Citation manipulation.

All articles published in the journal have DOIs (digital object identifiers) that contain all associated metadata and articles URL.

8. Article processing charge

There is an article processing charge, paid by the author when the article is accepted for publication after peer review (“Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” Journal does not charge fees for submitting or reviewing articles). The charge covers the costs of editing the manuscript text, figures and tables, text formatting, the review process administration, archiving of articles, site administration (posting of articles on the site, its maintenance and support), promoting of the journal and articles (distribution of journal content, maintenance of indexing services, etc) and customer support. The potential authors can find all information about author payments on the website at the Article processing charge and discounts before submitting their manuscripts for review or preparing their manuscript for submission.

The article processing charge of 50 EUR is paid by the authors after their acrticles has been accepted for publication. Payment does not depend on the length of the article.

Payment for the article publication can be made through the online payment system.

The journal provides discounts for authors from low- and middle-income countries (20% and 10%, respectively). Authors from developing countries, countries with military conflicts, as well as authors who do not have the financial means to pay the article processing charge may be exempted from payment.Moreover, the journal provides an opportunity for Ukrainian scientists to receive grants for publication. Detailed information about these possibilities is available on the journal’s website under the Article processing charge and discounts and APC for Developing Countries links.

The “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” Journal adheres to the Fair Open Access Alliance recomendations for providing a transparent fee structure in accordance with Principle 5 Plan S.

9. Identifying research misconduct and handling allegations of research misconduct

The Editorial Board urges all authors, who intend to submit a manuscript to the journal “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks”, to adhere to the principles of scientific transparency, honesty, thoroughness and excellence in research, show respect for co-authors and research participants.

The Editorial Board of the journal “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” adheres to ethical standards in the publishing and scientific spheres, as well as the COPE principles. Before sending articles for review, all submitted articles are checked for originality and plagiarism.

Plagiarism

Plagiarism is an act of using ideas, scientific results or fragments of the text from other studies without giving proper reference to the original source. Self-plagiarism, also known as redundant publication, occurs when an author publishes the same scientific results under different names and/or in different journals. All manuscripts submitted to the journal “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” should be free of plagiarism and self-plagiarism. The Editorial Board strictly rejects any manuscript that contains any form of plagiarism, whether it is deliberate or careless plagiarism. Self-plagiarism is also unacceptable. The presence of plagiarism in an article indicates unethical and unprofessional behavior of the author(s) and may undermine the reputation of the author(s) and the journal.

According to the journal’s policy, articles that contain only the authors’ ideas and the results of their research are accepted for consideration. The Journal “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” uses StrikePlagiarism.com and iThenticate to check articles for originality and plagiarism.

The Editorial Board will reject manuscripts that contain any form of plagiarism, such as:

• direct;
• copying;
• self-plagiarism (recirculation);
• mosaic (patchwriting);
• accidental;
• remix;
• hybrid;
• mashup;
• links to non-existent sources;
• aggregator;
• re-Tweet.

The journal’s website at the link Plagiarism Statement provides detailed information on the types and forms of plagiarism (literal, substantial, paraphrasing) and outlines the sanctions for researchers who violate the policy of borrowings (plagiarism).

Other types of research misconduct

In addition to plagiarism, there are many cases in which the action is recognized as research misconduct:

• Manipulation of authorship or contempt for the other researchers’ contributions to publications.
• Submission or publication of the same research in two different journals both at the same time and with a gap of several years.
• Redundant publication (known as “salami publishing”).
• Manipulation of citations.
• Falsification of data.
• Fabrication of data.
• Reprinting significant portions of early publications, including translations, without proper acknowledgment or citation of the original work.
• Concealment (silencing) of research results.
• Enabling sponsors to compromise the independence of the research process or the reporting of results to formulate or disseminate a biased view of the research.
• Unjustified expansion of the research bibliography.
• Maliciously accusing the researcher of committing a misdemeanor (crime) or other violations.
• Distortion of scientific achievements.
• Exaggeration of the practical significance of the results.
• Delaying or unnecessarily complicating the work of other researchers (sabotage).
• Abuse of an official position to encourage the violation of research integrity.
• Ignoring alleged violations of research integrity by other persons or covering up a misdemeanor (crime) or other violations by institutions.
• Creating or supporting journals that neglect research quality control (“predatory journals”).

Detailed information on the content of these types of research violations is provided on the journal’s website under the link Research misconduct policies.

Procedure for handling allegations of research misconduct

If ethical violations are detected during submission, reviewor publication of a manuscript, the Editorial Board will follow the procedure outlined below:

• Inform all authors and/or reviewers about the revealed facts of research violations, non-compliance with publication ethics and misconduct.
• Publish an official notice with a detailed description of misconduct on the journal’s website.
• Terminate consideration and review the manuscript (if it has not yet been published) or retraction of the article (if unethical behavior has been already found after publication of the article).
• If the revealed facts of ethical violations on the part of the authors are significant, the Editorial Board reserves the right to inform about it the organizations where the authors work, the institutions that funded the research or other research authorities.

The following sanctions may be imposed in the case of violation of the Research misconduct policy during research: 1) immediate rejection of the manuscript and other subsequent manuscripts submitted by the author(s) to the journal, the co-founder of which is Sumy State University; 2) ban on submission of manuscripts for 1–2 years; 3) a ban on holding the position of editor and performing the duties of a reviewer of the journal, the co-founder of which is Sumy State University.

The above mentioned information is available on the journal’s web page under the link Research misconduct policies.

10. Publication Ethics

The journal “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” adheres to the ethical principles of COPE. They are based on mutual trust among all participants involved in the publishing process. The publication ethics policy is described in detail on the journal’s website:

1. Authorship and contributorship. According to the Publishing policy of the journal Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks and following the COPE principles, an author (the co-author) of the manuscript is a person who either owns an idea or develops and implements research through the dissemination of intellectual and creative works. When defining authors and authorship, Authorship and Authorship Responsibilities proposed by the Council of Science Editors (CSE) and Defining the Role of Authors and Contributors, determined by International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) are taken into account. On the journal’s website, under the Authorship and contributorship link, the authorship criteria are defined in accordance with the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors Recommendations (ICMJE Recommendations 2019). Moreover, ways of identifying other persons in the article (except the authors) who participated in its preparation, the rights and obligations of the corresponding author, approaches to determining the author’s contribution and specification of the authors’ roles in accordance with the principles and recommendations of СОРЕ and CRediT – Contributor Roles Taxonomy are demonstrated.
2. Ways for considering complaints and appeals. The types of complaints and appeals accepted by the Editorial Board are described in detail on the journal’s website under the Complaints policy link. The detailed procedure for considering complaints is defined (in the form of a block diagram according to COPE, see here), contacts for submitting complaints and appeals are provided. The Editorial Board of the Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks journal promptly responds to complaints. A confirmation letter is sent to the complainant, which confirms the fact of receiving the complaint and determines the deadline (not exceeding 7 days), during which the Editorial Board undertakes to review the complaint on the merits and notify the complainant. If the Editorial Office receives any complaints about submitted or printed manuscripts, the Editorial Board must take appropriate and reasonable measures to objectively consider these complaints on the merits and resolve the problem, if the fact of ethical violations is confirmed. During the complaint review process, the author should be given the right to respond to any allegations and provide their own comments on the merits of the complaint.
3. Conflicts of interests. Cases in which conflicts of interest may arise are described in detail on the journal’s website under the link Conflicts of interest. Each group of participants in the publication process (authors, members of the Editorial Board, Editors and Reviewers) are provided with a set of actions in detail to avoid a conflict of interest, report it in a timely manner, and resolve it. The content and methods of submitting a conflict-of-interest statement and and the a statement of Information Disclosure are also defined. The content of interests that must be disclosed by all participants in the publication process and that may lead to a conflicts of interest is described in detail: financial interests (direct or indirect), personal relationships and beliefs, academic competitions, unpaid positions of authors, membership in professional organizations, political or religious preferences , institutional affiliation, etc.
4. Reproducibility and robustness. The Journal “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” urges researchers to be transparent about the data used and the methodology of their research, which in turn will ensure the reproducibility of experiments in the future. When publishing articles in the FMIR journal, authors must attach all open data with a complete and accurate description of the experiment (source data, methods and results). It is unethical and unacceptable for authors to distort data or use unverified information. Authors are obliged to test their models and methods of obtaining results, which should be appropriately explained and provided in the article. Detailed information on the policy of the journal in the direction of ensuring reproducibility and robustness of data is available on the journal’s website under the Reproducibility and robustness link.
5. Ethical oversight. The journal “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” relies on the definition of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) on the ethical oversight, namely: “Ethical oversight should include, but is not limited to, policies on consent to publication, publication on vulnerable populations, ethical conduct of research using animals, ethical conduct of research using human subjects, handling confidential data and business/marketing practices” (https://publicationethics.org/oversight). Detailed information about the journal’s policy on ethical oversight is available on the website under the Ethical oversight link. When reporting about experiments on human, authors (co-authors) must indicate whether the procedures followed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the Human Experimentation Committees (institutional and national) and the WMA Declaration of Helsinki, with all current amendments and additions. When reporting about experiments on animal, authors (co-authors) should indicate whether institutional and national guidelines for the care and use of laboratory animals were followed.
6. Intellectual property. The Editorial Board of the journal “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” places significant emphasis on the issues of copyright infringement, scientific ethics, plagiarism or other violations of best publishing practices and is focused on protecting the authors’ rights. Authors (co-authors) guarantee that their manuscript is original, does not infringe intellectual property rights, and has not been previously published or submitted to other journals for publication. All articles published in “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” journal are copyrighted by the author(s) of the article. All articles are licensed under Creative Commons CC BY. If the authors used previously published information (text, figures, tables, etc.) and this material does not have a copyright or is in the public domain, additional permission for its re-publication is not required. There is a list of cases when it is unnecessary to obtain permission to use the information on the journal’s website under the link Copyright and Licensing. If previously published information has a copyright, permission must be obtained from the journal where this information was published for the first time, for its re-publication. The link Copyright and Licensing provides detailed information on when such permission must be obtained, as well as the way how the fact of obtaining permission to publish relevant information should be confirmed.
7. Retraction and correction after publication. The policy of making corrections, additions to already published articles, publication of statements about the removal of articles, as well as notifications by the editor to readers about the investigation of certain issues regarding the published article by the journal and statements by editors warning readers about serious concerns about the publication integrity are demonstrated on the journal website, under the link Correction policy. On the journal’s website, the Retractions link outlines the journal’s policy for retracting a publication, i.e., notifying readers that an article contains invalid results. It is based on COPE instructions (COPE Council. COPE Guidelines: Retraction Guidelines.) and recommendations of the European Association of Scientific Editors. Retractions are made when there is clear evidence that the results of the study are erroneous and unreliable, due to unethical behavior, intentional or unintentional error. The journal clearly defines the circumstances and process under which an article can be retracted, the content of the Article retraction notification, and provides a link to the form to be filled out by the initiator of the article retraction.
8. Inclusive language. “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” journal encourages the authors to use an inclusive language of the material presentation, thereby recognizing the diversity, individual differences and equal opportunities of people, showing respect for each individual. The language of the manuscript should not contain signs of age, racial, ethnic, cultural, gender, physical or other discrimination.

11. Publishing schedule

“Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” journal has been published quarterly (in March, June, September, December) since 2017. The publishing schedule is indicated on the main page of the journal website.

12. Access

The journal “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” is open access. The Editorial Board adheres to the principles of the Budapest Open Access Initiative, 2002, which defines “open access” as free access to article content on the Internet that allows any user to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or refer to the full texts of articles, scan them for indexing, transmit them as data to software, or use them for any other legitimate purpose without financial, legal, or technical barriers, except from those inseparable from accessing the Internet itself. The only restriction on reproduction and distribution, and the only role of copyright in this area, is to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to proper recognition and citation”. Marks about open access to the texts of articles are presented on the main page of the journal’s website and next to each article in the table of contents of the corresponding issue. Readers can access all issues of the journal on the website at the link and the contents of the latest issue can be found at the link.

The journal supports the following initiatives: Budapest Open Access Initiative, the Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities, The Initiative for Open Citations (I4OC), adheres to the recommendations of the Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA), the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), joined the Cited-by (CrossRef) service.

13. Archiving

Archiving and storing of the FMIR journal content is ensured by:

• Site archiving: All digital content (in XML and PDF format) is collected on a single cloud server that is available to readers online. In any case, a backup copy of digital content (in both XML and PDF format) will be kept for 24-36 hours.
• Abstracting/indexing: The journal is indexed in many scientometric databases and stored on content aggregators, a full list of which is presented on the journal website at the link.
• Self-archiving: Accepted articles can be archived by authors in their institutional repositories or on personal websites/pages. However, it is important that authors include the following statement: “The published paper is available at http://dx.doi.org/[DOI of the document]”. It will identify the name of the journal and the publisher.
• Independent and local archives: Readers can access manuscripts of the local eSSUIR (Electronic Sumy State University Institutional Repository) and independent archives (Vernadskyi National Library of Ukraine, Sherpa Romeo, Portico).

Detailed information about the archiving policy is presented on the journal’s website under the link Digital archiving and preservation policy.

14. Sources of revenue

The journal’s revenue sources are fees paid by authors, institutions, or research sponsors for processing an article when it is accepted for publication after peer review (there are no submission or review fees). This fee covers the costs for copy editing, text formatting, creating figures and tables, etc. This fee also includes administration of the review process, archiving of articles, site administration (posting of articles on the site, maintenance and support), promotion of the journal and articles (distribution of journal content, maintenance of indexing services, etc.) and customer support. Detailed information is indicated on the links Article processing charge. and APC for Developing Countries..

In addition, the journal’s revenue sources include the fee for preparing a selection of articles (thematic collection) upon individual request from authors or readers. A selection of articles published in different issues of the journal can be ordered based on such criteria (such as topic, author or group of authors, authors from a certain country, region, university or institution, etc). The price for preparing such a thematic collection (selection of articles) for a specific request is agreed upon separately. Detailed information is indicated at the link..

As the ARMG Publishing operates on the material and technical base of Sumy State University as an inter-institutional center, the university provides institutional, organizational, informational and technical support for publishing the journal.

15. Advertising

The “Financial Markets, Institutions and Risks” journal does not endorse advertising commercial products and services. The Editorial Board promotes scientific conferences, books, publications, services and/or products that encourage lifelong learning and expand educational and scientific collaboration. Decisions on advertising are approved by the co-founders, publisher, Head of the ARMG Publishing Center and the Editors-in-Chief. Advertising does not influence the decision to publish articles. Detailed information is indicated by the link on the website.

16. Direct marketing

The promotion of the journal and/or individual articles is carried out in compliance with the principles of publishing ethics where information is truthful and does not mislead readers or authors. The promotion implemented through email marketing, co-organization of conferences and other scientific events, professional social networks; specialized associations, platforms, organizations and partners of the journal, as well as other advertising activities. Detailed information is indicated on the website.