Post-privatization state ownership and bank risk-taking: Cross-country evidence

We examine the relation between state residual ownership and bank risk-taking for privatized banks from 45 countries. Applying propensity score matching, we find that privatized banks tend to exhibit higher levels of risk-taking post-privatization than their publicly listed non-privatized counterparts. Moreover, partially privatized banks exhibit higher levels of risk-taking than fully privatized banks. We also observe a positive and significant relation between the level of residual state ownership and risk-taking. These findings are consistent with the distorted objectives associated with government control, as suggested by the political benefits of control, and with the soft budget constraint views of state ownership. The distortion can be mitigated by the quality of a country's institutional and regulatory environments. Finally, our results show that the effect of state ownership on risk-taking is more pronounced in countries with a higher dominance of state-owned enterprises, and it was more prevalent during the global financial crisis.     

货币政策调整对企业投资的差异性效应——理论分析与经验证据

基于国有与非国有企业并存的二元所有制结构背景,本文分析宽松货币政策对企业投资偏离的总量经济效应与所有制差异效应,运用2008年至2019年中国A股上市公司数据进行实证检验,结果表明:(1)当企业面临较高的投资机会时,宽松货币政策通过流动性效应降低了企业外部融资约束,对投资不足产生显著抑制效应;(2)宽松货币政策对不同所有制企业投资偏离存在差异性效应,信贷扩张导致国有企业过度投资,受银行信贷配给和国有投资挤出影响,非国有企业投资不足加剧。     

Internal Funds Allocation and the Ownership Structure: Evidence from Korean Business Groups

We examine the relationship between the controlling shareholder’s cash flow rights and the funds transfer in the internal capital market within Korean business groups (chaebols) during the period from 1998 to 2001. We find that the funds allocation in the firms where controlling shareholders have high cash flow rights is better aligned with the investment opportunities and therefore, more efficient than in the firms where they have low cash flow rights. This effect is stronger when they have controlling powers large enough to expropriate minority shareholders. However, during the financial crisis period, funds simply move toward the firms where controlling shareholders have high cash flow rights. The results evidence the tunneling behavior in the internal capital market within a chaebol that the ownership structure distorts the allocation of internal funds in such a way as to benefit the controlling shareholders.JEL Classification: G31, G30     

The determinants of cash flow sensitivity of cash: The family ownership effect

This paper investigates firms’ cash flow sensitivity of cash (CFSC) in a European setting. We examine the differing effects of financial constraints and income and substitution effects on CFSC in the context of the family ownership structure. When examining the shareholders’ behavior within the ownership structure of family firms, we find a positive CFSC level for our full sample. Our results show a significant connection between the family ownership structure and CFSC’s determinant factors: the higher (lower) sensitivity for the firms with more (less) financial constraints suggests that family firms are financially less constrained than non-family firms. Additionally, contrary to prior literature, we find income and substitution effects have a nonnegative effect on CFCS. We explain this finding from a productivity shocks perspective related to the financial crisis, which occurs during our analysis period.     

Ownership Structure, Corporate Governance, and Firm Value: Evidence from the East Asian Financial Crisis

We use a sample of 800 firms in eight East Asian countries to study the effect of ownership structure on value during the region's financial crisis. The crisis negatively impacted firms' investment opportunities, raising the incentives of controlling shareholders to expropriate minority investors. Crisis period stock returns of firms in which managers have high levels of control rights, but have separated their control and cash flow ownership, are 10–20 percentage points lower than those of other firms. The evidence is consistent with the view that ownership structure plays an important role in determining whether insiders expropriate minority shareholders.     

The role of cross-listing,foreign ownership and state ownership in dividend policy in an emerging market

In this paper, we investigate if dividend policy is influenced by ownership type. Within the dividend literature, dividends have a signaling role regarding agency costs, such that dividends may diminish insider conflicts (reduce free cash flow) or may be used to extract cash from firms (tunneling effect) – which could be predominant in emerging markets. We expect firms with foreign ownership and those that are listed in overseas markets to have different dividend policies and practices than those that are not, and firms with more state ownership and less individual ownership to be more likely to pay cash dividends and less likely to pay stock dividends. Using firms from an emerging economy (China), we examine whether these effects exist in corporate dividend policy and practice. We find that both foreign ownership and cross-listing have significant negative effects on cash dividends, consistent with the signaling effect and the notion of reduced tunneling activities for firms with the ability to raise capital from outside of China. Consistent with the tunneling effect, we find that firms with higher state ownership tend to pay higher cash dividends and lower stock dividends, while the opposite is true for public (individual) ownership. Further analysis shows that foreign ownership mediates the effect of state ownership on dividend policy. Our results have significant implications for researchers, investors, policy makers and regulators in emerging markets.     

融资融券、终极控制人两权分离与大股东掏空抑制

采用2010-2016年沪深两市A股上市公司数据,考察融资融券机制、终极控制人两权分离对大股东掏空行为的影响.研究发现:两权分离度越高,大股东掏空越严重.而融资融券抑制了终极控制人两权分离引起的大股东掏空.进一步分析发现:在投资者保护环境更差、信息披露质量较低、内部治理机制更差的公司中,融资融券的掏空治理效应更加明显.     

Corporate Performance of Mixed Enterprises

We delineate Hong Kong listed corporations into three levels of privatization: the fully privatized blue chips, semi‐privatized red chips and the least privatized H shares. Both H shares and red chips are mixed enterprises that mimic private ownership with joint government and private stock ownership. We find that mixed enterprises are less profitable and lower valued than the fully privatized blue chips, but red chips are more efficient and perform better than blue chips when market confidence swings to their favor. Regression analysis suggests that increased stock ownership by the government and increased emolument incentives are counterproductive to profitability, especially in bad economic times of the 1997–98 Asian financial crisis.     

Tunneling and propping: A justification for pyramidal ownership

This paper links existence of the pyramidal ownership structure to tunneling and propping. Tunneling refers to a transfer of resources from a lower-level firm to a higher-level firm in the pyramidal chain, whereas propping concerns a transfer in the opposite direction intended to bail out the receiving firm from bankruptcy. We show that tunneling alone cannot justify the pyramidal structure unless outside investors are myopic, since rational outside investors anticipate tunneling and adjust their willingness-to-pay for the firm’s shares accordingly. With propping, however, they may be willing to be expropriated in exchange for implicit insurance against bankruptcy.     

Perpetuating traditional influences: Voluntary disclosure in Malaysia following the economic crisis

Prior research on listed companies in Malaysia, Hong Kong and Singapore during and before the 1997 financial crisis has reported a significant association between ownership structure and the extent of voluntary disclosure in annual reports. We examine data for Malaysia after the 1997 financial crisis to assess whether the regulatory reaction to the crisis increased the awareness of disclosure as a tool of corporate governance and reduced the influence of insider domination on voluntary disclosure. We contrast director ownership and government ownership as determinants of voluntary disclosure in Malaysian company annual reports. Additionally, we include consideration of proprietary costs by testing whether industry competitiveness has an impact on voluntary disclosure.We find that director ownership is significantly associated with the extent of voluntary disclosure while government ownership, new governance initiatives and industry competitiveness are not significant in pointing companies towards greater transparency. We conclude that, despite the upheaval of the economic crisis, traditional influences of director ownership and family domination of the board outweigh the effect of government-backed accountability initiatives in determining the extent of voluntary disclosure.     

产权性质、融资约束与现金调整:兼论货币政策有效性

本文采用现金-现金流敏感度分析,通过2002年至2010年包括国际金融危机前后我国上市公司的样本,实证分析了金融危机外部冲击对不同产权性质企业现金持有及调整策略的影响,我们发现,在国际金融危机前,由于信贷歧视,民营上市公司的现金-现金流敏感度要高于国有上市公司;在国际金融危机的冲击下,由于银行信贷流向更不均衡以及政府财政刺激使得国有上市公司获得了更多的外部现金流,国有上市公司现金持有对公司内部产生的现金流敏感性进一步降低。通过动态调整模型的分析表明,在国际金融危机后,民营上市公司应对现金流动性变动的反应更强,现金持有向均值的调整积极性更高,因此,私人部门的现金策略行为在一定程度上缓解了对宏观经济的不利影响。     

Does economic policy uncertainty raise corporate precautionary cash holdings? Evidence from China

Using China as the research setting, this paper investigates the relationship between economic policy uncertainty and corporate precautionary cash holdings. Empirical results show a U-shaped relation between economic policy uncertainty and corporate precautionary cash holdings. Empirical analysis, in terms of ownership structure, firm size, corporate competitiveness and geographical location, further shows that (i) the effects for economic policy uncertainty in both state-owned and non-state-owned enterprises are significant, but the effect is stronger for state-owned enterprises; (ii) such significant effect is also found more strongly in small and medium-sized enterprises and highly competitive enterprises; and (iii) the effects for eastern, central and western China are all statistically significant, but the effect is strongest for eastern China.     

上市公司控制权转移与“隧道效应”分析

本文从关联交易的角度，对公司管理者收购上市公司控制权（MBO）与民营企业收购上市公司控制权（PBO）以后的“隧道效应”进行了实证分析和比较分析。结果发现：两种类型的收购发生以后都可能产生“隧道效应”，但证据尚不够充分。另外，MBO公司比PBO公司显示出更大的产生隧道效应的可能性。     

Small business groups enhance performance and promote stability, not expropriation. Evidence from French SMEs

This paper investigates the influence that a firm’s distance from control has on its performance, using balance sheet information and a unique data set on small business ownership. This study fills a gap in the empirical governance literature by investigating whether there is expropriation of minority shareholders in small business groups. Contrary to observations for large business groups, results show a positive relationship between the separation of control from ownership and firm performance. Results also underline that tunneling promotes controlling shareholders’ profit stability rather than profit maximization in small business groups.     

大股东控制权对股权激励效果的影响

本文分析了大股东控制权实现过程中对管理层股权激励的监督或冲突作用以及这种影响在不同股权性质和不同成长性公司中的不同表现。研究发现:大股东控制对管理层的作用显著影响股权激励效果;国有控股上市公司大股东对管理层的监督作用明显,随着第一大股东持股比例的增大,管理层股权激励效果增强;民营控股上市公司大股东控制权与管理层股权激励之间存在冲突,第一大股东持股比例越高,股权激励效果越差;高新技术企业大股东控制权与管理层股权激励之间存在冲突;非高新技术企业中第一大股东与管理层之间存在不明显的监督作用。本文的研究结论从股权激励的公司治理环境角度解答了我国股权激励效果不佳的困惑,为不同类型的上市公司启用管理层股权激励方案时考虑适宜的公司治理环境特别是大股东控制程度提供了经验证据。     

国企“混改”与企业金融资产配置

本文利用2010～2017年中国沪深A股非金融类上市公司面板数据,考察了国企“混改”对企业金融资产配置的影响,并重点分析了国企“混改”过程中企业金融资产配置的动机。结果显示,非国有股东参股促进了国有企业的金融资产投资。机制检验发现,非国有股东参股通过治理效应路径和融资约束路径共同影响了国有企业的金融资产配置行为,具体表现为非国有股东参股带来的监督治理效应和融资约束强化效应均增强了国有企业配置金融资产的预防性储蓄动机,进而促使国有企业增加金融资产投资。上述研究结果表明,非国有股东参股推动的国有企业金融资产投资并非出于短期利益追逐,而是为了平滑企业投资进行的预防性储蓄。本文研究对于如何通过深化混合所有制改革引导企业“脱虚向实”有一定的借鉴意义。     

Market power in CEE banking sectors and the impact of the global financial crisis

The aim of this study is to undertake an up-to-date assessment of market power in Central and Eastern European banking markets and explore how the global financial crisis has affected market power and what has been the impact of foreign ownership. Three main results emerge. First, while there is some convergence in country-level market power during the pre-crisis period, the onset of the global crisis has put an end to this process. Second, bank-level market power appears to vary significantly with respect to ownership characteristics. Third, asset quality and capitalization affect differently the margins in the pre-crisis and the crisis periods. While in the pre-crisis period the impacts are similar for all banks regardless of ownership status, in the crisis period non-performing loans have a negative effect and capitalization a positive effect only for domestically-owned banks.     

金字塔式控股结构与上市公司资本运作的机会主义倾向

在处于金字塔式控股结构的上市公司中,反映实际控制人责任承担能力的现金流权与其影响公司决策的控制权是分离的,由此形成了责任与权利不对称的负外部性。不同于以往研究,本文从纵容市场炒作和资本运作这一新的视角,实证考察金字塔式控股结构下控股股东及其背后实际控制人资本运作的机会主义倾向,以此揭示金字塔式控股结构存在的其他负外部性。研究表明,随着金字塔结构复杂程度的增加,处在金字塔式控股结构下的上市公司的股票更具有“彩票股”的特征、非金融企业的金融资产配置更多,且会进行更多的关联资本运作,但这些行为并没有带来预期的企业绩效改善,而在很大程度上演化为以实现控股股东及其背后实际控制人财富短期快速增值为目的的机会主义资本运作行为。因而,金字塔式控股结构在一定程度上助长了“脱实向虚”的资金流动趋势,并加剧了资本市场的波动。如何抑制金字塔式控股结构的负外部性由此成为促使我国资本市场有效助力实体经济发展的关键环节之一。     

Does stable ownership create value? Evidence from the global financial crisis

We investigate the value of stable ownership for a sample of European firms using the global financial crisis as an exogenous shock and pre-and post-crisis years as benchmark periods. Consistent with the argument that stable ownership allows managers to focus on the creation of long-term value, we find that stable ownership resulted in higher stock returns and a higher market-to-book ratio during the crisis. This positive effect of stable ownership was not reversed after the crisis. Stable institutional blockholdings were more valuable in countries with weaker investor protection. However, the positive effect does not apply to firms in which a family is the largest blockholder. Finally, we also find that ownership stability was associated with a higher level of investments, illustrating that stable ownership affects real corporate decisions.

     

The Determinants of Nonperforming Loans Before and After the Crisis: Challenges and Policy Implications for Turkish Banks

This article examines the determinants of nonperforming loans (NPLs) in the Turkish banking sector via panel data estimation techniques. In order to see the effect of the global crisis and whether this effect changes across ownership, the analysis is conducted in subperiods covering the precrisis and the postcrisis periods and estimations are repeated by an ownership breakdown. Findings show that the determinants of NPLs have changed, and macroeconomic and policy-related determinants have higher significance after the crisis. Accordingly, strong economic activity and sound fiscal policy improve loan quality, while higher policy rate induces NPLs. Meanwhile, the significance of bank-specific determinants depends on ownership. Yet, a common theme applies suggesting that asset size should grow in favor of loans, but this should be backed with efficient loan monitoring, while capital adequacy is stringent enough to limit NPLs.