Do Stock Markets Value Firm-Level Technical Efficiency? Some UK Evidence

An empirical model determining the relationship between changes in firm-level productivity and changes in firm value is estimated using an unbalanced panel of 706 public limited companies observed over the period 1996-2002. The main findings are: (1) changes in technical efficiency and labour productivity are reflected in changes in the value of manufacturing firms, and (2) changes in earnings per share and return on capital employed explain changes in the value of service sector firms but technical efficiency and labour productivity do not. For manufacturing firms, the evidence is consistent with the stock market valuing the adoption of better management practices that lead to better resource utilisation

Executive Remuneration And Firm Performance: Evidence From A Panel Of Mutual Organisations

The empirical relationship between the remuneration of: the highest paid director (HPD), mean Board remuneration (Director), and the Chairperson of the Board (Chair) and firm-level performance is examined on a panel of mutual building societies over the 1991 to 1996 period. Two measures of performance are employed: profitability and the change in total factor productivity (TFP). A strong positive relationship between profitability and pay is found for the HPD but not for the Director or Chair. The relationship between pay and TFP change is generally weak for all three measures of executive remuneration. A strong relationship between size and the executive remuneration measures is found, particularly for the Director. Although there is evidence of pay being used as a governance device, the pay-size relationship is consistent with managerial theories of the firm. Surprisingly, our results are similar to those reported for joint stock firms

Financial Liberalisation and the South Korean Financial Crisis: Some Qualitative Evidence.

This paper provides a novel analysis of the South Korean financial crisis drawing on the findings of a unique survey of IMF/World Bank officials and South Korean economists. The survey reveals that over-optimism and inadequate recognition of financial risks inadvertently led to excessive risk taking by Korean financial intermediaries. It also indicates that the sources of over-optimistic assessments of East Asian economies, including Korea, were mainly to be found outside East Asia, including the IMF, the World Bank, western media and analysts. Weaknesses in risk management were the result of (i) lack of expertise in relation to handling the risks associated with capital flows, and (ii) disincentives to manage risks emanating from a relatively successful history of government provided safety nets for both industry and banking. Financial liberalisation widened risk-taking opportunities, by allowing lending to companies outside Korea. It also created additional disincentives for managing risk by intensifying competition and eroding bank franchise values. Finally, weaknesses in prudential regulation allowed bank portfolios to become much riskier, importantly in terms of maturity mis-matches between dollar-denominated assets and liabilities. The liquidity crisis, which followed the re-assessment of the South Korean economy by international lenders in late 1997, triggered a full-blown financial crisis because of the absence of an effective international lender of last resort

The Impact of State and Foreign Ownership on Post-Transition Industrial Concentration: The Case of Polish Manufacturing

This paper reports an analysis of the determinants of the level and changes in Polish industrial concentration in the early post-transition era. The empirical evidence is based on a panel of 144 Polish manufacturing industries over the period 1989-1993. The results suggest that both state and foreign ownership have a significant impact on industry concentration and this relationship is U-shaped. Minimum efficient scale is found to be the only other factor to impact on industry concentration

Agency, strategic entrepreneurship, and the performance of private equity-backed buyouts

Agency theory has focused on buyouts as a governance and control device to increase profitability, organizational efficiency, and limited attention to growth. A strategic entrepreneurship view of buyouts incorporates upside incentives for value creation associated with growth as well as efficiency gains. In this paper, we develop the complementarity between agency theory and strategic entrepreneurship perspectives to examine the performance implications for different types of buyouts. Further, we study how the involvement of private equity (PE) firms is related to the performance of the post-buyout firm. These issues are examined for a sample of 238 PE-backed buyouts in the UK between 1993 and 2003. Implications for theory and practice are suggested