Research On Agency Problems Of Employee Stock Ownership Plan In Mixed-ownership Reform

In 2013,the third plenary session of the 18 th central committee formally proposed the decision to encourage the development of the mixed-ownership economy.The current mixed-ownership reform is an inevitable move to deepen the reform of state-owned enterprises,which is of great significance to improve the governance mechanism of state-owned enterprises and improve the competitiveness of state-owned economy.Employee stock ownership plan(ESOP)is one of the important aspects and concrete measures.By the end of 2018,a total of 968 listed companies have announced their ESOPs,among which 89 are state-owned enterprises and 194 by targeted additional shares insurance(TASI).The existing studies show that ESOP and TASI have different forms of agency problems in practice.However,state-owned enterprises have natural governance defects,and the absence of owners leads to insider control.Will the agency problems in ESOP be magnified? How to control the possible agency problem of ESOP through institutional arrangement so as to ensure the smooth progress of mixed reform of state-owned enterprises? These questions need to be answered based on the research on the mixed-ownership reform of Chinese listed companies and the practice of ESOP.Based on the case of SiChuan Jiuyuan Yinhai Software Co.,Ltd,this paper studies whether and what kind of agency problems are caused by ESOP in mixed-ownership reform with principal-agent theory and information asymmetry theory.Through the calculation of CAR,horizontal comparison and other methods.The case study found that the company will use the opportunistic choice of the ESOP announcement date to minimize the price granted;After the ESOP is launched,the company will simultaneously launch an unusually high dividend distribution plan to maximize the value of the shareholding;Management power is used to obtain excessive share awards,etc.The results of the case study show that for the state-owned holding company,due to the lack of ownership and internal control,the ESOP will become the source of management agent problems in the process of state-owned enterprise mixed reform,especially when the source of share is TASI.It is more likely to lead to problems such as overpayment,opportunistic timing and dividend distribution.The findings further suggest that agency problems are caused by imperfect supervision,defects in mixed-ownership reform and irrational market transactions.In order to solve the agency problem,it is necessary to make the regulatory policies consistent in the general direction and improve the breadth and depth of TASI supervision,make the state-owned enterprises involved in the mixed reform strengthen internal supervision and compliance operation,and fully mobilize the enthusiasm of all stakeholders,make individual investors raise their invest level,and make institutional investors guide market investment correctly.