股权再融资认购选择、政府控制与上市公司恶性增资行为研究

【作者】 唐洋；

【导师】 刘志远；

【作者基本信息】 南开大学 ， 会计学， 2009， 博士

【摘要】 无论是对一个企业的成败还是对一国的经济增长,资本投资都是至关重要的,而近年来,我国企业的资本投资总额一直呈现出逐年增长的趋势,在这一背景下,研究如何提高投资效率,避免恶性增资行为的发生显得极为重要。目前,对于恶性增资行为的研究主要有两方面的特点或者说不足:第一,多数研究是基于市场经济体制下的西方企业展开的,专门针对转轨经济体制下的企业恶性增资行为的研究还很少;第二,多数研究是从决策者心理、认知偏差和行为等非理性视角进行的,从决策者理性视角出发所作的研究还较少。这与最早提出并对恶性增资进行研究的是心理学家,目前国外从事该领域研究的仍有半数是心理学家或行为经济学家,并且他们主要来自于发达的市场经济体制国家有关。无可否认,从非理性视角研究恶性增资有着重要的意义,但是对于中国,理性因素同样重要,原因在于,与发达的市场经济国家相比,中国上市公司的治理结构、内外部监管体制均不健全,决策者选择利己的投资行为的成本较低,空间更大。因此,在研究中国上市公司恶性增资行为时,仅从非理性视角出发而忽视理性视角的研究是不全面的,同时也会造成恶性增资理论研究的欠缺。从决策者理性视角出发对恶性增资行为所作的研究主要是基于代理理论的理论基础进行的。但是,现有在代理理论框架下的研究多数还停留在管理者与股东、大股东与小股东的代理冲突这一泛化层面上。作者认为,转轨经济时期的中国上市公司具有较特殊的地方:(1)由于国有产权的特殊性,导致国有上市公司具有双层委托代理关系,从最初委托人(全体公民)到政府是第一层代理,从政府到企业经理是第二层代理,政府是双层委托代理的纽带和核心。由于终极所有者缺位,同时政府官员具有强剩余控制权和弱剩余索取权,使得在经济中发挥实质性作用的是第二层代理关系,国有经济的腐败问题恰恰是第二层级的委托人与代理人共谋租金的结果,这些将影响企业的投资决策。另一方面,我国政府的行政分权、财政包干和政府官员晋升制度也使得地方政府为了追求GDP增长和晋升机会而推动企业过度增资;(2)我国上市公司具有极强的股权再融资偏好和上市公司大股东普遍放弃股权再融资认购权的特点,在中国制度背景下,这将大大降低大股东的融资成本和投资风险,激化大股东与中小股东的代理冲突,降低公司的投资效率。因此,转轨经济体制下的中国上市公司的恶性增资行为的产生原因及形成机理应该具有独特的地方。本文着眼于转轨经济时期的中国制度背景,从决策者理性的视角出发,以上市公司的代理关系为主线,将股权再融资认购选择、政府控制和恶性增资放在一个研究框架内,提出了基于中国制度背景下的恶性增资行为理论分析框架,然后,从理论上分析了大股东的股权再融资认购选择、政府控制对上市公司恶性增资行为的影响效应,再选用2003-2006年间沪深两市的相关公司为样本,用实证方法检验了本文的研究结论。研究结果表明:(1)无论是否存在政府控制,在大股东参加股权再融资认购时,上市公司都存在恶性增资的可能,其恶性增资的发生概率与大股东持股比例负相关;而在大股东放弃认购时,恶性增资的发生概率与大股东持股比例呈非线性关系;(2)与大股东参加认购相比,放弃认购将增加上市公司恶性增资的概率;(3)无论是大股东放弃认购还是参加认购,与不存在政府控制相比,政府控制将显著增加上市公司恶性增资的额度。并且,总体而言,上市公司恶性增资额度与大股东持股比例呈负相关关系。在把政府控制进一步划分为国有资产管理机构控制、中央国企控制和地方国企控制三类后,我们发现:(1)与民营上市公司相比,无论是恶性增资发生概率还是恶性增资额度,国有上市公司均更大;(2)在恶性增资发生概率上,中央国企控制的上市公司最低,国有资产管理机构控制的上市公司次之,地方国企控制的上市公司最高;在恶性增资额度上,三类国有上市公司无显著差异。本文的贡献在于:(1)从决策者理性的视角出发,以中国上市公司的代理关系为主线,构建了基于中国制度背景下的恶性增资行为理论分析框架;(2)研究了大股东的股权再融资认购选择对恶性增资的影响效应,为我们理解大股东的股权再融资认购选择的经济后果以有益的启示,为管理层监督和规范上市公司的投融资行为提供了理论依据;(3)深入研究了政府控制对企业恶性增资行为的影响,为政府控制研究提供了新视角,加深了我们对政府控制经济后果的理解;(4)首次将恶性增资和过度投资纳入一个研究框架内,丰富和推进了非效率投资以及恶性增资的研究。更多还原

【Abstract】 Capital investment is critical whether to the success of an enterprise or to a country’s economic growth. China’s fixed assets investment has been increasing continuously in the past few years.In this context, it is very important to investigate how to improve the efficiency of fixed assets investment, and how to avoid the occurrence of escalation of commitment.By far, there are two weak points on the study of escalation of commitment in investment. Firstly, most studies are based on the practice of enterprises in market economy, and few studies related to enterprises of transition economy have been made. Secondly, most studies are carried out from the perspective of decision-maker’s judgment bias and irrationality, and only a few studies are made from the perspective of decision-maker rationality. This is because of that the earliest researchers of escalation of commitment are the psychologist. At present, studying abroad in this field there is still half of the psychologists or behavior economists, and they are mainly from countries in market economy.It is undeniable that study on the escalation of commitment from the perspective of irrationality is very important. However, the rational perspective is equally important in China, because the governance structure and internal and external monitoring system of Chinese listed companies are not as effective as those in market economy of developed countries. Besides, the cost of selfish investment decision is lower and the there is more leeway in such behavior in China than in developed countries. Therefore, it is not complete for studying escalation of commitment in China only from the irrational perspective, and neglecting the rational perspective will cause theoretical research in escalation of commitment to be deficient.Currently, the research conducted from the rational perspective is mainly based on agency theory, and most of it only deals with the conflict at the general level, for example: conflict between managers and shareholders, or between major shareholders and minority shareholders.We believe that Chinese listed companies in transition economy are unique in two ways: (1) there is a two-tier principal-agent relationship in these companies characterized by state ownership. The first-tier principal-agent relationship is the one between the initial clients (all citizens) and the government, and the second-tier principal-agent relationship is the one between the government and managers, and the government represents the core connection of the two-tier principal-agent relationship. The second-tier principal-agent relationship is the one actually effective due to the problem of the final owner absence, government officials’ strong residual right of control and weak residual right of claiming. The rent-seeking collusion by the principal and agent in the second-tier principal-agent relationship leads to the problem of corruption in state owned enterprises and affects enterprise investment decision. In addition, the decentralized administration, the financial contract system and the promotion system of government officials in China also cause local governments to encourage enterprises’ over-investment in pursuit of GDP growth and promotion opportunities; (2) Chinese listed companies have a strong preference for seasoned equity offering, and the major shareholders generally give up the subscription right In the Chinese institutional system, these will greatly reduce the financing cost and investment risk of major shareholders, and reduce the enterprise investment efficiency. Therefore, the causes and formation mechanism of escalation of commitment in Chinese listed companies should have its own unique aspects.This paper proposes an analytical framework of the escalation of commitment from decision maker’s rationality perspective, based on China’s institutional background in transition economy, focusing on the principal-agent relationship in listed companies, and elaborated to include the subscription selection of seasoned equity offering and government control in the framework. Subsequently, the paper analyzes theoretically the effect of major shareholder’s subscription selection and government control on escalation of commitment, and conducts an empirical research based on data of Chinese listed companies from 2003 to 2006.The results show that: (1) Regardless of the existence of government control, there may be escalation of commitment in listed companies when the major shareholder takes part in the subscription, and the relationship between the probability of escalation of commitment and the major shareholder’s shareholding proportion is negative. But the relationship becomes non-linear when the major shareholder gives up the subscription; (2) Compared with the case when the major shareholder takes part in the subscription, their giving up the subscription will increase the probability of escalation of commitment; (3) Regardless of the major shareholder’s subscription choice, compared with the case when there is no government control, government control will increase the degree of escalation of commitment. Moreover, the relationship between government control and the degree of escalation of commitment is negative.When we further divide the government-controlled enterprises into three categories: ultimately controlled by state asset-management bureaus(SAMBs)、state-owned enterprises affiliated to the central government(SOECGs)、state-owned enterprises affiliated to the local government (SOELGs), we find that: (1) both the probability and degree of escalation of commitment are higher in state-owned listed enterprises than private listed companies;(2) in terms of the probability of escalation of commitment, SOELG listed firms are highest, followed by SAMB-controlled listed firms, and SOECGs listed firms are the lowest. The three types of state-owned listed companies do not differ significantly in the degree of escalation of commitment.The contributions of this paper are: (1) Tracing down the principal-agent relationship of Chinese listed companies, we propose an analytical framework based on China’s institutional background and from the rational perspective; (2) We study the effect of major shareholder’s subscription selection of seasoned equity offering on escalation of commitment. This helps us understand the economic consequences of the subscription selection by major shareholder, and sets up theoretical foundation for managing and supervising the investment and financing behavior of listed companies; (3) We study the effect of government control on escalation of commitment, which provides a new perspective for government control research, and improves our understanding of the economic consequences of government control; (4) We place the escalation of commitment and over-investment into the same research framework, which enriches and advances the study of inefficient investment and escalation of commitment更多还原