Ar-Rahnu scheme which provides short-term, fast, hassle-free, and riba-free financing to the public becomes more popular nowadays. Several factors can motivate the public to subscribe to Ar-Rahnu products, namely customers’ Shariah view, good customer service, pledge asset, good pricing system, locality, product management, and advertisement. This study reveals that Shariah view, pledge asset, pricing system, locality, and advertisement have a significant relationship with the acceptance of the civil servants in Malaysian public universities towards the Ar-Rahnu scheme. The most dominant factor contributing to the acceptance of low-income civil servants in Malaysian public universities towards Ar-Rahnu scheme in Malaysia is locality. The respondents from the lower-income group in Malaysian public universities agree that the locality of financial institutions providing Ar-Rahnu scheme in their system is considered an important element in enhancing the acceptance towards Ar-Rahnu scheme in Malaysia. Subsequently, future study is needed to acknowledge the acceptance and effect of Ar-Rahnu towards all levels of societies and wider areas.

The study investigates the effect of the Covid-19 on the volatility of the technology and healthcare sector stock index in Malaysia. The two sectors pose considerable attention during the pandemic due to the increase in demand for healthcare products and digital services. The volatilities are estimated using the GARCH model for the period before and after the implementation of the nationwide movement order control using daily data from September 2019 to September 2020. The finding shows that the Covid-19 pandemic caused a volatility jump for the technology sector index in March 2020 but subsided afterward with estimated conditional volatility revert to normal in the middle of April 2020. However, during the high uncertainty period, the healthcare sector shows a steady increase in volatility beginning in March 2020 till the end of September 2020. The study confirms that there is a significant difference in the volatility of healthcare and technology sectors before and during the Covid-19 outbreak. The outbreak has a significant impact on increasing the volatilities for both sectors but is impacted in different magnitude.