【作者】 苏忠秦；

【导师】 沈中华；

【作者基本信息】 西南交通大学 ， 企业管理， 2013， 博士

【摘要】 自Krueger (1974)对寻租理论的开创性研究以来,政商关系就成为各界激辩的话题,也是学术界研究的热点问题。中国为本文研究政治关联对企业的影响提供了绝佳的机会。中国是“法与金融”理论一个明显的悖论,它的法律尚不健全、金融市场并不完善,但却成为历史上增长最快的经济体。Allen et al.(2005)认为中国一定存在某种非正式的制度安排和管理机制,比如基于名誉、“关系”,支持经济的快速增长。根据资源依赖理论,我们会直觉的认为政治关联对中国企业有正向的影响效应。换句话说,企业会调整自己去适应外部环境,寻求更多被政府控制的资源。纵观中国历史,中国人的生存哲学深受老子阴阳理论的影响,这种相对论的哲学引导中国人根据外部环境调整自己的行为,并且灵活运用这种相对的关系。根据资源依赖理论以及中国人骨子里的这种,相对论哲学,我们有理由相信建立政治关联可以帮助企业获得关键资源并增加公司的价值。然而,中国学者对政治关联影响效应的经验研究却得出两种截然相反的结论,即政治关联可能对企业绩效产生正面和负面的影响,这样一种违反直觉的结果。一部分中国学者研究揭示高管的政治网络关系与企业的绩效正相关。与此相反,另一部分学者研究表明政治关联企业的绩效更差。鉴于中国经验研究证据的不一致,对政治关联影响效应的进一步研究成为必要。先前政治关联影响效应的研究往往关注公司本身,忽视了从投资者的角度探讨政治关联对权益资本成本的影响。本文以在沪深交易所上市的公司为样本,编撰了一个刻画政治关联相对客观的数据库,考察上市公司政治关联和终极控制人性质对公司价值构成因素——权益资本成本的影响。研究发现,政治关联与权益资本成本显著负相关,并且这种效应在政治关联强的公司中更加明显。此外,政治关联与权益资本成本的关系受终极控制人性质的影响,非国有企业、地方国有企业和中央国有企业有差异。总之,本文从权益资本成本的角度证实了政治关联的价值,投资者对政治关联企业要求更低的权益资本成本。此外,本文以我国2004-2010年上市公司非平衡面板数据,考察上市公司的政治关联对债务资本成本的影响。研究发现,政治关联与债务资本成本显著负相关,并且这种效应在政治关联强的公司中更加显著。本文从债务资本成本的角度证实了政治关联的价值,债权人对政治关联企业要求更低的风险溢价。进一步地,随着改革开放的深入,企业开始采用市场化的方式作为经营中的行为准则及主要的经营方式,并且随着要素市场的发展,许多资源并不是完全由上而下控制,企业可以有更多机会与其他市场主体建立公平性的关系。但是,这种制度的变迁并不是可以等量齐观的,中国各个地区之间仍存有相当大的差异。因此,本文从中国制度背景入手,把中国市场化相对进程的影响纳入研究框架,以反映不同的市场化进程如何影响政治关联和公司资本成本之间关系。研究发现,虽然各地的市场化进程不尽一致、要素市场的发育水平参差不齐、法律保护水平也有差异,但是政治关联的影响效应并没有表现出明显的不同。这个结果似乎违反我们的直觉,但是却支持了国外的研究,即无论发达国家还是发展中国家,政治关联的影响效应都始终存在。本文的主要改进和创新主要体现在如下几个方面：首先,本文改进了政治关联的度量方法,以往研究中不加区别地把政府官员、人大代表等作为政治关联的定义可能存在噪音,因为在结构严谨的中国社会,单纯以是否有政府部门任职经历来衡量政治关联,很难准确把握政治关联的影响效应。本文在刻画政治关联的时候引入了两个新的思维。本文定义的政治关联是指企业高管或董事成员具有在中国政府部门(军队)任县处级(团级)以上职位的经历。政治关联应该具有一定的门槛效应,即低级别的政府官员作为政治关联来定义可能导致结果的偏误,因为这些低级别的官员不具备足够的资源分配的权力。另外,本文对政治关联的研究包括了整个高管团队(CEO及其他高管)和董事成员在企业中的政治资本,而不仅仅是CEO或者董事长,扩展了公司团队的政治关联影响效应。本文通过编撰政治关联指数来研究公司整体的政治资本。本文也考察了人大代表、政协委员对公司资本成本的影响。本文的结果表明,是否有人大代表、政协委员对公司权益资本成本的影响不显著,这可能是在中国现有的权力结构中,人大代表、政协委员虽然具有一定的政治身份,但并不意味着他们拥有分配资源的权力。第二,本文将政治关联引入到公司资本成本影响因素的研究中来,并把焦点从对权益资本成本的考察扩展到债务资本成本,探讨公司资本成本研究的新视角,拓展和充实中国现有的公司资本成本的研究。先前的一些研究实证检验了政治关联的价值(Sapienza,2004; Dine,2005; Charumilind et al.,2006; Faccio,2006),本文的研究提供了中国上市公司政治关联和权益资本成本之间关系的证据。本文的发现表明,权益资本成本是政治关联影响公司价值的一个渠道,是对Cooper et al.(2011)想要进一步检验公司政治关联和风险回报之间关系的回应。同时,本文的研究也是对Chaney etal.(2011)从债权人角度研究政治关联的影响效应作出的回应。本文的结果表明,除了标准的公司层面的因素,政治关联是一个具有经济意义的重要影响因素,由于政治关联企业在市场中的风险暴露较少,政治关联企业相对没有政治关联企业的风险较低,投资者要求较低的风险回报。第三,本文从终极所有者的视角,审视不同的控制人如何影响政治关联和公司资本成本之间的关系。进一步地,本文从中国制度背景入手,把中国市场化相对进程的影响纳入研究框架,以反映不同的市场化进程如何影响政治关联和公司资本成本之间关系。更多还原

【Abstract】 Since Krueger’s (1974) seminal work on rent seeking, the nexus between business and government has been a topic of intense debate and academic research alike. China can serve as a test case to gauge the impact on firms of political connections. It is a counterexample writ large to the law-finance-growth nexus: Its legal and financial systems are underdeveloped, yet its economy is one of the fastest growing in history. Thus, Allen et al.(2005) argue that China must have alternative institutional arrangements and governing mechanisms to support economic growth, such as those based on reputation and relationships.Conceptually, it seems intuitive to expect that political connections have a positive effect on Chinese firms in light of resource-based theory. That is, firms will adjust themselves to line up the external environment to secure more resources controlled by the government. Throughout China’s long history, Chinese have been influenced deeply by the yin-yang theory of relative positioning advocated by Lao Tze, a philosopher who lived2,500years ago. The philosophy primarily guides people to adjust their behavior according to the external environment and utilize it by positioning themselves strategically. According to the resource-based theory and the relative positioning theory, it is expected that developing political connections helps firms obtain key resources and thereby increases value.Empirical evidence in the literature related to political connections in China shows both positive and negative effects on firm performance, a counterintuitive result. Some Chinese scholars demonstrate that managers’ political connections are positively related to firm’s performance. In contrast, other Chinese scholars show that firms with politicall connection underperform those without politically connected. Given the mixed evidence on the effect of political connections on the Chinese firms, further research on this issue is warranted.Previous studies pay more attention to the influence of political connections from the perspective of firms’value, but neglect the influence of political connections on cost of equity capital from the perspective of investors. Our paper collects and compiles a database of political connections for all Chinese firms listed on the Shanghai and Shenzhen Stock Exchanges to examine the relationship between political connections and the cost of equity capital. We find that politically connected firms enjoy a lower cost of equity capital than their non-connected peers. We also find that political connections are more significant for firms with stronger ties to government. In additional analyses, we find that the effect of political connection on firms’equity financing costs is influenced by the ultimate controllers. Collectively, our findings suggest that investors value firms with political connections for which they assign lower equity financing costs.Besides, this paper collects and compiles a database of political connections, and uses unbalanced panel data analysis to examine the relationship between political connections and the cost of debt capital in Chinese listed firms from2004to2010. We find that politically connected firms enjoy a lower cost of debt capital than their non-connected peers. We also find that political connections are more significant for firms with stronger ties to government. Collectively, our findings suggest that creditor value firms with political connections for which they assign lower risk premium.Moreover, with the deepening of reforms and opening up to the outside world, firms have begun to adopt more "market-oriented" way as an intuitive guide and a source of motivation in daily operation, with an increasing intrusion of the market, which provides resources freer of top-down control, firms may again relate more to others on instrumental/equity grounds rather than on the basis of previous social interactions. This pattern of change is uneven, however, with much variation from place to place and many pockets that are resistant to change. Thus, a further study is conducted on the effects of political connections under different marketization processes.The results consistently demonstrate a strong correlation between political connections and cost of capital under different marketization processes, a counterintuitive result, but consistent with the previous findings that political connections are positively related to firm’s performance in both developed and developing countries.This study contributes to the literature in several ways. First, we propose a new definition of political connections to improve upon the relatively diverse definition in earlier studies, which use official government titles, Party membership, or membership in the National People’s Congress in China as political connections. In doing so, we introduce two new concepts related to political connections. We define the firm-level political connections as whether the firm’s top managers or board members have strong political positions linked specifically to someone with a certain rank or above in the Chinese government. Political capital is expected to have a threshold effect on firms. That is, political connections with low-ranking government officials may lead to biased or unclear results because those officials may not have the real authority, power, or ability to achieve the intended objective of the rent-seeking firms. In addition, we explore political connections through the team effect of political capital in a firm by including top executives (CEOs and other executives) and board members instead of examining only the CEO. Including other top executives such as CFO and CIO expands the influence of political connections for the firm and thus reinforces the importance of the notion of the team effect of political connections. Firms acquire political capital that flows from political connections that will likely enable them to have real economic power in the market and thus improved performance. We also include the effect of membership in the People’s Congress (PC) and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) on firm’s capital cost for additional analysis. We argue here that PC and CPPCC members do not necessarily have real power to implement government policies and thus membership may not yield positive results.Second, while several studies examine the value of connections (e.g., Sapienza,2004; Dine,2005; Charumilind et al.,2006; Faccio,2006; among others), this paper provides the first evidence on the link between political connection and the cost of equity capital using Chinese sample. The findings suggest that the cost of equity capital is one of the channels through which political connections may affect valuation thus answering the call by Cooper et al.(2011) for the need to further analyze whether the correlations between firms’political connections and returns arise from mispricing or risk. Meanwhile, this study is closely related to Chaney et al.(2011) who examine the impact of political connections from the perspective of bondholders (i.e., on the cost of debt) in Chinese setting. This paper add to existing studies on the cost of capital of firms by showing that, in addition to the standard firm-level factors, political connection is a material determinant with economic significance, suggesting that due to their lower exposure to market-wide risk in recessions, politically connected firms are less risky compared to non-connected peers in the market.Last but not least, this study adds to the political connection literature from the perspective of the ultimate owners to examine how different controls affect the relationship between the political connections and the cost of capital of the Company. This study also adds to the political connection literature by showing that the effect of political connections on the cost of capital wheather is conditioned by interprovincial institutions.更多还原