产业政策与企业资本结构调整速度

本文以2006-2015年我国沪深A股上市公司为研究样本,在“十一五”与“十二五”产业规划所处的时间区间内,考察了产业政策对企业资本结构调整速度的影响以及作用路径。结果显示,产业政策与企业资本结构调整速度显著正相关,且分别在非国有、小规模和融资约束较严重的企业中更加显著。区分调整方向后发现,产业政策能提高资本结构向上调整的速度,但只有重点产业政策能提高固定资产比例较低的企业向下调整的速度。基于作用路径的分析发现,产业政策提高了企业选择增加债务的方式来调整资本结构的概率;重点产业政策提高了特定类型企业以增加权益方式向下调整资本结构的概率。上述结果表明,产业政策主要通过债务融资方式影响资本结构调整速度,而只有受到重点产业政策支持的特定类型的企业能够通过权益融资方式提高资本结构调整速度。     

A trade-off theory of ownership and capital structure

This paper determines the optimal ownership share held by a unit into a second unit when both face a tax-bankruptcy trade-off. Full ownership is optimal when the first unit has positive debt, because dividends help avoid its default. Positive debt is, in turn, optimal when its corporate tax rate exceeds a threshold, and/or thin capitalization rules place an upper limit on the debt level in the second unit, and/or the Volcker Rule bans bailout transfers to the second unit. Full ownership is no longer optimal only if there is a tax on intercorporate dividend. This theory rationalizes observations on multinationals, financial conglomerates, and family groups.     

Slowing investment rates in developing economies: Evidence from a Bayesian hierarchical model

Using a large unbalanced panel of 11,812 publicly listed firms covering 11 major developing economies between 1997–2017, we detail a slowdown in investment rates post-2008: from 2013 for Chinese incorporated firms, and 2008 for others. We test competing explanations for slowing investment rates using a Bayesian ‘mixed effects’ model consisting of time-varying and country-varying coefficients. Firms’ estimated underlying mean impetus to invest (their ‘animal spirits’) falls more sharply than raw investment rates from 2008 to record lows by 2017. One-third of the variation in falling ‘animal spirits’ over time is statistically explained by the corporate sector’s changing median leverage, which declines by 40% since 2008. Firms’ investment rates have increasingly been sustained through external financing constraints loosening (as cash flow coefficients decline), and firms becoming more responsive to investment opportunities — reflected by time-varying Q regression coefficients increasing. At the country-level, we find that loosening external financing constraints is associated with greater responsiveness of firms to investment opportunities.     

Leverage constraints and asset prices: Insights from mutual fund risk taking

Prior theory suggests that time variation in the degree to which leverage constraints bind affects the pricing kernel. We propose a measure for this leverage constraint tightness by inverting the argument that constrained investors tilt their portfolios to riskier assets. We show that the average market beta of actively managed mutual funds—intermediaries facing leverage restrictions—captures their desire for leverage and thus the tightness of constraints. Consistent with theory, it strongly predicts returns of the betting-against-beta portfolio, and is a priced risk factor in the cross-section of mutual funds and stocks. Funds with low exposure to the factor outperform high-exposure funds by 5% annually, and for stocks this difference reaches 7%. Our results show that the tightness of leverage constraints has important implications for asset prices.     

Financial intermediation and real estate prices impact on business cycles: A Bayesian analysis

How do financial intermediation and real estate prices impinge on the business cycle? I develop a two-sector stochastic general equilibrium model with financial intermediation and real estate collateral to assess the impact of financial conditions and land prices on aggregate fluctuations. I estimate the model with Bayesian methods using a novel data set that includes U.S. macro and financial variables during the period 1975–2010. The results from the estimated model show that financial conditions have a sizable effect on the variability of investment spending, while productivity shocks are the main source of consumption fluctuations. Specifically, on the macro side, (1) financial shocks explain about three quarters of investment spending variability and one third of the variance in hours worked. On the financial side, (2) financial shocks explain most of the variability in land prices, credit spread, and aggregate net worth of the financial sector. The model also accounts for observed unconditional moments of macro and financial variables. Our quantitative results are suggestive of the impact of diverse sources of financial instability, and as such relevant for macro prudential policy analysis.     

失业保险与公司财务杠杆

我国劳动力市场化程度日益加深导致劳动者职业转换愈加频繁,失业保险的作用日益突出。本文探究了失业保险金水平对企业财务杠杆的影响。运用2009—2019年上市公司数据进行实证分析,结果发现失业保险金上升会导致公司财务杠杆下降。渠道检验显示,提高失业保险金可以降低员工失业风险溢酬,公司劳动力成本下降,公司有更多自由现金流和盈利进行内源融资和偿还债务,公司财务杠杆下降。进一步分析发现,失业保险金的作用在失业率高的地区更加显著。主要结果在分别运用《社会保险法》和《关于调整失业保险金标准的指导意见》构造双重差分模型和工具变量解决内生性问题、更改模型设置、排除投资水平影响、删除特殊省份、更换样本期间后,依然成立。本文结果说明加大失业保险保障力度有助于降低企业财务风险。     

Heterogeneous Traders,the Leverage Effect and Volatility of the Chinese P2P Market

The new financial industry represented by peer-to-peer lending has gradually become a new source of volatility due to the increasing complexity of the Chinese financial market. This volatility leads to greater risk to P2P investors and has become the focus of the regulatory authorities in China. Based on the background data of the P2P platform, Honglingchuangtou, we use the factor analysis method to construct a platform volatility (PV) index and we construct an HAR model to study the heterogeneous traders and leverage effect in the Chinese P2P market. The empirical results show that there are both short-term and long-term heterogeneous traders in the Chinese P2P market and that long-term traders have the greatest impact on market volatility. Similar to traditional financial markets, the volatility of the P2P market also shows a leverage effect, which means that the negative volatility of trader actions should have a negative impact on market fluctuations. With regard to the leverage effect, the LHAR-PV model is superior because of a higher goodness of fit and a lower prediction error.     

居民家庭“加杠杆”能促进消费吗？——来自中国家庭微观调查的经验证据

基于中国家庭追踪调查(CFPS)数据,本文实证检验了家庭杠杆对其总支出和消费性支出的直接和间接影响,以及这种影响在不同类型消费和城乡居民家庭消费中的差异。结果显示,我国居民家庭杠杆会显著地抑制家庭总支出的增加,强化资产对总支出和消费性支出的正向促进作用,即强化财富消费效应。家庭杠杆会促进生存型消费的增加,强化生存型消费的财富消费效应,但会抑制发展与享受型消费。就对城乡居民家庭消费影响的差异而言,家庭杠杆会抑制城镇居民家庭的总支出增加,但会促进农村居民家庭消费性支出和生存型消费的增加并强化其生存型消费的财富消费效应。这表明,在供给侧结构性改革背景下,居民家庭“加杠杆”并不能直接有效地提高消费和促进消费结构升级,推动消费增长和消费结构升级的根本途径在于增加家庭收入和家庭总资产水平。     

从资产负债表角度考察人口结构的宏观含义

中国人口红利趋于弱化的主要影响是低利率格局将逐步发生改变,从而提高负债方融资的整体成本,这反过来将对资产方投资配置产生冲击。为此,本文从国家资产负债表的角度考察人口结构变迁的宏观含义,人口红利趋于消失意味着融资杠杆能力的弱化以及投资效率的降低,这将导致一个经济体合适的、可持续的潜在增长率逐步呈现下行态势。人口结构对国家资产负债表的冲击也限制了政策的腾挪空间,经济增长中枢速度的平稳回落以及通货膨胀中枢水平的上升,意味着决策者如果以低物价和高增长组合作为政策目标,将可能导致紧缩过度或刺激过度。     

股票流动性对公司资本结构的影响研究

本文分析了流动性对公司资本结构的影响。理论分析表明,一个公司股权交易流动性的提高,使得公司股权融资成本得以降低,公司更倾向于采用增发、配股等股权融资的方式融资,这会降低公司的财务杠杆率。同时,借鉴资本结构动态调整的思想分析,发现个股流动性越高,资本结构的调整速度越快。本文基于2002—2010沪深两市发行的非金融业A股数据,采用面板数据回归等方法研究了股票流动性等因素对公司资本结构的影响,本文的经验结果支持这一理论假设。