董事来源地特征、政治关联等级与公司价值*——基于“18号文”董事政策性辞职的经验证据

董事政治关联对于公司价值的影响一直是学者们关注的重要问题。中组部2013年10月30日发布了《关于进一步规范党政干部在企业兼职（任职）问题的意见》（以下简称“18号文”）,禁止现任及尚未办理离职手续的政府官员在企业兼职任职。基于此,本文以2013年10月30日-2014年10月30日期间我国股市所有辞职董事为样本,研究了董事政治关联等级与公司价值的关系,以及该关系受到的董事来源地特征的影响。本文发现：（1）董事政治关联等级越高,辞职引发的公司价值的下跌程度越显著;（2）考虑辞职董事来源地特征后发现,异地董事、京城董事或者异地且京城的董事辞职后,其政治关联等级对公司价值下跌的影响更显著。进一步分析表明,“18号文”公布时也有显著的市场反应,表现为聘有政治关联董事的公司价值下跌更明显。本文研究表明,聘任政治关联等级较高的董事,特别是异地或权力中心的董事,是公司建立政治联系、影响公司价值的重要途径。     

Estimating the value of political connections in China: Evidence from sudden deaths of politically connected independent directors

This paper estimates the value of political connections by examining stock price reactions to sudden deaths of retired government officials who were acting as independent directors of private firms in China from 2003 to 2012. Employing an event study, we find that, if a private firm loses political connections because of the sudden death of an independent director who was previously a government official, its stock price drops 3.61% on average within ten trading days. After the loss of political connections, we find that it is possible but infeasible for a private firm to reestablish political connections with the government in a short period of time. Moreover, the sudden death of a retired government official leads to a reduction in the economic benefits (e.g., bank loans, tax preference, and government subsidies) obtained by a private firm, which provides a reasonable explanation for the negative stock price reaction after losing political connections.     

Political Connections and Firm Performance in Chinese Companies

This study uses panel data analysis to examine the relationship between political connections and firm performance in Chinese firms from 2004 to 2008. We define firm‐level political connections and demonstrate a robust result for the positive relationship between political connections and firm performance. In addition, we integrate the effects of ownership structure, related‐party transactions and political connections into our analysis and continue to show a positive relationship. We show that political connections dampen the negative effect on firm value of related‐party transactions. Finally, we demonstrate channels through which the benefits of political connections are realized in terms of greater cash holdings, larger long‐term loans, lower financing costs, larger sales and lower sales costs. Our results indicate that state‐owned and non‐state‐owned enterprises use political connections equally effectively to enhance performance.     

How does political connection affect firm financial distress and resolution in China?

We examine the impact of political connections on firm performance, financial distress, and its resolution in China, a country where government influence over stock markets has been demonstrated to be considerable. Our findings suggest that over 1999 to 2015, although political connections had limited impact on the emergence of financial distress, such connections assisted distressed firms in gaining increments to debt financing and contributed to a higher likelihood of recovery. This indicates that Chinese authorities follow market economy principles, and only intervene in firms’ operations after they fall into financial distress. In addition, central and local government political connections have different impacts on distress recovery. We conduct additional analyses on differences in distress outcomes for various ownership (State-owned enterprises, SOEs, and non–SOEs) and sample sub-periods (1999–2007 and 2008–2015). Our results are robust to potential endogeneity issues and to alternative measures of financial distress.     

管理者政治关联、制度环境与企业绩效间关系的实证研究

以2008—2013年中国沪深两市的上市公司为研究样本,采用最小二乘法实证检验了管理者政治关联对企业绩效的影响,探讨了不同层面的政治关联对企业绩效影响的差异,揭示了管理者的政治关联在制度环境不完善时的替代效应。研究结果表明:管理者有政治关联会显著提高企业绩效;中央级政治关联对企业绩效的推动作用显著大于省市县级政治关联;管理者政治关联是一个有效的制度外替代机制,制度环境不完善地区的企业管理者拥有政治关联可有效提高企业绩效。     

高管政治关联助推公司媒体报道了吗?—来自民营企业IPO期间的证据

媒体报道对资产定价具有重要影响,致使其日益受到公司管理层的重视.文章以2006?2014年民营企业IPO为样本,基于公司管理层经历或背景,研究高管政治关联对公司媒体披露的影响及其市场效应.研究发现:(1)高管政治关联有助于公司在IPO期间获得更高的媒体关注度和更正面的报道倾向;而且,政治关联层级越高,媒体报道对其越有利.(2)高管政治关联对媒体报道的影响主要通过非证监会四大信息披露媒体和地理邻近媒体来实现的;而地区制度环境可在一定程度上抑制高管政治关联对媒体报道的影响.(3)由政治关联所带来的媒体报道水平的改善,有助于促进IPO首日抑价的上升;但中长期会导致股价反转.文章不仅丰富了公司治理对媒体(信息)披露管理影响方面的文献,而且为民营企业的政商关系研究提供了新的经验证据.     

Institutional development and stock price synchronicity: Evidence from China

Better developed legal and political institutions result in greater availability of reliable firm-specific information. When stock prices reflect more firm-specific information there will be less stock price synchronicity. This paper traces the experience of China, an economy undergoing dramatic institutional change in the last 20 years with rich variation in experiences across provinces. We show that stock price synchronicity is lower when there is institutional development in terms of property rights protection and rule of law. Furthermore, we investigate the influence of political pluralism on synchronicity. A more pluralistic regime reduces uncertainty and opaqueness regarding government interventions and therefore increases the value of firm-specific information that reduces synchronicity.     

“Alcohol Bans”: Can they reveal the effect of Xi Jinping's anti-corruption campaign?

China is perceived to be one of the most politically corrupt countries in the world. Chinese government officials establish firm ties with trusted people through lavish banquets with flowing alcohol, providing privileged access to scarce resources like licenses, land, bank loans, subsidies, and government contracts. In China, Baijiu, the most popular grain liquor at these parties, works as the currency of bribery and is the lubricant for political connections for corruption. Xi Jinping's anti-corruption policy, known as the “Alcohol Bans,” has targeted Baijiu in an attempt to stop the boozy banquets, and, consequently, to bring an end to this channel of political networking. This paper employs the event study approach and connects cumulative abnormal stock returns of high-end Baijiu companies with the impact of the Alcohol Bans. It applies the difference-in-difference method to rule out unobserved reasons for stock market changes. The result is unchanged in both the efficient market hypothesis test and the abnormal return test. We consider if Baijiu may be substituted for other luxuries, and find little evidence for such “substitution effects.” Our work concludes that the Alcohol Bans has partially contributed to Xi's anti-corruption campaign.     

交易成本对股票价格的影响研究--基于深圳股票市场的经验研究

本文利用Umlauf(1993)方法和事件研究法,研究了证券印花税变化对深市大盘指数以及单只股票的影响,证明了印花税税率下调会提高股票价格指数水平,得到一个显著的正收益率,而上调会降低股票价格指数水平,得到一个显著的负收益率这一结论.表明了印花税可以作为一种调控证券市场的宏观政策工具,并且为这种政策调控提供了一定的数量指导.     

Political uncertainty and stock market volatility: new evidence from the 2014 Scottish Independence Referendum

We investigate the impact of heightened political uncertainty in the run‐up to, and after, the 2014 Scottish independence referendum. The conditional volatilities of stock returns of our Scottish index and the FTSE all share index are characterised by the same GARCH parameters for a sample ending in late 2013, but this no longer holds when estimation extends closer to the referendum. The relative volatility of Scottish companies’ stock returns peaked when polls indicated the referendum result was ‘too close to call,’ fell back on the result, but rose again in the run‐up to publication of proposals for further devolution.     

国有股权能够为民营企业带来好处吗?——基于中国上市公司的实证研究

民营企业家参政所产生的政治关联效应已受到广泛关注,但民营企业中的国有股权是否也具有政治关联效应还有待进一步证实.文章以中国民营控股上市公司为样本,研究了国有股权在民营企业中的政治关联效应和作用机制.研究发现:民营企业中的部分国有股权能够为其发展获取更多的经济资源与发展机会,因为国有股权可以依靠其与政府的体制关联为民营企业的发展提供声誉担保;与此同时,这些融资便利与经济资源能够进一步提升民营企业的经营业绩.文章拓展了公司政治关联领域的研究文献,为进一步全面理解中国经济转型时期政治关联对企业的影响提供了一个新的视角.     

政治关联断损、研发投入与企业创新效率

政治关联断损现象逐渐引起学者重视，但少有研究涉及政治关联断损对企业创新的影响。基于中组部“18号文”导致上市公司大量官员独立董事强制辞职事件，通过使用双重差分模型对2012-2016年沪深A股上市公司相关数据进行实证研究发现，官员独立董事辞职造成的政治关联断损能够显著促进企业增加研发投资，虽然对提高企业创新效率无显著影响，却能够增强研发投资对创新效率的正向影响。政治关联断损层级与企业研发投资间具有显著负向关系，虽然对创新效率无显著影响，却对研发投资与创新效率间关系起显著负向调节作用。政治关联断损和断损层级对企业研发人员投入强度无显著影响，也不能显著调节研发人员投入强度与创新效率间的关系。     

Financial leverage and market volatility with diverse beliefs

We study a general equilibrium model of asset trading with financial leverage, where the investors can engage in speculative trading with diverse beliefs about the asset??s fundamental value. We show that an increase in the leverage ratio causes the stock price to rise in the current period through a ??leverage effect??, and will result in more borrowing and more stock purchase that pumps the stock price higher in the subsequent period, known as the ??pyramiding effect??. There can also be a ??depyramiding effect?? when the price falls because lenders issue margin calls and force stock sales, contributing to further stock price plummeting. Price changes from depyramiding effect, however, may not take effect when margin calls are not triggered. We demonstrate that, under certain conditions, decreasing leverage ratios leads to lower stock price volatility, measured by the variation of prices caused by an exogenous shock, when the shock is unanticipated. The influences of dispersion of beliefs and available investment funds on the relation between financial leverage and market volatility are also examined. When the shock is anticipated, we demonstrate that reducing leverage ratios may not lower stock price volatility, which poses an important challenge to future studies on this issue.     

政治关联、制度环境与家族企业创新绩效

基于社会情感财富理论,以2012-2015年中国A股上市家族企业为研究样本,从研发投入与研发产出两个方面实证检验政治关联对家族企业创新绩效的影响,以及制度环境对该影响关系的调节作用。实证结果表明,无论是从研发投入还是研发产出看,政治关联都与家族企业创新绩效显著负相关,而好的制度环境则会削弱政治关联对家族企业创新绩效的抑制作用。家族企业应该权衡社会情感财富损益及政治关联得失而避免企业战略短期导向,政府则应为家族企业创新及其绩效提升营造良好的金融、法制、经营等制度环境,减少政治寻租空间。     

政治关系如何影响公司价值：融资约束与行业竞争的证据

政治关系影响了公司价值,但对于如何影响公司价值还知之甚少。文章从资本结构与行业竞争关系的角度检验政治关系如何影响公司价值。基于1998-2007年中国上市公司中制造行业的公司数据,文章发现政治关系提高了行业竞争对资本结构的敏感性。在使用两种不同的融资约束划分标准后,研究发现不同融资约束下公司政治关系的价值不同,对于存在融资约束的公司而言,政治关系更深地影响了行业竞争对资本结构的敏感性,因此具有更高的价值。文章的证据支持了政治关系有助于公司获取融资资源从而提高公司价值的观点。     

Political uncertainty and stock market returns: evidence from the 1995 Quebec referendum

Abstract.  In this study, we investigate the short run effect of the 30 October 1995 Quebec referendum on the common stock returns of Quebec firms. Our results show that the uncertainty surrounding the referendum outcome had an impact on stock returns of Quebec firms. We also find that the effect of the referendum varied with the political risk exposure of Quebec firms, that is, the structure of assets and principally the degree of foreign involvement. JEL classification: G14, G15     

Political connections and labor investment efficiency: Evidence from China's private firms

This study investigates whether political connections affect labor investment efficiency. We test this question in the context of China's private firms, where we find that political connections are negatively associated with labor investment efficiency. We also explore the channels through which political connections reduce labor investment efficiency and provide evidence that political connections aggravate both agency problems and information asymmetry. Further tests show that the influence of political connections is more pronounced for firms with overinvestment problems or high-level political connections, and for firms from regions facing severe unemployment or loose anticorruption. Overall, our results are consistent with the “grabbing hand” argument that politicians destroy firm operational efficiency.     

Central bank independence and stock market returns in emerging economies

We investigate the effect of central bank independence on stock market returns in emerging economies. We find evidence for a positive overall effect, but economic independence of the central bank appears to be more relevant than political independence.     

政府补贴强度对资源型企业实质性创新产出的影响

政府补贴如何高效激励企业创新产出是当前的重要课题。基于补贴强度异质性视角,以2012—2018年我国资源型上市公司经验数据为观测对象,利用门限回归模型、动态面板数据模型等计量方法,实证检验政府补贴强度对资源型企业实质性创新产出的影响效应,结果表明,政府补贴对资源型企业实质性创新产出的门限效应显著,存在补贴强度的最优区间。但基于企业政治关联异质性的分析表明,补贴的最优区间在国有企业、具备政治关联的民营企业和不具备政治关联的民营企业中存在显著差异。进一步研究发现,政府补贴主要通过提升企业创新意愿和能力,促进企业加大研发投入强度,进而提升实质性创新产出,但目前资源型企业创新成果还未能普遍实现经济价值转化。     

Political Connectedness and Firm Performance: Evidence from Germany

Abstract. This paper investigates politically connected firms in Germany. With the introduction of a new transparency law in 2007, information on additional income sources for all members of the German parliament became publicly available. We find that members of the conservative party (CDU/CSU) and the liberal party (FDP) are more likely to work for firms than members of left‐wing parties (SPD and The Left) or the green party (Alliance 90/The Greens). Politically connected firms are larger, less risky and have lower market valuations than unconnected firms. They also have fewer growth opportunities, but slightly better accounting performance. On the stock market, connected firms significantly outperformed unconnected firms in 2006, i.e. before the publication of the data on political connections. Differences in stock market performance were much smaller in 2007.