Stock Dividend Announcement Effects in an Imputation Tax Environment

A key question in asset pricing is the extent to which tax effects are passed through market prices or are capitalised in them. New Zealand stock dividends provide a useful window into this debate because of (1) the existence of both taxable and non-taxable stock dividends, and (2) the particular form of imputation tax system which allows the full pass through of corporate taxes to the investor on the proportion of profits which are distributed either as cash or taxable stock dividends. We present evidence that investors value future tax benefits associated with imputation tax credits.     

Incentive Compensation and the Stock Price Response to Dividend Increase Announcements

Linking executive compensation to stock price performance is predicted to decrease the usual positive price response to dividend increases for two reasons. One, increasing pay‐performance sensitivity (PPS) exacerbates managers' optimistic bias regarding future firm performance, reducing the credibility of dividend signals. Two, increasing pay‐performance sensitivity reduces the need for dividends as a means of reducing agency costs. Consistent with behavioral and agency theories of corporate finance, we find that price response does decrease as pay‐performance sensitivity increases and that this effect is concentrated in firms with low market‐to‐book ratios. Additional findings are most consistent with the agency cost explanation.     

送转股对股东财富的影响——基于中国上市公司的证据

以2008、2009年的送转股除权日进行事件研究,通过均值比较与检验方法,首次实证研究我国上市公司送转股后股价变化对股东财富的影响,结果发现:相对于经过调整的除权前一日的股价,2008年股票除权后,股价以高于送转股的比例单调下降;而2009年股票除权后,股价呈上升趋势,并于第14日显著高于经过调整的除权前一日的股价。除权后20天内的股价整体上高于年末股价,说明相对基于年末股价的股利决策,送转股没有降低股价。企业发放股票股利,导致股票总市值上升,增加了股东财富。     

Dividend Policies and Price-Volume Reactions to Cash Dividends on the Stock Market: Evidence from the Istanbul Stock Exchange

This study examines the effects of cash dividend payments on stock returns and trading volumes in the stock market. It also investigates whether there is any difference in the investment behavior of investors with respect to the dividend pay out ratio and size in the Istanbul Stock Exchange (ISE)from 1995 to 2003. Prices start to rise a few sessions before cash dividend payments, and on the ex-dividend day, they fall less than do dividend payments, finally decreasing in the sessions following the payment. Trading volume shows a considerable upward shift before the payment date and, interestingly, is stable after Thus, cash dividends influence prices and trading volumes in different ways before, at, and after payment, providing some profitable active trading strategy opportunities around the ex-dividend day. The findings support price-volume reaction discussions on the divident payment date and the significant effect of cash dividends on the stock market.     

Dilution,Dividend Commitments and Liquidity: Do Dividend Changes Reflect Information Signaling?

We develop new tests of the dividend signaling hypothesis by focusing on the role of liquidity. We allow for two different types of signaling models: one where current dividends signal firm value and the objective is to prevent current dilution, and the other where commitments to future dividends constitute the signal. We find that the results differ by the sign of the dividend surprise. Signaling models of the commitment type explain the market reaction to negative dividend surprises. Interestingly, this result is significant only for the earlier sub-period in our sample due, perhaps, to the well-documented increase in institutional investors with longer horizons. The market reaction to positive dividend surprises, on the other hand, is shown to be consistent with the over-investment and wealth transfer hypotheses. We show that the failure of the signaling model for these firms could be due to lower costs of dividend increases.     

Factors Influencing Dividend Policy Decisions of Nasdaq Firms

This study reports the results of a 1999 survey of Nasdaq‐listed firms. Respondents provided information about the importance of 22 different factors that influence their dividend policy. Our results suggest that many managers of Nasdaq firms make dividend decisions consistent with Lintner's (1956) survey results and model. The results also show significant differences between the manager responses of financial and non‐financial firms on nine of the 22 factors. This finding implies the presence of industry effects on dividend policy decisions. In general, the same factors that are important to Nasdaq firms are also important to NYSE firms.     

Odd‐lot Costs and Taxation Influences on Stock Dividend Ex‐dates

Abstract:   Past research has revealed significant abnormal ex‐date returns for stock dividends even though the ex‐date is known in advance and the distribution contains no new information. Various researchers have suggested that the higher transaction cost of selling odd‐lot share parcels compared to round‐lot share parcels is a key driver in the abnormal returns. However, no study to date has directly compared the ex‐date price reaction of stock dividends distributed when odd‐lot transaction costs were charged to those issued when odd‐lot costs were not evident. As odd‐lot trade costs were eliminated from the New Zealand Stock Exchange on 1 October, 1991, the New Zealand market provides a unique opportunity to directly test the role, if any, that odd‐lot transactions costs have in explaining stock dividend ex‐date returns. We find that prior to October 1991 stock dividend ex‐dates exhibit significantly positive returns, however, we do not find any significant ex‐date return once the higher odd‐lot transaction costs were removed. The New Zealand market also enables us to examine an imputation tax based argument of the ex‐date price reaction and we find evidence that imputation tax credits have a value greater than zero.     

Prior Information and the Market Reaction to Dividend Changes

We investigate two hypotheses regarding the information content of dividend change announcements. The first is that the importance of information signaled by a dividend change depends on the reliability of earnings forecasts existing before the dividend announcement. The second hypothesis is that the stock price reaction to dividend change announcements is related to earnings forecast error as of the time of the dividend announcement. Our results reveal that dividend increases convey more information for firms in which financial analysts least accurately predict earnings. The results also indicate that dividend increase and decrease announcements provide market participants with information which, on average, allows them to differentiate between firms on the basis of future earnings realizations. These differential information effects are shown to be robust to price, size, dividend yield, and overinvestment effects.     

An International Analysis of Dividend Payment Behavior

Abstract:  This study investigates patterns in dividend payment across nine common law and sixteen civil law countries over 1994-2007. We begin by examining whether the recent decline in the number of dividend payers is solely a US phenomenon or part of a more global trend. We find that at the beginning of our sample period, 72% of our sample firms pay dividends, but by 2007, this percentage decreases to 55%, with the decline more acute in common law countries. Our analysis further shows that the growing incidence of non-dividend paying firms can be explained by an increase in the percentage of firms that have never paid dividends. We find that common law firms are less likely to initiate new dividend programs than those in civil law nations, although they tend to have more abundant growth opportunities. We further establish that this global decline in the propensity to pay dividends is more pronounced in firms incorporated in common law jurisdictions. Finally, we find that both the percentage increase in aggregate dividends and the dividend payout ratio is higher in civil law countries.     

Stock Market Development and the Decline of the Portion of Dividend Payers throughout the World

I contend that stock market development has substantially contributed to the decline of dividend payers worldwide. Using data from 31 countries, my research shows that stock market development makes firms in countries with a relatively high dependence on stock market financing less likely to pay dividends, to pay less, and more likely to omit. These results also are robust to the sample selection, the time‐varying firm characteristics, and the differences in legal systems, capital market scales, and country‐level information disclosure.     

证券交易所的可竞争性与我国证交所的发展

在技术与制度激变的全球化时代,证券交易所越来越成为了金融业中的竞争实体,21世纪初全球证交所大范围的整合并购,要求我们对于证券交易所的定位与发展应该有新的认识。本文从证交所在市场的中可竞争性出发,探讨我国证券交易所的未来发展。     

Equity ownership segregation, shareholder preferences, and dividend policy in China

We investigate how listed Chinese firms pay different types of dividend to satisfy shareholders, different dividend preferences shaped by institutional factors such as share tradability and asymmetrical taxation. We find that the cash dividend level is significantly and positively related to the proportion of non-publicly tradable shares and this relation is mainly driven by legal person shareholders' preferences for cash dividends. In contrast, the stock dividend level is significantly and positively associated with the proportion of publicly tradable shares. These findings provide an empirical rationale for the current reform on the segregation of equity ownership rights in China.     

The Differences Between Stock Splits and Stock Dividends: Evidence on the Retained Earnings Hypothesis

Abstract:  This paper investigates stock dividends and stock splits on the Copenhagen Stock Exchange (CSE), which is of interest because several of the more recent explanations for a stock market reaction can be ruled out. The main findings are that the announcement effect of stock dividends as well as stock splits is closely related to changes in a firm's payout policy, but that the relationship differs for the two types of events. A stock dividend implies an increase in nominal share capital and hence a decrease in retained earnings. Firms announcing stock dividends finance growth entirely by debt (explaining the need for an increase in nominal share capital) and retained earnings. Basically all firms announcing a stock dividend with a split factor of less than two can also afford to increase their total cash dividends permanently, at least proportionally to the increase in share capital, leading to a significant announcement effect of 4.23%. Firms announcing a stock dividend with a split factor of two or more also increase total cash dividends permanently, but less than proportionally to the increase in share capital. This leads to an insignificant announcement effect of 0.08%. These findings support a retained earnings/signaling hypothesis. For stock splits, no separate announcement effect was found when a firm's payout policy was controlled for. This lends support to the idea that a stock split per se is a cosmetic event on the CSE and is also consistent with the fact that making a stock split on the CSE is virtually cost free.     

现金股利、控制权结构与股价崩溃风险

本文研究了上市公司在具有不同实际控股股东控制权结构下,现金股利与股价崩溃风险的关系。结果表明,过度支付现金股利会显著增加上市公司的股价崩溃风险;实际控制股东控制权与现金流权的分离程度会加剧现金股利与股价崩溃风险之间的正向关系。我们认为这一现象是现金股利中所蕴含的股东治理效应在资本市场上的体现。其现实意义在于,政策监管要着力于治“本”,通过提升公司治理水平以使股利分配真正立足于保护全体股东的利益。     

The More, the Merrier: An International Analysis of the Frequency of Dividend Payment

Abstract:  The joint contributions of prospect theory and mental accounting imply that investors receive a higher utility when a given level of dividends is paid more frequently, suggesting that dividends should be paid as often as possible. We document a strong positive relationship between payment frequency and firm value, confirmed with an event study of dividend payment frequency changes. Upon examining the frequency with which dividends are paid around the world, we discover that considerable variation exists, and that dividends are not paid as often as behavioral aspects suggest they should. From our multivariate analysis, we determine that non-behavioral factors such as the legal regime as well as the level and standard deviation of operating income exert significant influences on the payment frequency of dividends, suggesting that a tradeoff exists between behavioral and non-behavioral factors. The relationship between payment frequency and firm value remains robust in the presence of these non-behavioral factors.     

我国股票市场发展对银行间市场的影响

股票市场和银行间市场是我国金融市场中两个主要的子市场,随着金融市场发展和创新步伐加快,两者之间的关系日益密切。在近年来我国股票市场快速发展的背景下,研究股票市场发展对银行间市场的影响,有助于理顺和改进我国股票市场与银行间市场相互间的关系,促进两个市场协调健康发展。     

The Chinese Stock Dividend Puzzle

In this paper, we examine the announcement effects of dividends with an emphasis on stock dividends in China's capital market. We find that dividend-paying stocks exhibit significantly positive abnormal returns while non-dividend-paying stocks show a negative announcement effect. Further, we document that the cumulative abnormal returns for pure stock dividends and combined dividends are the main drivers of this announcement effect. In contrast, pure cash dividend stocks experience no significant price run-up before announcement. The significant announcement effect of stock dividends is robust to controlling the earnings surprise effect. We offer some discussion of the possible explanations.     

Minority Protection and Dividend Policy in Finland

This paper highlights some theoretical arguments and empirical results on whether legal‐based minority protection affects corporate cash dividends in Finland. The Company Act in Finland states that shareholders having one tenth of all shares can demand a so‐called minority dividend, which is half of the profit of the fiscal year, yet not more than 8% of the equity. Minority dividend, as in Finland, is rarely used in EU countries. I find, that minority protection is a better influence over managerial control than controlling shareholders having absolute voting power. When there is no controlling shareholder and coalition costs are lowest, minority protection in Finland is better than minority protection in mandatory dividend countries. Combining strong shareholder rights (as in the USA) and minority dividend (as in Finland) could decrease agency costs both vertically and horizontally.     

Dividend Imputation and Shareholder Wealth: The Case of New Zealand

On April 1, 1988, New Zealand stopped the double taxation of dividends by implementing a full dividend imputation program. Because many believed that the tax advantage of debt had led to more highly leveraged firms subject to greater financial risk than was socially optimal, it was hoped the removal of incentives to finance with debt would result in a more efficient allocation of capital. The empirical results suggest that the shareholder wealth gain from dividend imputation was more than offset in firms with large debt levels. Moreover, an examination of debt ratios indicates debt levels declined in the post–imputation period.