Zhou Quan, Han Heyang, Han Junhua
School of Economics and Management, Shihezi University, Shihezi 832000, China.
School of Internal Auditing, Nanjing Audit University, Nanjing 211815, China.
Heliyon. 2024 Jan 12;10(2):e24489. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2024.e24489. eCollection 2024 Jan 30.
This study uses sample data of Chinese A-share listed companies from 2006 to 2022 and employs methods such as propensity score matching (PSM), difference-in-differences (DID), and instrumental variables (IV) to study the supervisory incentive effect of ESOPs from the perspective of corporate risk-taking. The results indicate that ESOPs significantly increase corporate risk-taking. The specific mechanism is that ESOPs reduce the dual agency costs between shareholders and managers, as well as between managers and employees, thereby alleviating corporate financing constraints and enhancing the level of corporate risk-taking. The enhancement of corporate risk-taking through ESOPs was also found to be of high quality. This is because ESOPs promote R&D investment that benefits the growth of corporate value and also reduce overinvestment and excessive debt that are detrimental to corporate value, thus leading to a higher quality of corporate risk-taking and stronger value effects. In addition, the design differences of ESOPs have different effects on corporate risk-taking: leverage, high discount, longer lock-up and tenure periods, and plans managed by third-party institutions have a stronger promotion effect on corporate risk-taking; employee subscription is more effective than executive subscription in promoting corporate risk-taking; in China, ESOPs do not have a "free-rider" problem, and the larger the proportion of ESOP issuance, the more participants, and the larger the scale of funds, the better the implementation effect.
本研究使用2006年至2022年中国A股上市公司的样本数据，并采用倾向得分匹配法（PSM）、双重差分法（DID）和工具变量法（IV）等方法，从企业风险承担的角度研究员工持股计划的监督激励效应。结果表明，员工持股计划显著增加了企业风险承担。具体机制是，员工持股计划降低了股东与管理者之间以及管理者与员工之间的双重代理成本，从而缓解了企业融资约束，提高了企业风险承担水平。研究还发现，通过员工持股计划提高企业风险承担具有高质量。这是因为员工持股计划促进了有利于企业价值增长的研发投资，也减少了对企业价值不利的过度投资和过度负债，从而带来更高质量的企业风险承担和更强的价值效应。此外，员工持股计划的设计差异对企业风险承担有不同影响：杠杆率、高折价、较长的锁定期和任期，以及由第三方机构管理的计划对企业风险承担有更强的促进作用；员工认购在促进企业风险承担方面比高管认购更有效；在中国，员工持股计划不存在“搭便车”问题，员工持股计划发行比例越大、参与者越多、资金规模越大，实施效果越好。
