Estimating the effect of board independence on managerial ownership using a quasi-natural experiment

Grounded in agency theory, this article investigates the effect of board independence on managerial ownership. We exploit the passage of the Sarbanes–Oxley Act and the associated exchange listing requirements as an exogenous regulatory shock that raises board independence. Our difference-in-difference estimates show that board independence leads to significantly higher managerial ownership. In particular, firms forced to raise board independence exhibit managerial ownership that is 26.35% higher, relative to firms not required to raise board independence. Thus, board independence and managerial equity ownership constitute governance mechanisms that act as complements, rather than substitutes. Our empirical strategy relies on a quasi-natural experiment and is far more likely to show a causal effect than what has been documented in the literature. Finally, an instrumental-variable analysis reinforces our conclusion.     

Effects of corporate governance on the decision to voluntarily disclose corporate social responsibility reports: evidence from China

This article investigates effects of corporate governance on the decision to voluntarily disclose corporate social responsibility (CSR) reports. By using a unique longitude data set of Chinese publicly traded manufacturing firms from 2010 to 2016, this study finds that ownership structure and board characteristics are significantly associated with firms’ decisions to voluntarily disclose CSR reports. In particular, our study finds that state ownership, institutional ownership, managerial ownership and board size are positively and significantly associated with the decision to voluntarily disclose CSR reports. However, board independence is not related to the decision. We also find CEO duality is negatively and significantly related to the decision. Our findings highlight the role of corporate governance in firms’ transparency by influencing the voluntary disclosure of additional information on firms’ CSR activities.     

管理层持股、股利政策与代理问题

本文基于2004年至2009年沪市和深市所有发行A股的公司数据,通过建立probit和tobit计量模型,从管理层持股和现金股利政策角度讨论了委托代理关系。研究表明,管理层持股能够增加现金股利支付倾向和力度,但是股权激励只有在持股水平相对较高时才能发挥作用。所以只有进一步完善企业的管理者持股机制,才能更有效地保护资本市场中小投资者的利益。     

股权结构对股权代理成本的影响——来自中国上市公司的实证检验

股权代理成本可细分为两种:一是股东与经营者之间的利益矛盾而引起第一类股权代理成本;二是控股股东与中小股东之间的利益冲突而引起的第二类股权代理成本。在理论分析和研究假设基础之上,本文建立了两个回归模型来分别检验我国上市公司的股权结构对两类股权代理成本的影响,并提出通过调整和完善上市公司的股权结构来降低其股权代理成本的建议。     

Family ownership,altruism and agency costs in Australian small- and medium-sized enterprises

Given the continuing uncertainty about whether family firms enjoy lower agency costs, this article hypothesizes that a combination of the effects of family ownership, altruism and self-control is instead at play. To begin with, family ownership can indeed reduce agency costs through better aligning the interests of owners and managers. This is a ‘determining’ effect in that it independently mitigates one source of agency problems. However, altruism combined with self-control problems arising from the highly concentrated ownership often found in family firms can also increase agency costs. This is an ‘embedding’ effect as it is rooted in the personal relationships within the family firm. Using the Business Longitudinal Database compiled by the Australian Bureau of Statistics on small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), we find that for larger SMEs (those with 20–200 employees), the gains in lower agency costs arising from family ownership are almost completely offset by the losses from altruism and the lack of self-control.     

Research on equity adjustment,agency costs and commercial bank performance: experimental evidence from China

This article studies the impact of options to adjust the performance of commercial banks from agency costs. In the shareholding structure of the adjustment process, considering changes in agency costs, only in agency costs no more than the commercial banks when new results, the company will have to adjust agent the cost of power stealth measure more just by reflecting the size of the incremental results. In addition, equity restructuring costs are the basis of agency governance and ownership structure has an important impact on agency costs. Through a few selected China 14 listed commercial banks’ 2007–2012 data, we show that the impact of performance of commercial banks on the proportion of the company’s largest shareholders is generally more significant; however, the impact of equity restriction on commercial banks was not as significant, as seen from the application of balanced panel data model analysis and the test results. However, the agency costs of commercial bank performance were significant also in a general state, indicating that equity adjustment activities of commercial banks’ cost perspective agency under the commercial bank performance significant changes are not large.     

国有机构投资者持股能提升企业投资效率吗?

具有国资背景的机构投资者,对于资本市场平稳发展具有重要意义。本文基于我国2015—2019年A股上市公司样本,考察持股对企业投资效率的影响。研究发现,持股显著提升了企业投资效率,并且该影响在代理冲突更严重和所处信息环境更不透明的公司中更加显著。机制检验表明,降低企业内外部信息不对称和代理成本是持股提升企业投资效率的重要渠道。进一步研究发现,国有机构投资者持股时间越长,对企业非效率投资的治理效果越好;细分国有机构投资者类型后发现,致力于长期维护资本市场稳定和上市公司长期健康发展的证金公司和汇金公司对企业投资效率的提升作用显著,但没有发现“救市”基金和外管局旗下的投资平台对企业投资效率有提升作用。研究结论从企业投资效率视角为国有机构投资者持股在微观企业日常经营中发挥的治理作用提供了新颖的经验证据,对进一步提高我国上市公司质量具有启示意义。     

Ownership structure and diversification in a scenario of weak shareholder protection

This work examines the influences of ownership concentration and insider ownership on corporate strategies for diversification within a scenario characterized by poor protection of shareholder interests. We find evidence of a quadratic relationship between ownership concentration and diversification, and a cubic relationship between diversification and insider ownership. These results point towards the high probability of both expropriation and entrenchment phenomena, respectively, in this kind of scenario. We also find that concentrated ownership requires high levels of insider ownership, in order to prevent negative externalities of diversification. Another result shows that entrenchment externalities affect diversification before they erode firm value, which suggests that for low levels of diversification, firm value is still not negatively affected. Additionally, our results show that control mechanisms, such as debt, director remuneration and compliance with codes of good practice, are negatively related to the level of diversification. Overall, our results confirm the theoretical relevance of agency theory in explaining managerial attitudes towards corporate strategy, i.e. diversification. Furthermore, companies characterized by deficiencies in shareholder legal protection, concentrated ownership structures and a higher likelihood of managers being entrenched, should focus on the correct functioning of corporate governance mechanisms.     

Debt financing,soft budget constraints,and government ownershipEvidence from China1

Debt financing is expected to improve the quality of corporate governance, but we find, using a large sample of public listed companies (PLCs) from China, that an increase in bank loans increases the size of managerial perks and free cash flows and decreases corporate efficiency. We find that bank lending facilitates managerial exploitation of corporate wealth in government‐controlled firms, but constrains managerial agency costs in firms controlled by private owners. We argue that the failure of corporate governance may derive from the shared government ownership of lenders and borrowers, which nurtures soft budget constraints.     

Politician control, agency problems and ownership reform

Using data from a recent national survey on the ownership reform of state‐owned enterprises in China, we study the effects of reducing politician control and agency problems on a number of reform outcomes. Taking into account the endogenous nature of the reform, we find that these outcome measures of the reform's success are positively affected by the lessening of politician control through increasing the firm's flexibility in labour deployment and by the mitigation of agency costs through the introduction of more effective corporate governance mechanisms such as one‐share one‐vote and shareholding‐based board structure composition. Ownership structure also matters: relative to shareholding by the state, foreign ownership has a positive effect on reform outcomes; individual (mostly employee) shareholding has a negative or insignificant effect. Somewhat surprisingly, operating autonomy (excluding labour deployment flexibility) has a negative effect on firm performance, suggesting serious agency problems in the reformed enterprises.     

股权激励与代理成本

传统以管理费用率作为代理成本的替代不能恰当地反映管理者在职消费和职务侵占的真实水平,本文用经过Jones模型纠正的费用率作为代理成本的替代,考察了所有权性质、总经理持股与否及持股比例对代理成本的影响。本文提供了私有制下总经理适当持股有利于降低代理成本的可靠证据,为中国上市公司即将展开的股权激励计划提供证据的支持。     

Origin and concentration

We analyse the effects of different types and concentration of ownership on performance using a large population of firms in the Czech Republic after mass privatization. Specifications based on first‐differences combined with instrumental variables show that the performance effects of different types and concentration of ownership are limited when compared to earlier studies. Often, concentrated ownership has a positive effect, a finding that supports the agency theory. The positive effect of foreign ownership is detected primarily for majority ownership and for ownership by foreign industrial firms. The state as a holder of the golden share has a positive effect on employment and sometimes, also on output and profitability. Overall, our results highlight the benefits of strategic restructuring accompanied by an inflow of new capital and managerial culture.     

国有控股上市公司控制权转移对经营绩效和代理成本的影响

本文对2000—2004年我国发生控制权转移的国有控股上市公司在控制权转移前后的经营绩效、代理成本进行了实证检验。结果表明：控制权转移后,公司的代理成本水平下降,经营绩效得到提高;卖方为地方的子样本代理成本的下降和经营绩效的改善大于卖方为中央企业的子样本;买方为民营的子样本的代理成本的下降和经营绩效的改善大于买方为国有的子样本;买方为国有的控制权转移经营绩效提高和代理成本下降主要来自最终控制人变更子样本。     

代理成本与审计师选择--基于中国IPO公司的研究

西方大量研究表明,公司的代理冲突程度越高,选择大事务所进行审计的动力就越强。文章在对179家IPO公司研究后发现,建立在英美市场经济条件下的代理理论对我国审计师选择行为的解释力并不充分。在公司规模、成长性、财务杠杆、管理层持股比例、董事会独立性等反映公司代理冲突的变量中,仅公司规模与是否选择大事务所进行审计有显著正向关系,管理层持股与是否选择大事务所审计则呈倒U形关系,没有发现成长性、财务杠杆与审计师选择存在显著关系的证据。     

Dividend policy and investor pressure

The economics of dividend policy has focused on the single tight narrative that dividends keep managers honest, mitigating concerns that they over-invest. This article provides a critique of that agency narrative, arguing that pressure from short-term focused investors, executives and board members pushes the firm into preemptive actions of returning too much cash via dividends. We analyze three channels of influence for investor pressure through 1) threat of takeovers, 2) shareholder value oriented corporate governance, measured by director independence and board equity incentives, and 3) trading and institutional ownership patterns. We find that firms adopt a higher dividend payout to discourage takeover bids. Also, FTSE 100 firms, that are most focused on shareholder value governance in the form of equity-based compensation and a higher share of independent directors, display a higher dividend payout. Frequency of trading and ownership by transient investors seeking current profits also predict increased dividend payout. Traditional agency theory, focused on dividends as a tool for managerial discipline, is not strongly supported by the results, which rather support a narrative of short-term investor pressure on firms irrespective of investment opportunities.     

Peer Effects among Swimmers

We develop a novel identification strategy and examine various aspects of peer effects using swimming data. We find that the performance of adjacent competitors positively influences swimmers' performances. In particular, swimmers are influenced by slower‐lane peers, suggesting that being chased improves one's performance. We use absenteeism data to directly compare the performances of swimmers with and without peers. We have found that swimmers swim faster with peers swimming behind them than when swimming alone, but that they swim slower with peers swimming ahead. Finally, we find that observability is a key determinant of peer effects, by comparing freestyle and backstroke competitions.     

代理成本、管理层持股与审计质量

所有权和经营权相分离的现代企业制度导致了股东和管理层之间严重的代理冲突。上市公司降低代理冲突的主要途径是激励与监督,其中,管理层持股和审计分别是内部激励和外部监督的重要方式。会计师事务所的规模和审计费用在一定程度上反映了审计质量。文章基于代理成本的角度,采用2005-2009年中国A股非金融类上市公司非平衡面板数据,运用Logistic二元逻辑回归模型和稳健最小二乘法研究了代理成本、管理层持股与审计质量之间的关系。研究发现:代理成本高的公司会寻求高质量的外部审计,倾向于聘请大规模的会计师事务所;管理层持股能起到完善公司内部治理机制的作用,减少代理冲突,从而降低公司对外部审计质量的需求。     

所有利益相关者参与公司治理并非最有效率

利益相关者公司治理模式强调所有利益相关者的利益最大化,从其目标本身来看,是无可非议的。但该模式通过管理层的广泛任务和分享控制权来内部化股东行为的负外部性,容易产生管理层激励设计难、融资和决策效率低等问题。本文认为,所有利益相关者参与公司治理并不是保护其利益的有效制度安排,而应该在坚持股东价值的范式下,通过契约和法律形式实现其他利益相关者的利益保护。     

制度变迁、银企关系和扭曲的杠杆治理

该文将我国商业银行改革划分为商业化、市场化和股份化三个阶段.通过使用1994年到2003年的上市公司数据,我们发现我国上市公司的负债水平在逐步上升,但是企业盈利在不断下降.该文进而分析了在商业化和市场化两个阶段的银企关系.我们发现,借款较高的公司企业绩效较低,公司治理水平较差.银行贷款和经理代理成本的协同关系在银行市场化时期并没有得到改善.该文认为,现有的银行市场化举措没有能够从根本上解决银行坏账问题,而银行股份化是值得考虑的理论选择.     

薪酬制定的管理层权力理论进展

薪酬制定的管理层权力理论,区别于传统的最优契约论．正成为目前国外学术界解释管理层薪酬现象的主要理论。本文回顾了国外关于管理层权力影响薪酬制定过程的实证和理论文献．分析了薪酬制定过程中可能存在的代理问题。在此基础上,探讨了我国企业管理层权力的现状及其对薪酬激励的可能影响和表现,得出了一些启示。