استراتژی مالی شرکت ها برای رقابت جهانی

This paper focuses on the role of corporate financial strategies to improve their market valuations and lower their cost of capital. The identification of successful strategies is accomplished within an overall strategic framework. The paper is built on 12 longitudinal case studies from the Nordic countries to illustrate the linkages between business strategy, firm motivation, and various financial strategies.

During the last two decades the small Nordic economies have been able to foster a remarkable number of high-growth capital intensive companies, such as Nokia from Finland, Ericsson from Sweden, Novo-Nordisk from Denmark, and Nycomed from Norway. We argue that without the skilful global financial strategies that enabled these companies to access global savings, the limited domestic availability and high cost of capital would have hampered their growth. We suggest that these company stories provide valuable insight for scholars as well as for European executives, in particular those of smaller and medium-sized growth-oriented firms. In order to succeed in a global financial market, firms' ‘executives must be capable of delivering the strategy story to the stock analysts and, ultimately, share value to the money managers’, Useem (1998, p. 43). The on-going globalization of equity markets provides the firm with the opportunity to actively reduce information and agency costs, and hence to contribute to higher firm values and lower cost of capital (Bekaert and Harvey, 2000, Stulz, 1999 and Stulz, 1996). The rise of global portfolio investment has laid the ground for more emphasis on shareholder relations. The international portfolio managers judge the potential company to invest in against the best-performing firms in each industry and no longer against its domestic peers only. For small- and medium-sized companies in particular, but also for large companies outside the Anglo-American world, and major countries like Japan and Germany, the gain of access to highly liquid capital markets can effectively boost growth. In the rest of this paper we will emphasize successful financial strategies for large companies from small and/or emerging economies for gaining global investor recognition. The brief story of Hafslund Nycomed and Nokia may serve as appetizers. In 1992, Hafslund Nycomed (now Nycomed Amersham), a Norwegian pharmaceutical company, simultaneously listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and made a US$ 74.7 million US equity issue. At the time of the issue the company represented as much as 11 per cent of the value of all shares on the Oslo Stock Exchange. The NYSE listing provided Hafslund Nycomed with enhanced visibility within the pharmaceutical industry and cultivated a reputation with US institutional investors. Also in 1992, the financial strategy of Hafslund Nycomed paved the way for a US$ 400 million acquisition of its major US rival Sterling Winthrops. The interplay between the corporate strategy and the financial strategy was paramount to the firm's global success. When the fast growing telecommunication company Nokia of Finland needed US$ 485 million in 1994, access to competitively priced funds was necessary in order to keep pace with competitors. In early 1994 the common stocks of Nokia's major competitors were priced at 22 (Motorola) and 25 (Ericsson) times earnings, however, Nokia was down at only 14 times earnings. To become more attractive to global investors, the firm listed on the NYSE (New York Stock Exchange) and made a Euro-equity offering. Within three months of NYSE trading Nokia's stock had gained 45 per cent versus a 2 per cent gain for the NYSE composite index. Nokia had achieved global recognition among investors, and was now classified and priced as one of the peers in the telecommunication industry. Historically there has been considerable theoretical and empirical research on the segmentation of international capital markets, as well as recent studies such as those done by Karolyi (1998), Modén and Oxelheim (1997) and Sundaram and Logue (1996). However, few studies have addressed the specific managerial challenges that internationalization of capital implies. The research issue of this paper is to focus on the way individual companies can undertake actions to improve their market valuations, and thus their cost of capital. The key ingredients are the linkages between business strategy, firm motivation, and various financial strategies to reduce the corporate cost of capital.

In this study we have shown ways for aspiring global companies to achieve an international cost of capital. Based on 12 longitudinal case studies we discuss how access to competitively-priced capital accelerated the international growth prospects of Nordic companies. In fact, without this funding the competitiveness of these firms would have been significantly hampered. We argue that the Nordic cases provide an excellent ‘laboratory’ to understand successful execution of a global financial strategy and its implication for overall corporate strategy. Today this is particularly appropriate for any small- to medium-sized firm, as well as larger firms from more segmented capital markets, such as the ones in Eastern Europe. We argue that the corporate motivation for internationalizing the cost of capital is the starting point for understanding a firm's globalization of ownership. Globalization of capital is particularly appropriate in conjunction with globalization on the product side. Second, we emphasize the need to link the business strategy with the financial strategy. Several avenues to internationalizing the cost of capital exist; from foreign stock issues to strategic equity alliances. Our case studies suggest that globalization of capital is more advantageous to companies with unique products and/or unique resources that serve high-growth markets. Finally, the long-term performance of the case companies indicates that the internationalization of capital has largely been beneficial to the firms' shareholders. We argue that globalization of ownership is really a new shareholder regime. First of all this affects shareholders and governing of firms, as global capital tends to be less tolerant of meager performance. Second, this implies that executives need to focus on the core competencies of the firm, as investors do not approve value-destroying diversification. Furthermore, global ownership also provides executives with greater opportunities to finance high-return/high-risk projects. For the home country of aspiring global firms, internationalization of capital provides both opportunities and threats. On the positive side one can observe how a small country can produce some impressive global companies, such as the case of Nokia of Finland. On the other side, global firms are becoming more ‘foot loose’ and without the right government policies (or other factors beyond the control of governments) companies can move abroad.