Verifiability and Contract Enforcement: A Model with Judicial Moral Hazard

I model the litigation of a contract containing a variable notobservable by courts, hence nonverifiable, unless the rationaland self-interested judge exerts effort. He values the correctruling but dislikes effort. Judicial effort is discretionary.I show that effort cost is inconsequential—"always breach"is equilibrium for any effort cost. But there exists anotherequilibrium where a small breach rate is achieved even withsignificant effort costs. Maximal remedies for breach are notoptimal. Because effort is discretionary, low effort cost increasesbreach. Pretrial negotiations can have a substantial negativeimpact on verifiability under arbitrarily small deviations fromfull rationality.     

The Effect of Repeated Interaction on Contract Choice: Evidence from Offshore Drilling

We argue that repeated interaction and high-powered formal contractscan be either substitutes or complements, depending on the relativeimpact of repeated interaction on incentive problems and contractingcosts. In the offshore drilling industry, we find that oil andgas companies are less likely to choose fixed-price contractsas the frequency of their interaction with a driller increases.This supports the conclusion that repeated interaction and high-poweredformal contracts are substitutes in this setting, indicatingthat repeated interaction reduces incentive problems more thancontracting costs. In addition, we find that using instrumentalvariables to account for the endogenous matching of drillersto projects strengthens our results.     

Contract enforcement and family control of business: Evidence from China

Family control of business is prevalent in developing economies, and one of the leading theories suggests that it is a response to weak contract enforcement in such economies. In this paper, we investigate the impacts of contract enforcement on the degree of family control of business using a sample of China’s private enterprises. It is found that weaker contract enforcement is associated with the higher degree of family control of business. Our results are robust to the control for omitted variables and reserve causality issues, to the adjustment for the sample attrition bias, to the use of a sub-sample, and to the inclusion of other explanations for the family control of business.     

空间套汇的条件

一般文献对于空间套汇的条件缺乏深入严谨的分析,为弥补这一缺陷,本文尝试在严格考虑到外汇银行对同一外汇买卖汇率报价不同的基础上,对空间套汇的条件做了较为深入严谨的讨论和分析,给出了不存在空间套汇机会的充分必要条件及其若干重要推论。     

Pricing in Segmented Markets, Arbitrage Barriers, and the Law of One Price: Evidence from the European Car Market

The paper uses micro‐level price data from the European car market to examine why there are deviations from the law of one price. The absolute law of one price is strongly rejected, but there is convergence to its relative version. Two sets of explanations are considered: (i) price‐setting in segmented markets, and (ii) arbitrage barriers. Overall, the determinants of arbitrage costs have more explanatory power. The single most important factor is the distance between markets. Evidence for Belgium and Luxembourg suggests that a single currency lowers price differences significantly.     

合同能源管理:模式创新与法律应对

合同能源管理在过去的发展过程中一直面临着市场模式单一、市场规模散小、融资及税收成本较大、收益期限过长的发展瓶颈,难以适应我国节能减排工作和节能产业发展的需要,因此为了推动合同能源管理、发展节能服务产业,依据国务院办公厅转发国家发改委等部门《关于加快推行合同能源管理促进节能服务产业发展意见的通知》,合同能源管理应当在模式创新以及法律规范性上进行更加深入地探索和研究,改变过去传统的BOT模式,尝试性将融资租赁模式、金融机构持股模式和专业融资担保模式运用到合同能源管理之中,同时完善能源管理合同,建立合同能源管理项目收益权融资交易制度,防范法律风险,最终实现合同能源管理的法定化。     

关系投资、内部控制与企业财务杠杆水平——基于关系契约与规则契约理论的经验证据

本文基于关系契约与规则契约的理论视角,以公司与前五大供应商/客户的购销比例作为关系投资的替代变量,探讨关系投资、内部控制及其交互作用对企业财务杠杆水平的影响,研究发现:供应商/客户的关系投资与财务杠杆具有负向关系,但当内部控制因素加入后,这种负向关系会因关系投资的角色不同发生变化,即供应商关系投资与内部控制存在互补效应,而客户关系投资与内部控制存在替代效应。同时,相对于非国有企业,国有企业的供应商关系投资治理机制与内部控制治理机制对降低企业财务杠杆水平的互补效应更明显,而国有企业的客户关系投资治理机制与内部控制治理机制对降低企业财务杠杆水平存在明显的替代效应。     

契约密集型货币:契约实施、产权和经济绩效

本文引入了一个客观地度量契约实施及产权安全性的指标,即"契约密集型货币(contract-intensive money)",或简称为CIM.它建立在人们选择以何种方式持有金融资产的决策基础之上.不同国家的案例研究表明,作为对政治事件的反映,CIM按照本文预测的方式随时变化.研究还表明,CIM和一国的投资额、经济增长率及依赖契约部门的相对规模存在正相关关系.     

Rate Design Arbitrage: The Case for Value-Based Peaking Services

Journal of Regulatory Economics -     

基于绩效提升的知识型员工心理契约构建

提高员工绩效是现代企业寻求竞争优势的重要手段,而心理契约对员工绩效的提高有重要影响,因为心理契约是联系员工与契约之间的心理纽带,也是影响员工态度和行为的重要因素。本文从心理契约的内涵出发,分析心理契约与绩效的关系,在此基础上探讨了知识型员工心理契约的构建。     

收益类型、合约特性和地方政府间合作绩效

各地方政府通过合作获得的经济收益有绝对和相对的区分。当地方官员追求绝对收益最大化时,合作绩效较高;当其追求相对收益最大化时,合作绩效较低。从合约理论来看,这种状况产生的根本原因是在单一制国家结构形式和转轨经济条件下,各地方官员履行职能的依据是一种特殊的代理合约。这种特殊的合约及其相应的治理结构导致了地方官员特殊的行为方式,并由此决定合作的绩效。     

股权结构与公司绩效:基于动态内生性视角的经验证据

在股权结构与公司绩效关系的研究中,已有文献大都先验地把股权结构作为外生变量来处理,并认为二者之间是一种静态关系。本文以1999～2008年间沪、深两市509家上市公司为研究对象,在动态面板数据模型中控制住内生性问题的影响后发现:(1)在静态分析框架下,第一大股东持股与绩效之间是相互影响的,但管理层持股与绩效之间无任何显著性关联;(2)在动态分析框架下,股权结构与绩效之间存在跨期动态作用的可能,不过证据比较微弱,它受绩效变量的影响。以上结论具有一定的政策含义。     

Contract-Intensive Money: Contract Enforcement, Property Rights, and Economic Performance

We introduce a new, easily accessed and objective measure of the enforceability of contracts and the security of property rights. This measure, called contract-intensive money or CIM, is based on citizens decisions regarding the form in which they choose to hold their financial assets. Country case studies show that CIM varies over time in response to political events in ways predicted by our arguments. We also show that CIM is positively related to investment and growth rates, and to the relative size of contract-dependent sectors of the economy.     

Offshoring and Firm Performance: Evidence from the Italian Manufacturing Industry

The fundamental question of whether offshoring is value enhancing and, more specifically, whether Italian manufacturing firms that undertake offshoring benefit from higher productivity and profitability is explored. Using data from the tenth wave of the “Survey on Manufacturing Firms” conducted by Unicredit‐Capitalia, it was found that, compared with domestic firms, firms relocating activities to a foreign country have different characteristics, and “better” firms might self‐select into offshoring decision. To disentangle the effect of offshoring on firms' performances from the effect of firm characteristics, several variants of propensity score matching are used. A mild and insignificant positive effect of offshoring on profitability was found and also evidence of a statistically significant positive effect of offshoring on productivity.     

The Determinants of Firm Performance and Bribery: Evidence from Manufacturing Firms in Nigeria

This paper uses ordinary least squares with firm effects and Probit regression models to investigate the determinants of firm performance and the likelihood of firms to pay bribes. Results for the manufacturing firms in Nigeria show that skilled workforce, exports, foreign ownership and capital investment influence firm performance. Conversely, poor electricity delivery and difficulty obtaining finance impede firm performance. Total sales and time spent dealing with government regulations increase the likelihood of firms to pay bribes. Surprisingly, foreign firms are as much likely to pay bribes as domestic firms. Policy implications from the findings are important considering that the manufacturing sector assumes an important role in the Lewis theory of economic development.     

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.     

Industrial Ownership and Environmental Performance: Evidence from China

This study explores the differences in pollution control performance of industries with different types of ownership – State owned (SOE), collectively or community owned (COE), and privately owned (POE). A theoretic analysis is conducted and followed by an empirical assessment with Chinese data. The empirical results show that the COEs in China have better environmental performances in water pollution discharges than the SOEs and the POEs, suggesting that COEs may internalize environmental externalities.      

类型相关情形下具有套利的非线性定价模型

在代理人类型相关的非线性定价环境中,代理人之间可能结成联盟操纵信息并进行套利,垄断厂商需要设计出同时防范信息操纵和套利的定价合约.对类型相关且代理人数n≥3的情形,Che and Kim(2006)证明了包含信息操纵与套利的合谋行为可以无成本防范.对n=2这一在激励机制设计问题中占有重要地位的情况,本文证明无成本防范这一结论不再成立:信息操纵行为会引起配置效率的扭曲,套利活动会引起配置的进一步扭曲.并且,类型正相关和负相关时配置的扭曲方式不同.负相关时的配置扭曲将随着类型相关度的逐渐减弱而消失,而正相关时的配置扭曲不会随着类型相关度的减弱而消失.扭曲方式的差异导致有套利情形下的配置效率随着信息结构呈现不连续变化.从而,本文也推广了Laffont and Martimort(2000)的类型相关但无套利和Jeon and Manicucci(2005)的存在套利但类型无关情形下的结论.     

电子合同对中国《合同法》的挑战

中国合同法对电子合同的规定简单、笼统，难以调整现实中大量存在的电子合同关系。本文在总结电子合同的特点，订立过程中的形式、要约和承诺规则，电子签名等问题的基础上，结合国内外相关立法，就电子合同封中国《合同法》的挑战作一讨论，希望能有助于後行者的深入研究。