When submitting a manuscript, authors must disclose any conflicts of interest, in particular competing non-financial or financial interests, regarding the submitted manuscript. In terms of financial conflicts of interest, both in relation to corporate and personal finance: authors should indicate the specific role of the sponsor in the research, preparation of the manuscript and its presentation, as well as organizations or individuals that may have any financial consequences after the publication of the article. The monetary value of their financial interests is not disclosed by the authors.

In terms of non-financial conflicts of interest: we recommend that authors indicate any relationships and participants that are not related to finance, but which may affect the process of considering the publication of the manuscript.

The absence of conflicts of interest or their presence is stated in the Cover Letter, which is a mandatory document attached to the manuscript, without which the manuscript is not considered.

If authors are bound by confidentiality agreements, instead of disclosing information in detail, they must declare that they are bound by confidentiality agreements that prevent them from disclosing their competing interests in the work.

 If the reviewer has a conflict of interest in relation to a potentially peer-reviewed manuscript, he must inform the editor about it. In this case, the manuscript is submitted for review to another expert.

The regulations of the editorial staff in case a conflict of interest is identified at the stage of peer review of a manuscript or after publication implies following the COPE recommendations «What to do if a reviewer suspects undisclosed conflict of interest in a submitted manuscript»  and «What to do if a reader suspects undisclosed conflict of interest in a published article». In particular: the editorial office contacts the corresponding author to clarify the existence of an unspecified conflict of interest, an internal investigation is carried out based on the justifications of the author(s) and the reviewer or an outsider who has declared the existence of a conflict of interest, information about the conflict of interest is declared if it is confirmed as a result of the investigation or the appropriate corrections are made according to the article's retraction policy.