CEO turnover, firm performance, and enterprise reform in China: Evidence from micro data

In this paper, we use unique data on China's listed firms from 1998 to 2002 to show that CEO turnover is significantly and inversely related to firm performance, although the magnitude of the relationship is modest. In addition, we find that this turnover-performance link is weaker for listed firms that are still controlled by the state and those that have a relatively weak non-state controlling shareholder. In contrast, the appointment of independent directors enhances the turnover-performance link. Moreover, the listing suspension mechanism, adopted by China's securities regulatory agency, appears to be effective in improving the turnover-performance tie. Finally, listed firms with CEOs holding additional positions among the controlling shareholders have a weaker turnover-performance link. Journal of Comparative Economics 34 (4) (2006) 796–817.     

An optimal execution problem with market impact

We study an optimal execution problem in a continuous-time market model that considers market impact. We formulate the problem as a stochastic control problem and investigate properties of the corresponding value function. We find that right-continuity at the time origin is associated with the strength of market impact for large sales; otherwise the value function is continuous. Moreover, we show the semigroup property (Bellman principle) and characterise the value function as a viscosity solution of the corresponding Hamilton–Jacobi–Bellman equation. We present some examples where the form of the optimal strategy changes completely, depending on the amount of the trader’s security holdings, and where optimal strategies in the Black–Scholes type market with nonlinear market impact are not block liquidation but gradual liquidation, even when the trader is risk-neutral.     

Corporate restructuring in Japan: Who monitors the monitor?

Peek and Rosengren [Peek, J., Rosengren, E., 2005. Unnatural selection: Perverse incentives and the misallocation of credit in Japan. American Economic Review 95, 1144–1166] showed that, when the bubble economy era ended, regulatory forbearance and perverse incentives allowed Japanese banks to engage extensively in evergreening. This is the first comprehensive study to empirically analyze the economics of private debt restructurings of financially distressed companies in Japan, where the corporate monitoring mechanism is not market based but large-stakeholder based – typically, banks and affiliated companies. These stakeholders are expected to efficiently resolve potential bankruptcy or collapse with better information resulting from long-term relationships with the distressed firms. Our study, however, finds that private restructurings led by them failed because of delays in implementing fundamental solutions. Forbearance in addressing the needs of distressed firms demonstrates the weakness of such stakeholders in instituting discipline, hence the need for a system to “monitor the monitor”.     

The impact of post-merger integration on the customer–supplier relationship

While the impact of mergers and acquisitions (M&A) on internal stakeholders has generated considerable empirical study, comparatively little academic attention has been paid as to how external stakeholders such as customers are affected by, and respond to, M&A activity. This study adopts case-study methodology to illuminate how the customer–supplier relationship is affected by post-merger integration processes in the business-to-business context, with the aim of increasing our understanding of why customers respond to M&A in the ways that they do. The findings highlight the importance of a set of critical customer relationship variables through which post-M&A integration actions can influence customers' perceptions of the merged organisation and, ultimately, their purchase decisions. We also identify a set of specific individual integration actions that appear to trigger changes in the critical customer relationship variables. Together, the findings contribute to our understanding of the precise mechanisms through which M&A can affect customers' purchase decisions and the combining firms' market-related performance. More broadly, consistent with the stakeholder perspective, they reinforce the need to take account of external as well as internal stakeholders when considering the drivers of M&A outcome. Implications are discussed for future research as well as for B2B service industry executives involved in M&A.     

Optimal degree of privatization and the environmental problem

We determine the optimal degree of privatization in a mixed duopoly when the environmental problem exists. With regard to the ownership of the private firms, we analyze two cases: (h) the private firm is owned by domestic private investors and (f) it is owned by foreign private investors. A comparison of the two cases presents the following results. Partial privatization is always desirable in (h), and the optimal degree of privatization is independent of the degree of environmental damage. However, in (f), whether partial privatization is desirable or not depends on the degree of environmental damage: there are cases where full privatization or full nationalization is optimal.     

Voice matters in a dictator game

We conducted a laboratory experiment to study the effects of communication in a dictator game, while maintaining subjects’ anonymity. In the experiment, the recipient has an opportunity to state a payoff-irrelevant request for his/her share before the dictator dictates his/her offer. We found that the independence hypothesis that voice does not matter is rejected. In particular, if the request is for less than half of the pie, the dictator’s offer increases as the recipient’s request increases. Additionally, there is no dictator who is other-regarding and, at the same time, does not react to the recipient’s request.

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Electronic Supplementary Material  The online version of this article () contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.      

Do collective bargaining institutions crowd out discussion and implementation of firm‐related training programs? Evidence from Japan

The paper empirically examines labor‐management communication concerning in‐house training programs and its relation to the actual on‐ and off‐the‐job training policy and wage structure. Using governmental datasets from Japan, we study how different labor‐management communication institutions may affect the training interests of employers and employees differently. We classify these institutions in terms of whether they have a legal (i.e. statutory) foundation (‘de jure’) or not (‘de facto’). We find that collective bargaining, with legal grounds, may crowd out employees’ willingness to communicate about training. However, the existence of ‘de facto’ communication channels such as joint labor‐management councils or shop floor committees is positively correlated with both on‐ and off‐the‐job of training. At the same time, the existence of unions is positively correlated with the steepness of wage profiles for mid‐career workers, which is consistent with the fact that employers and employees assume a long‐term relationship. Thus, we show that a multi‐tiered structure of labor‐management communication, together with a long‐term orientation toward the employment relationship, contributes to strengthen employees’ voice in training matters.