刑事涉财产执行中的案外人权益救济——以案外人权益救济程序的当事人构造为视角

刑事涉财产执行程序因采取移送执行模式而被误认为不存在申请执行人，使得刑事涉财产执行程序及其衍生的案外人权益救济程序过分依赖执行法院的职权主义。在刑事附带民事诉讼裁判、追缴或责令退赔违法所得并返还被害人判项、责令被免予刑事处罚的被告人赔偿被害人损失判项的执行程序中，案外人权益救济程序原则上应以被害人为申请执行人，并参照适用民事强制执行程序中的案外人权益救济制度。其他刑事涉财产执行程序应以检察机关为申请执行人。除非出现被执行人逃避执行或者案外人对执行标的提出排除执行请求等特殊情形，作为申请执行人的检察机关通常无须现实参加执行程序。     

Learning from R&D outsourcing vs. learning by R&D outsourcing

We analyze how research and development (R&D) outsourcing influences product innovation. We propose a separation between learning from R&D outsourcing, whereby the firm improves its ability to innovate by using outsourced R&D directly in new products, from learning by R&D outsourcing, whereby the firm indirectly uses outsourced R&D by integrating it with internal R&D to create new products. Building on the knowledge-based view, we argue that learning from R&D outsourcing is likely to have an inverse U-shaped relationship with product innovation, because the initial benefits of using outsourced component R&D knowledge to innovate products is eventually outweighed by the hollowing out of the firm's ability to innovate. In contrast, we propose that learning by R&D outsourcing is likely to have a U-shaped relationship with product innovation, because the initial challenges of integrating internal and external R&D are eventually overcome, resulting in more innovations. Finally, we distinguish between domestic and foreign R&D outsourcing and propose a liability of foreignness in R&D outsourcing as it has a lower impact on new products than domestic R&D outsourcing. The empirical analysis shows that outsourced R&D has an inverted U-shaped relationship with the number of new products, while the interaction between outsourced R&D and internal R&D has a U-shaped relationship with the number of new products. It also shows that domestic outsourced R&D has a higher positive impact on the number of new products than foreign outsourced R&D.     

Unfolding China’s state-owned corporate empires and mitigating agency hazards: Effects of foreign investments and innovativeness

Integrating agency and institutional perspectives, we describe how China’s socio-political institutions create state-owned corporate empires with unique agency conflicts. We develop a framework demonstrating how economically unjustified firm expansion, i.e. empire building, mediates the relationship between state ownership and performance. We uncover the instrument in empire building and appropriate corporate governance and strategic management remedies. An empirical study on 29,638 Chinese firms evidences that (1) increased state ownership drives higher management expenses and lower firm profitability though empire building; (2) long-term debt is used to finance empire building; and (3) foreign capital investments and innovativeness can mitigate these agency conflicts.     

Agency costs and tax planning when the government is a major Shareholder

In state owned enterprises (SOEs), taxes are a dividend to the controlling shareholder, the state, but a cost to other shareholders. We examine publicly traded firms in China and find significantly lower tax avoidance by SOEs relative to non-SOEs. The differences are pronounced for locally versus centrally-owned SOEs and during the year of SOE term performance evaluations. We link our results to managerial incentives through promotion tests, finding that higher SOE tax rates are associated with higher promotion frequencies of SOE managers. Our results suggest managerial incentives and tax reporting are conditional on the ownership structure of the firm.     

委托理财导致上市公司脱实向虚吗?——基于企业创新的视角

依据2008-2017年上市公司委托理财与专利数据,本文实证研究了委托理财对企业创新的影响。研究发现随着委托理财规模与理财收益对公司业绩贡献的增加,上市公司总体上创新数量变化不明显,但创新质量却显著下降。对于不同的委托理财而言,上市公司购买银行与非银行委托理财对创新质量的影响均为负面,但对创新数量的影响却正好相反。两种类型委托理财对创新数量的影响可能相互抵消,从而导致总体上委托理财对创新数量的影响不显著。进一步研究发现,购买更多的委托理财导致上市公司更加倾向于进行风险低的开发性创新,减少风险高的探索性创新。购买银行理财的上市公司更倾向于机会主义创新,而购买非银行理财的上市公司更可能消极创新。总之,基于企业创新视角的分析发现大规模和投机性的委托理财会干扰上市公司创新行为,导致其经营"脱实向虚"。     

Relief aid stocking decisions under bilateral agency cooperation

We aim to quantify the benefits of cooperation between humanitarian relief agencies in terms of stocking decisions. We consider two agencies that stock the same type of relief item at different locations prone to individual disaster risks and agree to transship the shortage amount from available stocks in case of a disaster. We incorporate the disaster risk to the Newsvendor model by conditioning the stock quantity decisions on the event that a major disaster occurs within the lifetime of the stocked relief item. We optimize the stock quantity for each agency in response to the other's quantity and compute a Nash Equilibrium solution numerically. We apply this game theoretic approach to the case of earthquake preparedness in Istanbul to optimize the stocking decisions of an agency for shelter units in cooperation with another agency. We investigate the characteristics of the solutions under various parameter settings and identify cases in which cooperation may be beneficial to one or both of the agencies.     

Consumer Brand Hate: Steam rolling whatever I see

This study aims to investigate negative consumer‐brand relationships by developing a “Brand Hate” concept. A hierarchical Brand Hate model is theoretically discussed in light of the psychology and consumer behavior literatures. In Study‐I the Brand Hate concept was tested with two different types of consumer brand haters, true haters, and regular haters. The study found that in the study's proposed multidimensional Brand Hate hierarchy true haters display “Boiling Brand Hate” while regular haters reveal “Seething Brand Hate.” Two additional studies were developed to examine the relationship between consumer personality traits and Brand Hate, exploring which types of consumers are more prone to feel hatred toward targeted brands. Study‐II's findings revealed a relationship between consumers who are high in personality traits of “conscientiousness” and those who Brand Hate. Study‐III's findings indicated that “self‐confident” and “competitive” consumers might also be more prone to feel hatred toward those brands that perform poorly and unethically.     

Auditors' Responses to Workload Imbalance and the Impact on Audit Quality*

Using detailed data for fieldwork hours and audit hours by rank from audit engagements in Korea, we examine whether audits conducted under workload imbalance, proxied by busy‐season audits, impair audit quality, and how auditors adjust staff assignments for busy‐season audits. We generally find that busy‐season audits are associated with lower audit quality, and that audit firms reduce the involvement of senior auditors during busy‐season audits. In addition, the greater the involvement of senior auditors and junior auditors, the lesser the deterioration in audit quality. Finally, although there is no increase in interim audits in response to workload imbalance during busy seasons, increasing interim audits can mitigate the negative impact of busy‐season audits on audit quality. Our results are relevant to auditors and regulators, who have expressed concerns about the adverse effects of workload imbalance on audit quality.     

Philanthropic giving of China’s hotel firms: The roles of state ownership,corporate misconduct and executive remuneration

This study utilizes value enhancement theory, agency cost theory and crisis management theory to scrutinize the philanthropic giving (PG) of China’s listed hotel companies from 2003 to 2018. The results of dynamic panel regression tests reveal that state ownership (company character), corporate misconduct (crisis management determinant) and executive remuneration (agency cost determinant) are influential factors in hotel firms’ PG, but none of the value enhancement determinants can explain PG. Specifically, state ownership is negatively correlated with PG, reflecting low PG in government dominated hotel firms in China. PG is negatively associated with executive remuneration, indicating that hotel managers care more about self-interest than social responsibility. PG is also positively related to corporate misconduct, suggesting that hotel firms use philanthropy to manage a crisis. Finally, the lagged PG has a positive effect on PG, implying that PG is intended to avoid damage to social image and reputation of China’s hotel firms.     

Political interventions in state-owned enterprises: The corporate governance failures of a European airline

This paper is based on the theory of hybrid organizations and we investigate the context, factors, mediators, and outcome of a public scandal involving a Romanian state-owned company in the civil aviation sector. This retrospective case study is part of a research design that alternates between inductive and deductive procedures devised to test relevant hypotheses, integrate several theories, and construct the causal mechanism of the corporate scandal. Four theories have been selected to address multiple aspects of the case: the hybrid organization theory, the agency theory, the fraud triangle theory, and the legitimacy theory. Several hypotheses have been proposed at the confluence of these frameworks, and the data collection process was conducted to ensure the credibility, dependability, and transferability of results. In addition to the themes and categories that have emerged from the thematic analysis, the paper also uses the process-tracing method to propose a causal graph and an event-history map in support of the hypotheses. The paper puts forward a series of recommendations on how to improve the corporate governance of state-owned enterprises, and to prevent potential scandals. The authors suggest that the separation of ownership and control is beneficial for strategy implementation in state-owned enterprises and can alleviate an entity’s financial difficulties.