【作者】 李园园；

【导师】 李曙光；

【作者基本信息】 中国政法大学 ， 经济法， 2007， 博士

【摘要】 保护投资者是证券市场发展的生命，债券市场的发展亦不例外。保护债券投资者利益的重点在于防范债权无法受偿的风险，这种风险并不是指来自于市场的利率风险、发行公司的行业风险、交易风险或者市场的流动性风险。文章运用委托代理理论的分析框架对来自发行公司的违约风险进行研究，并将由于发行公司与债券持有人利益冲突引发的违约风险界定为负债代理成本，这种代理成本与公司所有权和控制权分离情况下公司管理者和股东利益冲突形成的股权代理成本相对应。形成发行公司与债券持有人之间负债代理成本的深层原因在于：掌握公司剩余控制权并承担有限责任的主体——股东与债券持有人之间存在利益冲突。理论上承担有限责任的股东可以占据无限的公司利润，因此股东偏好风险并且可以通过公司的剩余控制权来实现这种偏好，而债券持有人厌恶风险但却只能在合同的框架内防范这类风险；同时公司管理者作为股东利益的代言人，会将股东和债券持有人之间的负债代理成本日常化，因此负债代理成本的受托人就由发行公司变化为股东和公司管理者。受有限理性、信息不完全、乐观气氛等诸多因素影响，公司债权人都面临如何有效控制负债代理成本的问题，然而不同的债权人对于这种风险的控制能力有所不同，因此合同控制负债代理成本的有效性亦有所差别。忽视这种差别而将债权人负债代理成本的控制仅仅满足于合同控制这一路径，是不全面的。虽然债券持有人与公司就负债代理成本问题签订有债券合同，规定了债券合同中的限制性条款，但为了实现债券融资的流动性，债券合同在法律设计上具有格式性的特征，这决定了债券合同在一定程度上只有合同之名，而无合同之实；不仅如此，债券持有人还面临严重的内部集体协作问题，使得负债代理成本的控制具有明显的公共产品特征，这是一般的债权人在控制负债代理成本上所不具有的困难。由于债券合同和债券市场在控制负债代理成本方面的不完备性和失灵现实，有必要从法律的层面对负债代理成本进行相应的控制。自从1976年Jensen和Meckling提出代理成本概念以来，股权代理成本的概念及其控制就成为经济学和公司法研究的重点，负债代理成本则一直被限制在合同解决的框架内，从法律的角度对负债代理成本的研究少之又少。文章从研究负债代理成本的成因入手，指出合同控制负债代理成本的差异性特征，论证法律控制负债代理成本的合理性和必要性，探讨法律控制负债代理成本的结构和机制，并从法律层面构建债券持有人控制负债代理成本以确保债权得以实现的合理机制。由于负债代理成本的产生不是一个单向性而是一个相互性的问题，这种相互性体现为发行公司股东的有限责任和债券持有人作为分散性、流动性主体的群体性特征。因此通过控制负债代理成本来保护债券持有人利益至少应该从两个方面入手，一方面应建立发行公司和债券持有人的法律关系规则，这种规则涵盖发行公司管理者和债券持有人之间的法律关系以及发行公司股东和债券持有人之间的法律关系；另一方面考虑到债券的分散性、流动性带来的债券持有人对负债代理成本监督和控制的困难，应从制度上提供一套可供债券持有人用于缓解集体协作困难的会议机制，包括合理有效的会议启动机制、表决事项、表决效力、个体权利与集体权利关系等主要内容。更多还原

【Abstract】 The development of the securities market relies to a large extent on the protection of the investors. This doctrine is also true of the corporate bonds. To protect the corporate bond investors could be boiled down to defend the investors against the market-irrelevant risks with the reference made to breach and default risk caused by factors other than interest rate risk, inflation risk, industry risk, bond transaction risk or liquidity risk and risks alike. In this article, the author attempts to conduct an in-depth research on the breach and default risks arising out of or in connection with bond-issuing corporate itself. This kind of breach and default risk is fundamentally caused by the conflict of interest between bondholders and issuing corporate. Furthermore, the conflict of interest constitutes the debt agency cost which is integrated with the equity agency cost arising out of the conflict of interest between managers and shareholders as the agency cost.The underlying reason behind the debt agency cost between the bondholders and issuing corporate relies in the fact that the shareholders bear limited liability toward the corporate debt to the extent of the capital contribution made to the corporate and they get non-intervened and exclusive voting right over the material affairs of the corporate unless the bondholders could make contradictory rules on the voting right and limited liability. Thus the debt agency cost paradigm between bondholders and issuing company could be deconstructed and transformed into agency cost between bondholders and shareholders. Besides this, managers as the shareholders interests promoter makes the agency cost between shareholders and bondholders as routine occurrence. The debt agency cost could be categorized as cost between bondholders and issuing corporate, cost between bondholders and shareholders and cost between bondholders and managers.In essence, all corporate creditors have to fend against the debt agency cost through contract entered into between themselves and corporate as the debtor. However, the effectiveness of contractual solution toward debt agency cost varies among different groups of creditors. To neglect this contractual difference in minimizing debt agency cost is subjective and not feasible. To take the involuntary creditors as an extreme example, considering the fact that involuntary creditors like torts claimers don’t enter into any de facto or real contract with the corporate for the sake of minimizing their physical injury or property damage, most common law countries is willing to pierce the corporate veil in terms of granting relief toward tort claimers of the corporate when the corporate fails to cover the losses suffered by and damages inflicted upon tort claimers. Although bondholders are quite different from tort claimers in that they are voluntary creditors and they do enter into the contract with the corporate with regards to the interest rate, payment terms, breach and default relief, and restricted usage of the company asset as well as things which are expected to influence the probability of the bond realization. In light of the boiler plate of the bond contract, the contract between the bondholders and issuing corporate does not deserve the contract name in the real sense featured by equality on information basis and in terms of negotiation power. Besides, collective cooperation difficulty engulfs the bondholders’ action as a homogeneous group. The best alternative choice is to wait someone else within the group to identify, discover, monitor and control the debt agency cost. The collective problem is characterized by the rational apathy and passive waiting. Considering the contract incompleteness and market failure in addressing the debt agency cost between bondholders and issuing corporate, the institutional ex parte regulation is necessary otherwise agency cost will inevitably lead to adverse selection prior to entering into the bond contract and unavoidably result in the conflicts of interests which undermines the bondholders rights and interests and in the long run has a material adverse effect on the corporate bond market.Since Jensen and Meckling put forward the agency cost concept in 1976, equity agency cost since then having dominated the research focus. The debt agency cost solution is constrained within the contractual framework. Research conducted on the debt cost from the legal and institutional perspective is a rare sight. The author is confirmed in the belief that to explore the debt agency cost from the legal perspective shall be much more conducive to the protection of the bondholders. Underlying reason behind the debt agency cost is reciprocal with the issuing corporate on one hand and bondholders on the other. Thus the legal regulation of the debt agency cost shall be made on two aspects with the issuing corporate on one hand and bondholders on the other. On the issuing corporate side, the basic rules among the bondholders and shareholders as well as bondholders and managers shall be established. Especially, the equitable relationship between shareholders and bondholders in basic and most aspects resembles that between oppressed minority shareholders and controlling shareholders under the close company lock-up scenario. So the author put forward the proposition that the company law shall establish the fairness rights of the bondholders toward shareholders to protect themselves against unfair prejudicial losses. Furthermore the author disagrees with the fiduciary relationship between managers and bondholders, since it will render the managers into an awkward situation straggled between shareholders and bondholders without the clear-cut relevant guiding principles. Conversely, the relationship between bondholders and managers relies on that between bondholders and shareholders. On the bondholders side, a collective cooperation mechanism shall be established to alleviate the rational apathy problem within the bondholders. A desirable collective cooperation mechanism is comprised of initiating mechanism, voting items and voting efficacy.更多还原