Wanjun Yao and Shigeyuki Hamori
The purpose of this paper is to examine the long-term relationship between farm size and productivity in China at the national level.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the long-term relationship between farm size and productivity in China at the national level.
Design/methodology/approach
In contrast to the micro-data examination conducted by earlier literature, in this study, the authors use household aggregate panel data on 29 provinces in China for 1988–2012. Using the panel data PMG model, the authors control the factor of difference in land quality due to the fixed effect in each province, and the authors consider the difference in the long-run coefficients of farm size and land productivity rather than the difference in their short-run relationship. Thus, the authors examine the long-term relationship between farm size and productivity. Furthermore, the authors examine the robustness of this relationship in the long-term using samples of rice, wheat and corn production by region.
Findings
In contrast with the findings presented previously, the authors find that the relationship between farm size and agricultural productivity is statistically positive in the long term.
Originality/value
The relationship between farm size and agricultural productivity is a key research issue in agricultural and development economics. In China, many studies have provided evidence of the inverse relationship between farm size and agricultural productivity at the family farm level. However, this inverse relationship seems to reflect specific regions and specific periods in the relationship between farm size and land productivity. At the nationwide level, in the long-term, this is not an inverse but a positive relationship. It is desirable to expand farm size for the long-term development of agriculture.
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Tosporn Chotigeat, Maretno A. Harjoto and Ha‐Chin Yi
This study examines bank practices of corporate loan pricing in the Asia‐Pacific region. We find that the all‐in‐spread for loans (mostly term loans with longer maturities) in the…
Abstract
This study examines bank practices of corporate loan pricing in the Asia‐Pacific region. We find that the all‐in‐spread for loans (mostly term loans with longer maturities) in the Asia‐Pacific region are significantly smaller than those in the US. In addition, foreign banks tend to price their loans favorably in the Asia‐Pacific region, while foreign banks in the US have a higher loan spread. This finding indicates that foreign banks foster more competitive loan pricing in the Asia‐Pacific region, while foreign banks in the US seem to experience a competitive disadvantage compared to domestic lenders.
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Although extensive empirical studies have been conducted on capital structure in the context of developed countries, few have been carried out on emerging markets using large…
Abstract
Although extensive empirical studies have been conducted on capital structure in the context of developed countries, few have been carried out on emerging markets using large pools of data with comprehensive modeling techniques. This paper examines the financial characteristics of Malaysian companies and their debt policies using data of 106 firms from 1992 to 1999. The results of pooled GLS regressions show that all types of debt (short‐term, long‐term, and total) are influenced by the variables for profitability, size, and tangibility—but not by growth, risk, and investment opportunity (market‐to‐book‐value ratio). Thus, the latter results are contrary to evidence from developed markets. However, when the data are classified into two sub‐periods, only in the first (1992–95) does the risk variable reveal the hypothesized positive influence on all debt ratios, reflecting Malaysia's economic uncertainty in the throes of the Asian financial crisis and implementation during the second sub‐period (1996–99) of the domestic capital control policy. Profitability has a persistent and consistent negative relationship with all types of debt ratios in both periods; this confirms the capital structure prediction of the pecking order theory in an emerging capital market.
T. Chotigeat, Sebastien Kramer and C. S. Pyun
Large French banks have restructured over the last two decades responding to the evolution of the French banking system, European union integration, and globalization. Using…
Abstract
Large French banks have restructured over the last two decades responding to the evolution of the French banking system, European union integration, and globalization. Using financial time‐series and cross‐sectional data of three major French banks (Societe Generale, BNP Paribas, and Credit Lyonnais) from 1993 to 1999, this paper analyzes their performance. Our findings indicate that the French banks’ performance (return on equity capital ratio) was influenced negatively by total assets, the efficiency ratio, the Tier‐1 capital ratio, and loan loss provisions, but not at all influenced by non‐interest income (contrary to our hypothesis). When the French banks were compared their global counterparts, common factors explaining the performance of these banks are efficiency and total assets in at least 3 of the 6 countries.
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Tao (Tony) Gao and Talin E. Sarraf
This paper explores the major factors influencing multinational companies’ (MNCs) propensity to change the level of resource commitments during financial crises in emerging…
Abstract
This paper explores the major factors influencing multinational companies’ (MNCs) propensity to change the level of resource commitments during financial crises in emerging markets. Favorable changes in the host government policies, market demand, firm strategy, and infrastructural conditions are hypothesized to influence the MNCs’ decision to increase resource commitments during a crisis. The hypotheses are tested with data collected in a survey of 82 MNCs during the recent Argentine financial crisis (late 2002). While all the above variables are considered by the respondents as generally important reasons for increasing resource commitments during a crisis, only favorable changes in government policies significantly influence MNCs’ decisions to change the level of resource commitments during the Argentine financial crisis. The research, managerial implications, and policy‐making implications are discussed.
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Edward Nissan and Farhang Niroomand
Industrial concentration is broadly defined as: a few firms controlling a substantial share (assets, revenues) of the market. In the banking sector, this paper shows that the…
Abstract
Industrial concentration is broadly defined as: a few firms controlling a substantial share (assets, revenues) of the market. In the banking sector, this paper shows that the largest 50 banks in the world control about 50 percent of assets of the largest 1,000 banks. Two well known indexes of concentration were used (the Herfindahl and Theil’s entropy) to check the levels of concentration between 1990 and 2002. For purposes of robustness, the world’s largest 100 banks were also investigated. It was found in both cases that the concentration in 2002 was statistically significant as compared to concentration in the previous decade
The aim of this paper is to make sense of the “funding gap” by exploring how and why informal entrepreneurial finance is made available to entrepreneurs. By challenging the…
Abstract
Purpose
The aim of this paper is to make sense of the “funding gap” by exploring how and why informal entrepreneurial finance is made available to entrepreneurs. By challenging the epistemological and ontological assumptions of the “funding gap”, an enactment perspective of entrepreneurial finance, supported by a social constructionist stance, is proposed in this paper.
Design/methodology/approach
The study on which this paper reports was conducted through a longitudinal fieldwork process. Networks in two Chinese cities, Shanghai and Hong Kong, were chosen because of their differences in institutional context yet exceptionally high level of entrepreneurial activities.
Findings
This paper highlights the active role entrepreneurs play in managing their financial needs in the process of new venture creation. The results show that entrepreneurs are actively managing the demand as well as supply of entrepreneurial finance to narrow the “funding gap”. Furthermore, individuals work to fill the funding gap by creating required start‐up capital. In other words, the “funding gap” is not static or concrete; rather it is dynamic, manageable and in many cases is within individuals' power and ability to overcome.
Practical implications
The findings of this paper are particularly important to all stakeholders, including policy makers, educators, researchers, entrepreneurs and nascent entrepreneurs.
Originality/value
This paper contributes to the conceptual, methodological and practical knowledge in advancing understanding of the “funding gap”. First, it provides insight into the relationship between entrepreneurs and their environment that shapes the “funding gap”. Second, the findings suggested that a positive, supportive enterprise culture can be particularly useful in driving individuals towards entrepreneurship. Third, in terms of methodology, the author argues that an “inside‐looking‐lout”, interpretive, multi‐stage fieldwork and network as unit of analysis is particularly distinctive in revealing the complex process of managing entrepreneurial finance in the process of new venture creation.
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Attila Bruni, Silvia Gherardi and Barbara Poggio
Uses the neologism “entrepreneur mentality” – paying implicit homage to Foucault's govermentality – to highlight how an entrepreneurial discourse is mobilized as a system of…
Abstract
Uses the neologism “entrepreneur mentality” – paying implicit homage to Foucault's govermentality – to highlight how an entrepreneurial discourse is mobilized as a system of thinking about women entrepreneurs which is able to make some form of that activity thinkable and practicable, namely: who can be an entrepreneur, what entrepreneurship is, what or who is managed by that form of governance of economic relations? Discourses on women entrepreneurs are linguistic practices that create truth effects. Argues that social studies of women entrepreneurs tend to reproduce an androcentric entrepreneur mentality that makes hegemonic masculinity invisible. They portray women's organizations as “the other”, and sustain social expectations of their difference, thereby implicitly reproducing male experience as a preferred normative value. Taking a deconstructive gaze on how an entrepreneur‐mentality discourse is gendered, reveals the gender sub‐text underpinning the practices of the scientific community that study women entrepreneurs and, in so doing, open a space to question them.
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Ting-Ling Lin, Heng-Yih Liu, Chi-Jui Huang and Yu-Chiung Chen
This paper aims to examine the effect of ownership structure and board gender diversity on charitable donations for a group of listed electronics companies in Taiwan.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine the effect of ownership structure and board gender diversity on charitable donations for a group of listed electronics companies in Taiwan.
Design/methodology/approach
Using linear regression analysis, this paper analyses the ownership structure, board gender diversity and charitable donations of 380 Taiwanese electronics companies (2011-2013).
Findings
While domestic institutional investors, such as domestic mutual funds and corporate investors, take more of agency logic view, it negatively impacts on charitable donations. However, the empirical findings of this paper indicate that board gender diversity with the critical number of female directors was positively related to charitable donation. Thus, it is clear that female directors reaching critical numbers were taking more of a stakeholder view of institutional logic, emphasizing the balance of interests of internal and external stakeholders.
Research limitations/implications
This paper is limited to selected Taiwanese electronics companies over a two-year time frame, and charitable donations are the only proxy of corporate social responsibility (CSR) activity. The paper suggests that, as predicted by stakeholder theory and critical mass theory, companies with boards composed of at least three female directors make higher charitable donations.
Practical implications
This paper indicates that female directors on the board should have more voices on the board regarding the necessity and importance of CSR.
Originality/value
The paper contributes to existing literature by looking into the effects of ownership structure and board gender diversity on charitable donations.
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Joshua Abor, Emmanuel Sarpong‐Kumankoma, Eme Fiawoyife and Kofi A. Osei
This paper aims to evaluate the effect of risk on the financial policy of emerging market firms.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to evaluate the effect of risk on the financial policy of emerging market firms.
Design/methodology/approach
Using data from 34 emerging markets during a 17‐year period, 1990‐2006, a panel data model is employed for the analysis.
Findings
The results of this study indicate that firms with high probability of survival are likely to employ more debt. The level of risk exposure, particularly business risk is important in influencing the financial decisions of firms in emerging market economies. It is argued that since the use of debt increases firms' exposure to financial risk, firms with high business risk would shy away from using more debt. Also, finance providers in the financial market may not be interested in lending to firms with high business risk. This study also identified profitability, dividend, asset tangibility, growth opportunities, and GDP per capita as important determinants of the financial policy of emerging market firms.
Originality/value
This study contributes to the extant literature by providing empirical evidence regarding the effect of risk on the financial policy of emerging market firms.