Social trust and corporate financial asset holdings: Evidence from China

This study examines the impact of social trust on firms’ holdings of non-currency financial assets using a large sample of firms in China’s real sector. We find that firms in regions of the high social trust hold fewer financial assets, consistent with the notion that credibility in high-trust regions reduces information asymmetry and transaction cost among market participants. This leads to better access to formal and informal financing and higher profitability for the real economy, eventually depressing firms’ financial asset allocations. We also find that the negative effect of social trust on financial asset holdings is more prominent for private firms and firms with weak internal monitoring from large shareholders, suggesting that corporations rely more on trust in these cases; it is less pronounced when firms are in regions with good legal systems, proving social trust to be a substitute for formal institutions.     

The effect of market competition on corporate cash holdings: An analysis of corporate innovation and financial constraint

This study investigates the impact of market competition on corporate cash holdings. Specifically, we focus on the corporate innovation and financial constraint channels. Based on a sample of the Chinese stock market from 1998 to 2019, our empirical results show that cash holdings are negatively impacted by market competition, corporate innovation partially mediates this effect, and financial constraint exhibits full mediation. Moreover, the mediating effect of corporate innovation is moderated by financial constraints. Furthermore, the impact of market competition reveals an increasing trend as cash holdings increase with quantile regression. In addition, this impact is mitigated for state-owned enterprises, and firms with larger total assets are impacted to a lesser degree.     

Bank asset management and financial insurance

We have recently witnessed an increasing interaction between banking and insurance. Banks which are concerned about their risk level are insuring some of their loans with specialized underwriters. Some banks are also becoming involved in the role of providing special insurance packages to their stockholders or depositors. A comparative analysis of bank and insurance asset management models shows a high degree of complementarity. This complementarity suggests an increasing interdependence and a growth of financial exchanges between banking and insurance industries.     

The impact of competition and time-to-finance on corporate cash holdings

This paper empirically documents how the interaction between competition and time frictions in capital markets impacts firms' cash management decisions. Using the introduction of the U.S. Securities Offering Reform in 2005 as a quasi-natural experiment, we show that a shorter time-to-finance leads to a reduction in corporate cash holdings. This effect is significantly stronger for firms that are exposed to preemption risk. Furthermore, patents mitigate the risk of preemption and the effect of a reduction in time-to-finance on cash holdings is strongest for unconstrained firms.     

Technology spillovers,asset redeployability and corporate financial policies

Prior research shows that technology spillovers across firms increase innovation, productivity and value. We study how firms finance their own growth stimulated by technology spillovers from their technological peer firms. We find that greater technology spillovers lead to higher leverage. This is the result of technology spillovers increasing asset redeployability, as evidenced by more collateralized borrowing and asset transactions. Borrowing costs also decrease. Exogenous variation in the research and development tax credits of other firms allows us to identify the causal effect of technology spillovers on a given firm.     

The EMU effects on asset market holdings and the recent financial crisis

This paper examines if there are significant integration effects from the establishment of European Monetary Union (EMU) and the introduction of euro on EMU and non-EMU equity and bond markets. This is done by looking at the holdings of these markets. We investigate to what extent these effects have been affected by the recent global financial crisis. This is done based on gravity model determining bilateral asset holding among the EMU countries, non-EMU European countries and the rest of world. This model can control for the effects of other economic (gravity-type) variables on the effects of the EMU on financial markets, like the size of the capital markets across countries, the geographical distance, information asymmetries etc. Ignoring these effects may exaggerate the actual EMU integration effects. The paper provides clear cut evidence that the establishment of the EMU had significant integration effects on equity and bond markets. It significantly increased the EMU bond and equity holdings by the EMU and non-EMU investors. These effects have become important since year 2001. However, they have considerably reduced after year 2007, due to the recent global financial crisis. Across the EMU countries, we have found that the strongest disintegration effects of the above crisis were observed for the peripheral countries of the EMU. These effects became evident before the start of the European debt crisis in early 2010.     

Real asset liquidity,cash holdings,and the cost of corporate debt

We study the impact of the interplay between cash holdings and asset sales on the corporate debt spread. We allow cash holdings and asset sales to assist with both debt repayment and sequential investments. The interplay between cash holdings and asset sales leads to a convex relationship between credit spreads and the liquidity of the market for real assets. We use the 2008 financial crisis as a natural experiment and find that post-2008, the nonlinearity of the link between credit spreads and asset liquidity is pronounced, closely matching analytical predictions. This is especially acute for highly leveraged and low profitability firms.     

The effect of financial constraints,investment policy,product market competition and corporate governance on the value of cash holdings

This study empirically investigates the value shareholders place on excess cash holdings and how shareholders’ valuation of cash holdings is associated with financial constraints, firm growth, cash‐flow uncertainty and product market competition for Australian firms from 1990 to 2007. Our results indicate that the marginal value of cash holdings to shareholders declines with larger cash holdings and higher leverage. However, firms that are more financially constrained, that have higher growth rates and that face greater uncertainty exhibit a higher marginal value of cash holdings. These findings are consistent with the explanation that excess cash holdings are not necessarily detrimental to firm value. Firms with costly external financing and that also save more cash for current operating and future investing needs find that the market values these cash hoarding policies favourably. Finally, there is limited evidence of an association between various corporate governance measures and the value of cash holdings for a shorter sample period.     

Bank competition and financial stability in Asia Pacific

Analysis of the tradeoff between competition and financial stability has been at the center of academic and policy debate for over two decades and especially since the 2007–2008 global financial crises. Here we use information on 14 Asia Pacific economies from 2003 to 2010 to investigate the influence of bank competition, concentration, regulation and national institutions on individual bank fragility as measured by the probability of bankruptcy and the bank’s Z-score. The results suggest that greater concentration fosters financial fragility and that lower pricing power also induces bank risk exposure after controlling for a variety of macroeconomic, bank-specific, regulatory and institutional factors. In terms of regulations and institutions, the results show that tougher entry restrictions may benefit bank stability, whereas stronger deposit insurance schemes are associated with greater bank fragility.     

Cash holdings and real asset liquidity

This paper examines the relationship between the ability of a firm to sell its real assets and its cash holdings behavior. A substitution effect exists between the size of cash balances and the liquidity of a firm’s real assets when access to external capital markets is limited. Among financially constrained firms, higher asset liquidity is related to lower cash holdings. Additionally for financially constrained firms, the market value of cash is lower for firms with higher asset liquidity.     

Trust and corporate cash holdings

We examine the relation between the level of trust in a country and corporate cash holdings. The precautionary savings motive predicts that firms located in countries with less trusting societies will hoard more cash in order to compensate for reduced access to capital markets. The agency hypothesis predicts that shareholders in countries with low levels of societal trust will pressure firms to disgorge cash. The first theory predicts a negative relation between trust and corporate cash holdings while the second theory predicts a positive relation between these two variables. Using data on firms located in 54 countries around the world, we find evidence in favor of the agency-based explanation for the relation between trust and corporate cash holdings. Overall, our results highlight the role played by informal institutions in shaping corporate financial management.     

Accruals quality and corporate cash holdings

This Work Uses Panel Data For Firms Listed In The Spanish Stock Exchange Over The Period From 1995 To 2001 To Analyse The Effect Of Accounting Quality On Cash Holdings. The Results Show That Firms With Good Accruals Quality Hold Lower Cash Levels Than Firms With Poor Accruals Quality. This Finding Suggests That The Quality Of Accounting Information May Reduce The Negative Effects Of Information Asymmetries And Adverse Selection Costs, Allowing Firms To Reduce Their Level Of Corporate Cash Holdings. The Results Also Show That Cash Holdings Decrease When Firms Increase Their Use Of Bank Debt And In The Presence Of Cash Substitutes. In Contrast With This, Firms With Higher Cash Flow Hold Higher Levels Of Cash.     

Firm selection and corporate cash holdings

Since the early 1980s, the composition of US public firms has progressively shifted toward less profitable firms with high growth potential (Fama and French, 2004). We estimate a dynamic corporate finance model to quantify the role of this selection mechanism for the secular trend in cash holdings among US public firms. We find that an increase in the precautionary savings motive—primarily driven by the decline in initial profitability among R&D-intensive new lists—explains about 50% of the upward trend in cash holdings. This selection mechanism also explains part of the upward trend in sales growth volatility.     

Firm structure and corporate cash holdings

We analyze whether the organizational structure of firms (i.e., whether a firm is diversified or focused) affects their cash holdings. Using Compustat firm level and segment-level data, we find that diversified firms hold significantly less cash than their focused counterparts. Our results are robust to industry adjustments at the segment level and to different factors previously found to be important determinants of cash holdings. Using time-series, cross-sectional, and additional robustness tests we are able to attribute the lower cash holdings among diversified firms to complementary growth opportunities across the different segments of these firms and the availability of active internal capital markets. We find that the other theories that rely on the potentially effective use of asset sales of non-core segments of diversified firms to generate cash, and the increased agency/influence costs in diversified firms do not offer an economically significant explanation for the lower cash holdings among diversified firms.     

Shariah compliance and corporate cash holdings

This study investigates the influence of Shariah compliance status on cash holding levels and the speed of adjustment of non-financial listed firms in six Gulf Cooperation countries from 2005 to 2016. The results show that Shariah compliance status has a significant effect on firms’ cash holding decisions. Shariah-compliant firms have significantly higher cash holding levels than non-Shariah-compliant firms. Further, Shariah-compliant firms adjust more quickly towards their target cash holdings than their conventional counterparts. In our view, Shariah-compliant firms are subject to multiple restrictions that limit their external financing channels. Therefore, holding larger cash reserves is important as it helps gain from the transaction cost motive of holding cash. The findings of this study have important implications for regulators, investors and managers. To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first to compare the effect of Shariah compliance on firms’ cash holdings and the speed of adjustment towards the trade-off theory’s optimal cash holding target.     

Organization capital and corporate cash holdings

This paper investigates the relationship between organization capital and corporate cash holdings. We develop two competing hypotheses in relating organization capital with cash holding. Our analysis reveals that organization capital is related to high levels of cash holdings. Moreover, we find that the effect of organization capital on corporate cash holdings is stronger for firms experiencing high levels of financing constraint and cash flow risk. Our results remain robust to alternative measures of organization capital and corporate cash holdings, and are not driven by omitted variable bias or endogeneity issues. We also find that the positive relation between organization capital and cash holdings is not confounded by sample period or industry group. Overall, we provide robust evidence that supports the precautionary motive for corporate cash holding.     

CEO overconfidence and corporate cash holdings

This study proposes chief executive officer (CEO) overconfidence to be an alternative explanation to corporate cash holdings. We find positive effects of CEO overconfidence on the level of cash holdings and the value of cash, which are mainly due to the investment environments faced by firms. The positive effects of CEO overconfidence on cash holdings level and cash value are barely affected by the traditional motives of cash holdings based on trade-off and agency theories. The analysis of cash sources further explains why firms with overconfident CEOs can aggressively pursue risky investments and maintain large cash holdings at the same time. Although the prior literature indicates that overconfident CEOs tend to avoid equity issues for their capital investments, the contribution to cash savings from equity is higher than that from debt. Additional robustness tests also support our empirical findings.     

Earnings quality and corporate cash holdings

Poor earnings quality exacerbates information asymmetry between internal and external stakeholders of a firm. Agency considerations then persuade investors to discount the value of corporate cash holdings out of concern about the inappropriate use of funds. In this study, we show that poor earnings quality has a negative impact on the value of corporate cash holdings and a positive impact on the level of cash reserves. We find that the negative effect of poor earnings quality either neutralizes or more than offsets the positive effect of excess cash on firm value. Our results are robust to several measures of earnings quality and model specifications.     

Trading costs, liquidity, and asset holdings

In this article I develop a model that accounts for interdependencebetween trading costs in various asset markets arising fromthe optimizing behavior of liquidity traders. The model suggeststhat noise trading is an important determinant of the liquidityof asset markets and provides a positive theory for diversifiedasset holdings by risk-neutral liquidity traders.     

CEO cultural background and corporate cash holdings

This paper examines whether the cultural background of chief executive officers (CEOs) affects corporate cash holdings. Using UK data from 2000 to 2018, we find that CEOs with a cultural background that emphasises power distance and uncertainty avoidance are positively associated with corporate cash holdings, while CEOs with a cultural background that emphasises masculinity are negatively associated with corporate cash holdings. Our results are robust to various robustness tests. Further analyses show that the impact is more pronounced when power is concentrated among top executives, when the CEOs have a degree of discretion in pursuing their own goals, and when information asymmetry is high.