Empirical evidence of the value of monitoring in joint ownership

Joint ownership of assets by two partners can have an adverse effect on the incentives to invest and can result in unstable and inefficient organizational structures. Control sharing, however, plays an important role in economic, political, and social institutions. There is scarce empirical evidence on the benefits of joint ownership in corporate finance. We analyze acquisitions of corporate assets by joint ventures to empirically ascertain the value of joint ownership in economic activities. The results indicate that firms experience significantly larger returns in joint acquisitions than in full-control acquisitions and that this difference is restricted to the sample of firms in which both partners share equal ownership in the target. These findings suggest that monitoring in joint ownership structures ameliorates the possibility of value-destroying corporate decisions.     

自由现金流量、股权结构与我国上市公司过度投资问题研究

按照自由现金流量假说,当公司存在大量自由现金流量时,管理人员的机会主义行为容易引发过 度投资.本文以2005-2007年上市公司数据考察我国企业是否存在过度投资以及股权结构能否抑制过度投资.分析表明我国企业普遍存在过度投资行为,国有企业相比非国有企业过度投资更严重,现金流与投资行为显著正相关,第一大股东持股比例与股权集中度在某种程度上能够制约过度投资,但是举债在我国并不能对过度投资发挥有效的抑制作用.     

Do corporate governance mechanisms affect cash dividends? An empirical investigation of UK firms

The study examines whether corporate governance mechanisms and the compliance with good governance practice are related to cash dividends. In particular, the study assesses the effect of institutional ownership and board structure on the decision to pay cash dividends. A study on UK firms is interesting because firms are expected to voluntarily structure governance mechanisms based on their own needs. We find that institutional owners positively affect cash dividend payments, suggesting that UK institutions are effective in forcing firms to disgorge cash. There is limited evidence that independent directors affect the cash dividends. The results also show that firm specifics affect the cash dividends, namely, business risk, firm size, and leverage ratio. The results are consistent across several robustness checks.     

Municipal Finance in Poland,the Slovak Republic,the Czech Republic and Hungary: Institutional Framework and Recent Development

The recent process of political and economic transition in eastern European countries has not only contributed to the decentralisation of political structure but also significantly enhanced the fiscal autonomy of municipalities in these countries. In this context many similar types of public activities have recently been assigned to local governments, and some taxes were also declared to be local taxes. To be sure, this type of fiscal decentralisation has caused some additional problems, particularly for safeguarding the quality of publicly provided goods and services and for co-ordinating intergovernmental fiscal transfers between the central and local governments. For instance, some criticise that many small-sized municipalities in the transition economies have suffered from financial bottlenecks and have not been able to receive sufficient financial support from the central government. However, such a fiscal devolution trend appears to continue. This study primarily deals with issues surrounding the impact of national fiscal policy and the regulatory framework on local governments' expenditure behaviour and their ability to mobilise necessary revenues under the particular consideration of the institutional and administrative co-operation with the central government and of the less well-developed financial market in Poland, the Slovak Republic, the Czech Republic and Hungary.     

房地产正向财富效应形成的条件分析

房地产对居民消费的财富效应一直是关注的焦点。产生房地产财富正效应的条件为:城市居民二套住房拥有率要大于有潜在住房购买力的家庭占比率。我国应加大调控力度,降低房价,增加公共住房保障供给,大力发展适合中低收入阶层家庭的商品房项目。     

Saving up or settling down: Home ownership over the life cycle

In a Bewley model with endogenous price volatility, home ownership and mobility across locations and jobs, we assess the contribution of financial constraints, housing illiquidities and house price risk to home ownership over the life cycle. The model can explain the rise in home ownership and fall in mobility over the life cycle. While some households rent due to borrowing constraints in the mortgage market, factors that affect propensities to save and move, such as risky house values and transactions costs, are equally important determinants of the ownership rate.