سهامداران بزرگ و تحقیقات حسابداری

Large shareholders are a potentially very important element of firms’ corporate governance system. Whereas analytical research is typically vague on who these large shareholders are, in practice there are important variations in the types of large owners (and the different types of large owners could play very different governance roles). After briefly reviewing the standard agency cost arguments, in this article I emphasize the heterogeneity of concentrated ownership and in particular focus on the roles of families, institutions, governments, and employee ownership. I also discuss the role of large shareholders in private (i.e., unlisted) firms, where ownership tends to be more concentrated than in publicly traded firms. Finally, I briefly discuss variations in ownership structures across selected countries.

This article is based on my keynote address at the 2012 CJAR Special Issue Symposium at CEIBS in Shanghai. The topic of the conference was “large shareholders” and I was honored to be given the opportunity to make some comments on how large shareholders are important for (accounting) research. I should hasten to say that there are several well-cited survey studies on corporate governance in accounting, economics, finance, and management. Thus, in this paper I will not attempt a complete survey on the literature on large shareholders. Instead, I have decided to focus on one particular aspect – the heterogeneity of large shareholders. We tell our PhD students that they should base their research on theory to the extent possible. At least in financial accounting the “theory” that is referred to is often analytical economics-based research. At the Rotman School we have the same emphasis on theory and I am personally a strong believer in anchoring your work in theory. However, most analytical models are vague (to put it mildly) when describing exactly who the large shareholders are and how they act. As this article will highlight, there is in fact rather considerable diversity in the types of large shareholders we observe, and it is very likely that these may have different effects on outcomes of interest to accounting researchers. Hence the reader can consider this article also as a call for “attention to the context” in which the study is conducted. For example, I would encourage “case-based” type studies that delve deeper into one particular form of large shareholder, such as state-owned enterprises in China. I would like to offer three brief caveats. First, as already mentioned there are other, more comprehensive surveys on corporate governance issues and I would recommend that readers consult these if relevant. Second, although I consider several different types of large shareholders I could clearly have included additional types (e.g., the effect of foreign shareholders). Finally, there are important measurement issues in defining large shareholders (using cut-offs; multiple large owners; concentration ratios; ownership percentage versus voting rights; considering potential nonlinearities; organizational form; etc.). Section 2 provides a brief review of the classic Jensen and Meckling (1976) arguments and discusses both vertical and horizontal agency costs. It also discusses the role of the second-largest shareholders and examines how large shareholders exercise their monitoring in practice. Section 3 focuses on who the large shareholders are. The chapter considers the roles of families, institutions, governments, and employee ownership. Large shareholders are particularly prominent in private (i.e., unlisted) firms, and Section 4 summarizes relevant research on these economically very important firms. Section 5 contains a discussion of variations across selected countries in the types of dominating ownership, and Section 6 concludes.

This article has focused on highlighting the heterogeneity of large shareholders. Specifically, I discuss the importance of families, institutions, governments, and employees as shareholders. The roles of each of these is likely different and thus it is prudent to go beyond overly general notions of “large shareholders” and instead consider exactly who the owners are, and also suggests that further research on specific shareholder type effects on accounting outcomes would be welcome. I also emphasize that if researchers are really interested in researching ownership concentration, private firms may be the most fertile ground, both because these firms tend to have more concentrated ownership and because there is considerably less prior research on these economically important firms compared with publicly traded companies. But perhaps most importantly, I would encourage readers to use their imagination and not just “follow the bandwagon” in terms of choosing research topics. I would recommend reading outside of accounting (both to find interesting topics and to bring methodological advances into accounting) and to follow closely what is happening in practice. There are many exciting research opportunities in China and I very much look forward to future issues of CJAR and to attending future conferences in China.