Do site visits mitigate corporate fraudulence? Evidence from China

Corporate site visits emerge as an increasingly important means of information acquisition process for analysts and institutional investors. In this study, we test whether and how site visits mitigate corporate fraud risk using a unique dataset of site visits to Chinese listed firms. We find that corporate site visits can substantially reduce the incidence of corporate fraud, which is robust to adding a series of control variables, alternative model specifications and alternative measures of corporate fraud, as well as accounting for endogeneity issue and controlling for firm and time fixed effects. This negative effect is more pronounced for firms with poorer information environment and for firms with weaker corporate governance. Furthermore, we examine the mechanisms underlying the negative association between site visits and corporate fraud. Overall, this paper contributes to the literature by providing complementary evidence that site visits are important venues for analysts and institutional investors to collect firm-specific information and monitor the management of firms in China. Our findings also provide significant practical and policy implications for investors and regulators who seek to promote corporate information disclosure and mitigate the risk of corporate fraud.     

信用风险缓释凭证对企业投资行为的影响——基于融资约束中介效应的实证研究

2018年以来,作为债券融资支持工具的信用风险缓释凭证(CRMW)在我国得到了快速发展。本文采用基于倾向得分匹配的双重差分模型(PSM-DID),利用中国企业数据检验了CRMW产品对企业投资行为的影响。结果显示,我国信用风险缓释凭证的发行促进了非上市企业投资,并且这种促进作用对于融资约束较强的企业更为显著。本文还对CRMW产品通过缓解融资约束促进企业投资的渠道进行了检验,结果发现,CRMW产品对企业融资的促进作用主要体现在信贷融资渠道而非债券渠道。本文结论有助于深化对中国当前资本市场中信用风险缓释凭证的作用效果与作用机制的解读,为政策制定者利用该产品解决民营企业融资难、融资贵的问题提供了更充分的决策参考依据。     

Board structure and corporate risk taking in the UK financial sector

This paper examines the relationship between board structure and corporate risk taking in the UK financial sector. We show how the board size, board independence and combining the role of CEO and chairperson in boards may affect corporate risk taking in financial firms. Our sample is based on a panel dataset of all publicly listed firms in the UK financial sector, which includes banks, insurance, real estate and financial services companies over a ten year period (2003 − 2012). After controlling for the effects of endogeneity through the application of the dynamic panel generalized method of moments estimator, the findings of this study suggest that the presence of non-executive directors and powerful CEOs in corporate boards reduces corporate risk taking practices in financial firms. The negative relationship can be explained within the agency theory context, where managers are regarded as more risk averse because of the reputational and employment risk. An increased power concentration is therefore expected to enhance the risk aversion behaviour of directors. The findings however, do not show any significant effect of board size on corporate risk taking in financial firms. As this study covers recommendations of the UK Corporate Governance Code on the role of corporate boards in managing firms' risk, the empirical evidence could be useful for corporate governance regulation and policy making.     

The effects of board characteristics and sustainable compensation policy on carbon performance of UK firms

This study examines the effects of board characteristics and sustainable compensation policy on carbon reduction initiatives and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of a firm. We use firm fixed effect model to analyse data from 256 non-financial UK firms covering a period of 13 years (2002–2014). Our estimation results suggest that board independence and board gender diversity have positive associations with carbon reduction initiatives. In addition, environment-social-governance based compensation policy is found to be positively associated with carbon reduction initiatives. However, we do not find any relationship between corporate governance variables and GHG emissions of a firm. Overall, our evidence suggests that corporate boards and executive management tend to focus on a firm's process-oriented carbon performance, without improving actual carbon performance in the form of reduced GHG emissions. The findings have important implications for practitioners and policymakers with respect to the effectiveness of internal corporate governance mechanisms in addressing climate change risks, and possible linkage between corporate governance reform and carbon related policies.     

Pension risk and corporate investment distortion

Failure to correct for pension risk leads to upward-biased discount rate estimates in firms with pension risk exposure. The result is a negative and economically significant relation between pension risk and corporate investment. The effect is confined to investment decisions that require discount rate estimates. Moreover, it is stronger if project value is more sensitive to such estimates. Because of this bias, firms miss valuable investment opportunities. The results survive robustness tests that address endogeneity concerns and alternative interpretations of the evidence. The general implication is that non-operating risks can distort, if ignored, corporate investment decisions.     

海归高管抑制了股价崩盘风险吗？

以我国A股上市公司2009—2017年数据为样本,研究高管的海外经历对公司未来股价崩盘风险的影响。发现海归高管有助于降低公司未来股价的崩盘风险,在多种稳健性检验并控制内生性问题后,以上结论仍然成立。另外,海归高管降低股价崩盘的效果在分析师关注较少的企业以及外部审计质量较弱的企业中表现得更加明显。机制分析表明,海归高管通过降低公司过度投资以及提高会计信息质量来抑制股价崩盘风险。     

劳动保护、社保压力与企业违约风险——基于《社会保险法》实施的研究

本文利用2011年《社会保险法》实施的政策冲击所造成的准自然实验情境构建双重差分模型,考察了劳动保护对上市公司债务违约风险的影响。研究发现,劳动保护加强后,劳动密集型企业的违约风险显著提升了约1.5%。在此基础上,进一步检验了劳动保护影响企业违约风险的渠道,发现劳动保护提高了企业的经营性负债水平,并最终提高了违约风险。此外,在国有企业、融资约束水平较高、信息披露水平较低和创新水平较低的企业,劳动保护对企业违约风险的影响更加显著。本文拓展了劳动保护经济后果的研究,也为评价《社会保险法》的政策后果提供了新的经验证据。本研究可为"新冠"疫情期间政府制定政策减免企业社保支出提供参考。     

Executive compensation and corporate risk management

We provide the first evidence on the effects of executive compensation on corporate risk management for insurers. Our unique data set allows the construction of a new, more complete measure of corporate risk management behavior. Specifically, we include hedging-driven usage of not only derivatives but also insurance. To address potential endogeneity, we utilize a difference-in-differences approach, based on the implementation of FAS 123R that required firms to expense stock-based compensation at fair value. We find that the decline in the convexity of executive compensation following FAS 123R led firms to significantly increase corporate risk management, primarily through increased demand for insurance.     

Do investors find carbon information useful? Evidence from Italian firms

The usefulness of carbon disclosures has been questioned in the literature because they do not truly reflect firm’s carbon performance, suggesting that they may not be useful for risk evaluation and investment decisions. This study empirically tests the usefulness of carbon information voluntarily disclosed by the Italian firms. Our results based on the price model show that there is a positive association between the stock price and carbon disclosures, suggesting that investors find carbon information useful for their investment decisions. We find similar results based on the market valuation model. Additionally, the results reveal that the positive association is especially strong for firms that have established environmental committees on a voluntary basis and also for firms from the highly polluting industries defined by the EU_ETS program, confirming that investors’ positive response is especially strong to carbon disclosures by firms from the highly polluting industries. We also find that the market reacts positively to carbon disclosures by firms with a higher percentage of independent directors on their corporate boards, but the positive association is marginally significant.     

Who Manages Risk? An Empirical Examination of Risk Management Practices in the Gold Mining Industry

This article examines a new database that details corporate risk management activity in the North American gold mining industry. I find little empirical support for the predictive power of theories that view risk management as a means to maximize shareholder value. However, firms whose managers hold more options manage less gold price risk, and firms whose managers hold more stock manage more gold price risk, suggesting that managerial risk aversion may affect corporate risk management policy. Further, risk management is negatively associated with the tenure of firms' CFOs, perhaps reflecting managerial interests, skills, or preferences.     

Firm-level political risk and earnings opacity

Given the recent growing global uncertainties, firms have encountered increasing political risks and responded accordingly to avoid a negative impact on their performance. This study examines the impact of firm-level political risk on corporate earnings opacity among listed U.S. firms. Our empirical results reveal that higher firm-level political risk engenders greater corporate earnings opacity via three channels of market scrutiny, political proximity, and multiple business objectives. Further analyses show that politically risky firms are more prudent in earnings management when they are highly dependent on government spending. The results hold after a wide range of robustness tests. Our findings provide several implications for the management of earnings quality in response to increasing firm-level political risk in the U.S.     

Investment policy in family controlled firms

We explore the relation between family ownership and corporate investment policy. Our analysis centers on two incentives, risk aversion and extended investment horizons, which potentially influence the level and type of investments that family firms undertake. We find that family firms devote less capital to long-term investments than firms with diffuse ownership structures. When dividing long-term investment into its two components of R&D and capital expenditures, we note that family firms, relative to nonfamily firms, prefer investing in physical assets relative to riskier R&D projects. Additional tests indicate that family firms receive fewer patent citations per dollar of R&D investment relative to nonfamily firms. Overall, all empirical results indicate that family preferences for lower firm risk, across all family sub-types, affects corporate R&D spending and capital expenditures.     

金融资产配置与违约风险:蓄水池效应,还是逐利效应？

本文以2007—2016年中国A股上市公司为研究对象,检验了企业金融资产配置对违约风险的影响。实证研究发现:金融资产持有量越多,企业的违约风险越低,金融资产配置的“蓄水池效应”显著;在货币政策宽松时期,金融资产配置导致的代理冲突显现,宽松的货币政策会抑制金融资产投资对违约风险的降低作用。政府规制也会有一定的公司治理作用,将产业政策纳入讨论发现:对于产业政策支持的行业来说,企业金融资产配置能够降低违约风险,但是宽松的货币政策会刺激管理层的短视投资行为,抑制政府规制的公司治理作用。进一步地,本文提出会计稳健性的提升是企业金融资产配置降低违约风险的重要路径。本文的研究结论丰富了企业金融资产配置动机和违约风险影响因素的讨论,能够为政府部门防范经济运行中的内在风险提供有益借鉴。     

Geopolitical risk and corporate payout policy

In this study, we examine the effects of geopolitical risk on corporate payout policy. Exploiting a news-based index of geopolitical risk, we find that firms adopt a more conservative payout policy by reducing share repurchases in response to greater geopolitical risk, whereas the effects of geopolitical risk on cash dividends are insignificant. Further analysis suggests that cash flow uncertainty and financial distress risk are two potential channels through which geopolitical risk affects corporate payout policy. We also show that the effects of geopolitical risk on share repurchase are more pronounced for firms with greater exposure to product market competition and those facing higher threats of financial distress. Overall, our study emphasizes the implications of geopolitical risk for corporate payout choice.     

续贷限制与企业技术创新

本文以2007年的银行续贷政策改革作为“准自然实验”,采用双重差分模型探讨了续贷限制对企业技术创新的影响。研究发现,续贷限制显著抑制了企业的技术创新,且经过一系列稳健性检验后,该结论依然成立。进一步研究发现,该政策的作用效果因专利类型的不同而存在较大差异,具体表现为,在续贷限制之后,相较于低质量非发明专利,企业高质量发明专利下降幅度更大,进而企业创新质量降低。作用机制检验发现,续贷限制会降低企业信贷规模、缩短企业信贷期限以及增加企业融资成本,进而抑制企业技术创新。上述结果表明,“一刀切”式地收紧续贷标准会强化企业的融资约束,限制信贷资金对企业技术创新的支持作用,最终不利于企业的转型升级。本文研究为当前的续贷政策提供了来自企业创新视角的理论依据和实践参考。     

Does Effective Corporate Governance Facilitate Continuous Market Disclosure?

The focus of this study is the role of corporate governance in ensuring exchange listed companies meet their continuous disclosure (CD) obligations. In doing so it attempts to address a deficiency in the generic corporate disclosure literature by investigating the ability of corporate governance to ensure quality corporate disclosure. Despite acknowledging that disclosure is adversely affected by agency conflict and that corporate governance is an effective control of that conflict, few studies have attempted to provide empirical evidence of a link between corporate governance and corporate disclosure quality. The results of this study show that a company's corporate governance does impact on its CD performance. In particular, it provides evidence that the likelihood of a company failing its CD obligations decreases as the proportion of independent directors on the board increases. This likelihood also decreases for firms that segregate the roles of CEO and board chair. In addition, the study also shows that declining company profitability increases the risk of CD failure. These results provide an important link between the corporate governance literature and the disclosure literature. The results of this study should provide regulators and company stakeholders with evidence to continue to demand corporate governance improvements as an important tool in improving market efficiencies.     

续贷限制与企业技术创新

本文以2007年的银行续贷政策改革作为“准自然实验”,采用双重差分模型探讨了续贷限制对企业技术创新的影响。研究发现,续贷限制显著抑制了企业的技术创新,且经过一系列稳健性检验后,该结论依然成立。进一步研究发现,该政策的作用效果因专利类型的不同而存在较大差异,具体表现为,在续贷限制之后,相较于低质量非发明专利,企业高质量发明专利下降幅度更大,进而企业创新质量降低。作用机制检验发现,续贷限制会降低企业信贷规模、缩短企业信贷期限以及增加企业融资成本,进而抑制企业技术创新。上述结果表明,“一刀切”式地收紧续贷标准会强化企业的融资约束,限制信贷资金对企业技术创新的支持作用,最终不利于企业的转型升级。本文研究为当前的续贷政策提供了来自企业创新视角的理论依据和实践参考。     

Retail investor attention and corporate innovation in the big data era

This paper explores the corporate governance role of retail investor attention from the perspective of corporate innovation. Using a sample of Chinese listed firms from 2011 to 2019, we find that retail investor attention significantly promotes corporate innovation. Thisresult ise robust to a series of robustness checks to address potential endogeneity concerns. I further conclude that the impact of retail investor attention on corporate innovation is mainly through alleviating a firm's financial constraints and deterring agency costs. In addition, such effects are more pronounced in firms with higher media and analyst coverage as well as those with more overconfident CEOs. The results provide empirical evidence of the corporate governance function of individual investors in the current digital era.     

Fiduciary or loyalty? Evidence from top management counsel and stock liquidity

We examine whether and how corporate top management counsel (TMC) influences stock liquidity and document a significant positive association. Our results remained robust to a series of sensitivity tests and continue to hold after accounting for potential endogeneity concerns. We identify a reduction in information asymmetry and business risk as the channel through which TMC affects stock liquidity. Further tests reveal that the positive relationship is stronger when the CEO has no legal expertise and in the post-SOX period, where firms are mandated to have in-house counsel. Our paper contributes to the ongoing debate on the dual paradox of TMC's role (gatekeeper v. facilitator) and has policy implications.