The Stock Market Reaction to Investment Decisions: Evidence from Italy

Based on a study of new investment announcements from 1989 to 1995 by Italian firms listed on the Milan Stock Exchange, we find a positive stock price reaction to new investment decisions. The stock price reaction is larger for joint venture announcements. The market response is also larger for non-state owned companies and when the announcement is released in a period of rising stock prices. The announced investment has no impact on the non-voting shares but increases the voting shares' market price through a significant revaluation of their vote-segment. We find some evidence that new investments lead to management's private benefits rather than towards firm value. This is consistent with the typical Italian corporate governance structure, where a majority shareholder safely controls a listed company while having only a fractional claim on the firm's cash flows.     

Is Cash Dividend Policy a Tool for Tunneling or Masking Expropriations?——Empirical Evidence from Chinese Listed Companies

本文利用我国2004～2008年上市公司平衡面板数据检验终极控制股东与现金股利之间的关系.研究发现,在其他条件相同的情况下,现金流量权与现金股利支付水平显著负相关;控制权和现金流量权分离度与现金股利支行水平显著正相关.这表明终极控制股东并不是把现金股利作为“掏空”的工具,而是把现金股利作为掩饰“掏空”的面具.     

Effects of corporate equity ownership on firm value

We investigate the valuation effects related to corporate minority block purchases for a European sample of 113 purchases over 1993–2006. We argue that corporate block ownership, as opposed to institutional or individual block ownership, has several unique characteristics and can create significant short- and long-term wealth for target and acquiring firm shareholders. Because target firms that exhibit signs of inefficient monitoring or agency problems benefit the most, we conclude that corporate block ownerships can align incentives and mitigate information problems in corporate business relationships.     

Do synergies exist in related acquisitions? A meta-analysis of acquisition studies

Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) aim to increase the wealth of shareholders of the acquiring company, in particular by creating synergies. It is often assumed that relatedness is a source of synergies. Our study distinguishes between business, cultural, technological, and size relatedness. It discusses the reasons why these different forms of relatedness can lead to an acquisition success and we conduct a meta-analysis of 67 prior M&A studies. Results indicate that positive effects can be expected under specific conditions only and have a limited overall impact on acquisition success. A moderator analysis finds that synergies stemming from relatedness depend on industry-, country-, and investor-characteristics.

The cross-border hostile bid fight between Scania in Sweden and the two German companies MAN and Volkswagen: institutional change and the mandatory bid rule

International hostile takeovers provide a unique context for studying how corporate governance mechanisms migrate across countries. This paper is prompted by a case study of the cross-border takeover fight between the target companies Scania (Sweden) and MAN (Germany) and the involvement of the owners of Volkswagen, Porsche (both Germany) and Investor (Sweden), 1999–2014. It reveals how incumbent owners in Germany and Sweden—two countries with a history of corporate control through blockholdings, corporatist-governance, state control (Germany) and multiple voting shares (Sweden)—manage to take advantage of the minority shareholders through arbitraging the differences in implementation of a new governance device across borders. The study focuses in particular on the mandatory bid rule (MBR) that forces a shareholder who passes a certain threshold of ownership to bid for the rest of the shares. The study reveals over twenty incidents of breaches of the idea of the MBR, to the detriment of minority shareholders. Building on institutional theory and sociology, the study provides useful insight into how incumbent actors may use bargaining power to capture a new regulation and circumvent it. Furthermore, the case illustrates the importance of legitimacy in the efforts to converge corporate governance systems. Thirdly, it adds to the critique of the mandatory bid rule in countries with a governance system supporting blockholders. Overall, the study raises a number of important issues regarding how national politics shape corporate governance and responds to new actors and coalitions of actors entering the scene. A convergence of takeover regulation not compatible with the legal framework might result in a less efficient than anticipated outcome of the market for corporate control. These results are consistent with the institutional theory perspective that key actors may have a vested interest in resisting change.     

Dual class shares,board of directors’ effectiveness and firm’s market value: an empirical study

This study aims to identify whether a relationship exists between the controlling shareholders’ voting power and outside directors’ effectiveness in maximizing firms’ financial performance. We analyze a panel data with 3057 observations for the 2000–2012 period using a random effects model, logit and probit regressions, and the two-stage model of Heckman in the Brazilian stock market. Our findings show that firms whose controlling shareholders use dual class shares to leverage their voting power have less independence from the board and worse financial performance and market value. Further, the percentage of outside directors tends to be ineffective in increasing the firm’s value, and in changing the firm’s chief executive officer (CEO) when (1) the controlling shareholder’s voting power is leveraged, or (2) when the CEO assumes a position on the board of directors simultaneously. We interpreted that these results are in line with the arguments in favor of the existence of a new agency cost, which is related to the undue obedience of board members to authority, such as the largest controlling shareholder or the CEO in Brazilian listed firms.     

Cross-border mergers and the cross-border effect: the case of the automotive supply industry

In this paper we examine stock price reactions to cross-border mergers and acquisitions in a particular industry, the automotive supply industry. We show that cross-border transactions entail a pronounced value creation for the acquiring shareholders and that this value creation also holds for transcontinental transactions, which to our knowledge have not been investigated so far. Splitting the sample by different types of targets indicates that the value creation mainly stems from takeovers of subsidiaries. By examining differences between national and international takeovers in cross-section, we sustain the recent evidence of a negative cross-border effect (i.e., cross-border mergers and acquisitions entail lower announcement returns than national ones).

Corporate control and underinvestment

This paper reports a study of how the benefits that large shareholders derive from their control of a firm affect the equity issue and investment decisions of the firm. I introduce an explicit agency cost structure based on the benefits of control of the largest shareholder. In a simple extension of the model developed by Myers and Majluf (J Financial Econ 13:187–221, 1984), I show that underinvestment is aggravated when there are benefits of being in control and these benefits are diluted if equity is issued to finance an investment project. Using a large panel of US data, I find that the concerns of large shareholders about the dilution of ownership and control cause firms to issue less equity and to invest less than would otherwise be the case. I also find that it makes no significant difference whether new shares are issued to old shareholders or new shareholders.     

Managerial Risk‐taking in International Acquisitions in the Brewery Industry: Institutional and Ownership Influences Compared

This paper deals with the role that institutional differences play in managerial risk‐taking when firms engage in international acquisitions. It is assumed that multinational corporations (MNCs) have different interests and capabilities when dealing with international acquisition, which in the authors’ view are significantly shaped by specific home country institutional influences. This study concerns the question of how different forms of ownership – concentrated (e.g. family and bank based) and dispersed (stock market based) – influence risk‐taking and managerial decision‐making in large international acquisitions. Comparing a total of 12 large acquisitions of four leading MNCs in the global brewery industry, the paper shows that mutually reinforcing influences of country of origin (coordinated vs liberal market economies) and ownership (family ownership vs stock market ownership) lead to different risk profiles and managerial risk‐taking with regard to international acquisitions.     

股权分割、公司业绩与投资者保护

本文首先回顾了股权分割与公司业绩的相关文献 ,发现并没有一致的实证依据证明股权分割损害了上市公司的业绩。在此基础上 ,我们构建了一个更为广泛的上市公司1995～2001年的面板数据样本 ,对上市公司股权分割与公司业绩的关系以及公司上市后的业绩变迁进行了实证的研究 ,结果发现:(1)公司的业绩与非流通股 (国家股、法人股 )比例呈显著的U形关系 ,非流通股独大或独小并没有对公司业绩产生不利影响 ,相反适度混合的股权结构对公司业绩是最不利的;(2)上市公司在上市后的经营业绩整体呈逐年加速下滑趋势 ,而股权分割的差异对该趋势无显著的影响。我们认为 ,把股权分割当成是中国股市问题的核心是具有误导性的 ,私有产权和全流通并不能消除股票市场的委托代理问题。我国股票市场问题的关键在于缺乏有效的投资者保护机制 ,无法对政府、大股东和管理层的剥削行为进行约束 ,导致市场诚信的丧失。在制度性缺失的环境中 ,不同性质的公司控制者的行为方式不会有本质上的差异。我们认为股权问题的解决必须以投资者保护为基础 ,在我国大陆法系的架构下 ,当务之急是推动立法保护私有产权的合法权益 ,并通过引入“集体诉讼”和“辩方举证”机制加强投资者保护的效率