This paper examines the impact of ownership concentration on corporate financialization utilizing a large sample of Chinese A-share listed firms from 2003 to 2021. We find that firms with higher ownership concentration conduct significantly fewer financial investments. Mechanism analyses show this effect is more pronounced in firms with stronger vertical principal-agent problem (i.e., lower managerial ownership and higher managerial perks) and in firms with stronger horizontal principal-agent problem (i.e., lower ownership balance and lower institutional shareholding), supporting that increased ownership concentration enhances large shareholders' monitoring on managers and reduces their incentives to engage in tunneling through financial investments. We further find that ownership concentration curb financialization primarily in non-state-owned enterprises and mainly restrain long-term financial investments, which tend to be riskier and may crowd out real investment. Consistently, ownership concentration mitigates the adverse effects of corporate financialization by dampening its positive link to firm risk and negative links to investment and innovation. Overall, we contribute to the literature on corporate financialization and the role of ownership structure, and has great implication to the emerging practices of corporate financialization in China and other developing countries with similar ownership structure.

This study examines the relationship between multiple large shareholders (MLS) and corporate credit ratings. Using a sample of Chinese firms from 2007 to 2021, we find that credit rating agencies tend to assign lower credit ratings to firms with MLS than to firms with a single controlling shareholder. The negative relation is stronger with a higher perceived likelihood of large shareholder collusion, more severe shareholder-bondholder conflict of interests, and higher information asymmetry and weaker external monitoring, suggesting the mechanism behind the negative view of MLS by credit rating agencies is the heightened expropriation risk associated with MLS collusion. Further analyses show that MLS are associated with higher default probability, larger credit spreads, and higher ex-post risk-taking, confirming the rationality of the credit ratings. Moreover, stronger investor protection due to a recent regulatory change mitigates the negative effect of MLS. Overall, this study suggests that rating agencies incorporate the presence of MLS as an important non-financial factor in their credit assessment; the study also highlights a potential negative effect of MLS from the perspective of bond market participants.

This paper examines how independent director licensing affects firms’ stock price crash risk. Exploiting the regulatory qualification certificates for being an independent director in China, we find higher future stock price crash risk in firms with uncertificated independent directors (UIDs), compared with firms having all independent directors granted qualification certificates. Further analyses suggest that UIDs are less motivated to fulfill fiduciary duties due to insufficient awareness of legal responsibilities and less independence in monitoring insiders to show their gratitude. Firms with UIDs are also less likely to issue bad news forecasts and are associated with lower-quality information disclosure. The cross-sectional analyses show that the effect of UIDs is stronger in firms with more severe agency conflicts and weaker external monitoring. Additionally, the impact of UIDs intensifies in firms with higher information asymmetry and when UIDs serve on audit committees, but is mitigated when they have foreign experience. The results suggest that the certification plays a more pronounced role in settings where investor protection institutions are weaker and effective governance mechanisms are insufficient. Overall, our findings highlight the legitimacy of independent directors as an important factor when evaluating their governance effect and stock price outcomes.

We examine the effect of nonfamily leadership in family firms, whereby family members do not act as either a board chair or a CEO, on corporate earnings management. We find that firms with nonfamily leadership conduct significantly more earnings management than firms with family leadership, although this effect can be alleviated by more effective internal control and a stronger reputation concern. Additional analyses show that the increased related-party transactions can be one mechanism through which the nonfamily leadership increases earnings management. We further find that nonfamily leaders in family firms are on average weaker but receive higher (excess) payment than their peers in nonfamily firms, all consistent with the role of the nonfamily member as a marionette for the family's misbehaviors. Moreover, earnings management increases with the degree of family noninvolvement and is mainly driven by nonfamily chairs rather than the CEOs. Overall, our paper suggests that not having a family leader aggravates incentives for the controlling family to manage earnings to realize private benefits.

This study examines the voting behaviour of independent directors from academia based on manually collected voting data. We find that academic independent directors are less likely to dissent on board proposals than other independent directors, especially the directors who have fewer industry-specific experiences or have a relatively higher pay from the focal firm. The academic directors are also more likely to lose board seats after dissension, consistent with their concern of less job security as they are easily replaced. Lastly, although academic directors generally have weaker incentives to vote against insiders, they are more likely to dissent on proposals concerning related-party transactions. Overall, our study sheds new light on the role of academic independent directors in board monitoring effectiveness.

This paper investigates whether and how the penalty against peer firm leaders influences focal firm's earnings management. By employing a difference-in-difference (DID) approach, we find that penalties on peer firm leaders significantly decrease focal firms' earnings management, suggesting that firms adjust their expected costs related to misconducts when observing the salient penalties against their peers. Further analyses document that this effect is significantly stronger for firms that have witnessed severer penalties, firms with better corporate governance, and firms located in provinces with stronger law enforcement. Moreover, we find such peer firm penalties mainly decrease focal firms' upward earnings management rather than downward earnings management.

Using a large sample of Chinese listed firms from 2003 to 2018, we examine the effect of multiple blockholders on corporate financialization. We find that the existence of other large shareholders significantly restrains corporate financialization, and this finding is robust after addressing endogeneity concerns. Mechanism analyses show the effect is stronger when the relative power of other blockholders is stronger, when the agency conflicts are stronger, and when other corporate governance mechanism is weaker, supporting the monitoring role of other blockholders on the controlling shareholder. Further, we find that corporate financialization does suppress firms' real investment, increase firms' total risk and deteriorate firm performance, and that multiple blockholders help alleviate such negative effects, suggesting the real effect of multiple block -holders' monitoring on corporate financialization. Finally, we decompose financial assets and find other large shareholders mainly restrain the types of financial investment through which controlling shareholders are most likely to expropriate private benefits.

<span id="ChDivSummary" name="ChDivSummary" class="abstract-text">本文利用2003-2016年中国A股上市公司数据研究发现,公司存在多个大股东显著减少了控股股东股权质押后的利益侵占行为,改善了股权质押后的会计盈余信息含量,降低了股权质押后未来股价崩盘的风险;并且其他大股东相对力量越大时,该效应越大。此外,多个大股东公司在控股股东股权质押后更少面临分析师的降级调整,进一步为多个大股东对控股股东股权质押的监督作用提供了证据支持。本文在丰富多个大股东公司治理效应领域文献的同时,也对构建抑制控股股东私利行为的公司治理机制,以及如何促进中国资本市场稳定健康发展具有重要启示意义。</span>

Family involvement as chair of the board combines the reputation of the controlling family and the firm. Thus, the family's incentive to prevent reputation loss acts as a corporate governance mechanism in mitigating self-serving and bad news hoarding behavior of family firms. We find a lower future stock price crash risk in family firms with family related chairman, compared with family firms with non-family related chairman. The impact of family related chairman is more pronounced in firms with weaker external monitoring and more severe financial distress, and when families have greater reputation concern. Additionally, we find family-chair firms conduct more bad news forecasting, less tunneling behavior, higher earnings quality, as well as have lower costs of equity and overall better performance in the future. The family CEO has little impact on future stock price crash risk.

<span id="ChDivSummary" name="ChDivSummary" class="abstract-text">2008年我国《劳动合同法》的正式实施,极大提升了我国劳动保护的水平,也给我国劳动保护制度的经济后果研究提供了契机。本文采用双重差分模型,以2001-2014年中国上市公司为样本,实证研究劳动保护制度与公司资本结构的关系,并考虑企业产权性质以及所处地区的法律执行效率对两者关系的影响。本文研究发现:劳动保护水平显著降低了公司负债水平,并且公司所处地区的法律执行效率越高,以及在非国有企业中,该负向关系越显著。</span>

Using Chinese data, we examine whether synchronous remote board meetings, which facilitate status equalization among directors and alleviate their pressure for conformity, affect board monitoring effectiveness. We find that compared to face-to-face meetings, synchronous remote meetings are associated with directors’ better meeting attendance behavior, a higher likelihood of director dissent on monitoring-related proposals, higher forced CEO turnover-performance sensitivity, and more effective investments. These results hold when we use remote meetings that include both synchronous and asynchronous remote meetings. Proposal-director level analysis further shows that remote meetings reduce the pressure to conform faced by young first-term directors and socially connected directors.

Faccio et al. (2001) find that when East Asian firms have multiple large shareholders, they will collude to expropriate wealth and withhold dividend payouts. However, when it becomes difficult for large shareholders to expropriate wealth through activities like tunneling, large shareholders may then need dividends to fund personal cash flow needs. Thus, they may cooperate to make firms pay dividends and pay large dividends. To test this hypothesis, we study Chinese-listed firms. Consistent with our contention, we find that firms with multiple large shareholders are more likely to pay dividends and pay large dividends. These activities are especially prevalent after restrictions were placed on tunneling. We also find that dividend payouts and large payouts are more likely when the largest shareholder needs the cooperation of other blockholders to exert control over dividend payout policy, and when multiple blockholders are of the same identity.

银行竞争的加剧将促使银行更多地搜集和挖掘企业信息,降低银企之间的信息不对称,进而缓解企业融资约束.为此,本文在构建理论模型分析的基础上,进一步实证检验了这一假定.实证检验结果表明,银行竞争显著降低了企业投资-现金流敏感性,即缓解了企业融资约束;该结论在控制内生性问题,以及采用不同银行竞争指标和融资约束指标进行稳健性检验后仍旧成立.同时,本文还发现,银行竞争降低了企业债务融资成本,从而为银行竞争降低企业融资约束这一结论提供了补充性证据.进一步地,在企业信息不对称程度更严重的情况下,银行竞争缓解企业融资约束的作用更大,且银行竞争能够降低企业贷款的交易成本,从而为银行竞争降低融资约束的作用机制提供了证据支持.本文不仅丰富了银行竞争的经济后果以及融资约束等相关领域文献,同时还具有较为重要的政策含义.

<span id="ChDivSummary" name="ChDivSummary" class="abstract-text">控股股东之外的其他大股东可以抑制控股股东隐藏坏消息的行为,从而降低未来股价崩盘风险。本文以2000-2015年的中国A股上市公司为样本,检验了多个大股东对股价崩盘风险的影响。本文的实证结果表明,当公司存在多个大股东时,其股价的崩盘风险更低。进一步的研究发现,其他大股东对控股股东的监督作用主要体现在其他大股东相对于控股股东的力量较大、控股股东隐藏坏消息的动机较强、以及公司治理机制较弱的公司中。本研究在丰富股权结构以及股价崩盘风险相关领域文献的同时,对上市公司、投资者和政府监管部门也具有重要的启示意义。</span>

<span id="ChDivSummary" name="ChDivSummary" class="abstract-text">在集中的股权结构下,实际控制人掌握着企业资源支配权。已有文献探讨了公司董事和经理人性别的公司治理效应,但是尚未从实际控制人的视角进行研究。本文基于新兴资本市场的公司治理特征,以2003～2015年中国上市民营企业为样本,实证检验了实际控制人性别对其利益侵占行为的影响。结果表明,相比男性实际控制人,女性实际控制人更少地侵占中小股东利益。在一系列的稳健性检验后,本文的研究结论仍然成立。进一步的研究表明,除了女性实际控制人外,其他女性董事和女性CEO并不能影响实际控制人的利益侵占行为。最后,研究还发现,在内外部治理较弱的公司中,实际控制人性别对其利益侵占行为的影响更加明显。本文不仅从一个新的视角推进了高管性别如何影响企业公司治理的研究,也对政府职能部门制定相关政策提供了有益的政策启发。</span>