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An Empirical Study Of The Governance Structure Of Listed Companies And Voluntary Information Disclosure

Posted on:2007-05-12Degree:MasterType:Thesis
Country:ChinaCandidate:F ChenFull Text:PDF
GTID:2209360182485126Subject:Accounting
Abstract/Summary:PDF Full Text Request
On the base of mandatory disclosures, voluntary disclosures make corporate disclosures more complete and specific, and improve the quality of corporate disclosure, which is helpful in getting rid of information dissymmetry and incompleteness, in realizing fairness and efficiency of capital market. Because of these, people pay more and more attention on voluntary disclosures. Foreign scholars have done lots of studies on voluntary disclosures, but internal scholars have done a little on those, especially on empirical research. Because of the affection of unique economy environment, economy development and traditional culture, listed Chinese companies' corporate governance has some unique feature, so many foreign research results on voluntary disclosures are not fit for listed Chinese companies effectively. Then, this paper empirically examines the linkages between corporate governance and the extent of voluntary disclosures in annual reporting provided by listed Chinese companies.In this study, corporate governance is characterized by nine attributes, which are the proportion of outside ownership, ownership concentration, controlling shareholder identity, the proportion of GA (government agencies) ownership, the proportion of SC (state-owned corporations) ownership, the proportion of managerial ownership, the proportion of share-holding directors to total number of directors on the board, CEO duality and the proportion of independent directors to total number of directors on the board. Meanwhile, firm size, firm profitability and firm leverage are chosen as the control variables. This study is based on a sample of 172 listed Chinese companies that only have A-shares on either Shanghai or Shenzhen Stock Exchange. Then, a linear multiple regression equation is established to test the association between the dependent variable of voluntary disclosure and the independent variables of corporate governance. The results indicate that the proportion of outside ownership, controlling shareholder identity and the proportion of SC (state-owned corporations) ownership are significantly and positively related to the extent of voluntary disclosures, and the proportion of GA (government agencies) ownership and the proportion of share-holding directors are significantly and negatively related to the extent of voluntary disclosures, while the coefficients for the other independent variables are insignificant. The descriptive statistics on the extent of voluntary disclosures disclosed by 52 listed Chinese companies from 2000 to 2004 shows that, on the whole, listed Chinese companies' extent of voluntary disclosures is small, but is increasing clearly. Based on the empirical evidences, the paper provides some advice on improving listed Chinese companies' voluntary disclosures.
Keywords/Search Tags:corporate governance, voluntary disclosure, analysis on annual reporting
PDF Full Text Request
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