公司治理與美國存託憑證型態之選擇?--以亞洲四小龍為例

Abstract

公司治理的目的在於促使企業體能夠透過法律的制衡與管控，在企業經營權與所有權分離的制度下，有效地監督其組織活動，並健全組織之運作，以防止脫序行為之經營弊端，以實現企業社會責任之高度目標。近年來由於財務報表的窗飾，使得企業弊案頻傳，各國政府紛紛開始重視公司治理，並著手進行改革加強公司治理之落實。尤其在資本市場日漸全球化與自由化之下，企業基於各種理由開始向國際市場發展，交叉掛牌上市已成趨勢，其更需要公司治理來輔佐企業永續經營。 過去許多文獻研究公司治理對於企業績效表現之影響，亦有文獻探討公司特性與外部法令對於存託憑證之選擇。本研究將兩者結合，以亞洲四小龍為觀察主體，將公司治理分為董事會組成、CEO相關、內部人持股、與董事會運作等面向，並加入外部法令因素與企業特性，探討公司治理與企業選擇美國存託憑證型態之間的關係。 實證結果發現，以國家層級而言，上市型態之存託憑證吸引了來自對於投資人保護較低的國家之企業；以企業層級而言，上市型態之存託憑證則吸引了盈餘較高的大規模企業；而以公司治理良窳而言，公司治理較佳之企業反而傾向選擇規範較少之非上市型態之存託憑證。顯示除了外在環境與企業特性會影響企業對於存託憑證型態之選擇外，公司治理亦是企業選擇存託憑證型態之重要考量因素，亦即，企業會根據不同目的做出不同型態ADRs之選擇。

The purpose of corporate governance is to create a mechanism of checks and balances. Under the separation of management and ownership, managers’ behaviors are aligned to the interests of shareholders, corporate fraud is alleviated, effective and efficient management is assured, and corporate social responsibility can be carried out. In recent years, a growing number of firms involved in the corporate scandals have used window dressing to make financial statement more attractive. This creates the awareness of the importance of corporate governance among governments in various countries, who start to improve the law and enforcement of corporate governance. As capital market becomes more liberal and globalized, multinational companies start to expand their business in the global market by cross listing in international capital market, which requires stricter corporate governance compliance.

Some researchers focused on the relationship between corporate governance and firm performance. Other researchers explored the effects of company characteristics and external governance on the choices of depositary receipts. This study explores the relationship between corporate governance (board composition, CEO characteristics, insider ownership, and board committee) and ADR listing choices based on four Asian tigers.

The country-level result shows that companies from weaker investors’ protection countries tend to choose level II and level III ADRs. For corporate-level result, we showed that companies with bigger size and greater earning prefer level II and III ADR listings. As for governance-level result, we found that companies with better corporate governance are more likely to choose Level I and 144A. Our results showed that ADR listing choices are affected by external governance environment, company characteristics, and internal corporate governance. In other words, companies choose different ADR types for different purposes.