Review of Pacific Basin Financial Markets and Policies

The main purpose of this paper is to explore the role of risk management, speculative industry competition effect and hot issue markets. We used a sample of 260 initial public offerings (IPOs) in the Australian resource sector for the 1994–2004 period to test the underpricing effect. We do not find any evidence that risk management can reduce the uncertainty relating to the new issue and hence alleviate the extent of underpricing. A plausible explanation for this lack of evidence is the poor information content of publicly available disclosures regarding risk management activities of IPO firms. We further provide evidence that the underpricing returns for resources IPOs are not impacted upon by the strength of alternative speculative IPO markets. We also show that the degree of underpricing adjusts to both market return in the preceding three months and the average underpricing of resources IPOs in the 12 month period leading to the float which offers an explanation to the hot issue effect observed in the IPO market.

I argue that paying dividends before issuing new stock can increase the stock price in the case when firms announce dividend payments and new stock issuance contemporaneously. It enables issuing firms to disentangle the agency problem of paying dividends by newly-raised funds from dividend information for new stock issuances. I employ the seasoned offerings of Taiwan listed firms as the sample, because of their practice of paying dividends once a year. The conditional event study strongly supports this argument and explains why previous studies fail to detect the information conveyed by dividends for new stock issuances.

The financial environment affects the level of R&D activity of a country. Using the proxy measures of macroeconomic financial environment variables, we show that cross-country differences in R&D activity, including expenditures, researchers, and patents etc., are correlated with the stock market turnover ratio. In particular, we found that the relationship was in direct relation to R&D expenditures or the number of researchers but indirect in relation to R&D outputs such as patents. These results imply that finance structure of an economy could enhance R&D activity through providing efficient resource allocation function. Other proxy measures of the financial environment such as banking sector size or stock market capitalization are not found to be significant. The size of the finance industry does not seem to change the national portfolio toward more high-risk innovative sectors. Financial quality, not size, determines the level of R&D intensity.

This study examines the application of CEO turnover on reverse stock splits firms. Using Taiwanese samples, we find that non-CEO turnover firms receive negative long-term abnormal returns, and their financial performances continue to decline following reverse splits. These findings are consistent with prior studies. Contrarily, neither significantly negative long-term abnormal returns nor changes on financial performance were found for CEO turnover firms. This study concludes that applying CEO turnover is suggestive in reverse splits. Additionally, we find that reverse split firms raise debt and concern with their short-term solvency following splits.

This study measures and compares the profit and cost efficiencies of Thai commercial banks between 1990 and 2008 which has been subdivided into the pre-crisis, the financial crisis, and the post-crisis periods. The efficiency scores are measured using a combination of parametric and non-parametric frontier approach. Both average profit and cost efficiency levels of the post-crisis period are found to be significantly lower than those of the pre-crisis period. The evidence also indicates that the real GDP growth rate and some general and financial characteristics are correlated with the efficiency level of Thai commercial banks.

In the wake of corporate scandals and excessive stock options compensation, International Accounting Standard Board (IASB) has introduced a new accounting standard, IIFRS 2 Share-based Payments. The scope of the standard extends beyond payments to employees, but for the purpose of this study, the focus is only on 'employee stock options'. IIFRS 2 requires a fair value of stock options records calculated on grant date, and recognized as compensation expenses over vesting periods. Prior to the introduction of IIFRS 2, stock options were not recognized and were only disclosed in the notes to the accounts. In Malaysia, the standard is mandatory for all companies listed on or after January 1, 2006. This study assumes the requirement existed in 2003. This study examines the impact of stock options expenses from 2003 to 2005, on the top 100 Malaysian companies. The three year observations show at least 24% of the sample exceeds the 5% materiality threshold on diluted EPS. The sectors that are impacted the most are the Trade/Service and Finance sectors. From the multiple-regression test, this study finds that fair value of stock options have a negative relationship with dividend yields (input of the Black-Scholes Merton (BSM) Model). Most companies in the sample are found to pay dividends and grant stock options at the same time. Therefore, this study suggests that companies need to restructure their compensation plan thus balancing the stock options granted and dividends paid in the future.

This paper evaluates the role of fair value accounting in recent financial crisis, and examines whether the call for its demise is justified. Critics argue that fair accounting regulation added to the volatility in financial markets and aggravated financial crisis. On the other hand, supporters of this regulation argue that fair value accounting has been the victim of the recent financial crisis. They believe that this regulation is important for providing transparent, reliable, and accurate information on asset values to investors.

After evaluating the impact of fair value accounting regulation on financial crisis, we examine negative and positive aspects of this regulation. Our discussion shows that fair value accounting provides useful information during stable market conditions, but its usefulness may become questionable during unstable and volatile financial markets. Overall, this regulation has the support of financial professional bodies. Some professionals are, however, concerned about recent modification to the fair value accounting rule, i.e., FAS 157-4, because this modification may not enhance reliability and accuracy of financial information. Despite recent modification, discussion on fair value accounting is far from over. Critics of the regulation still believe that this regulation should be eliminated, but the positive aspects of this regulation support its continuation.