Killian J. McCarthy

Theory and evidence on mergers and acquisitions by small and medium enterprises

The theory of mergers and acquisitions (MA are more likely to be withdrawn, suggesting that SMEs are more flexible, and more able to avoid deals that turn sour; and, finally, SME M&As are more likely to be financed with equity rather than debt, indicating that the influential financial pecking order theory is of less relevance to SMEs.

The Euro and its Impact on the Number, Size, Performance and Regional Spread of European Mergers and Acquisitions

McCarthy K. J. and Dolfsma W. The euro and its impact on the number, size, performance and regional spread of European mergers and acquisitions, Regional Studies. The macroeconomic effects of the euro have been extensively studied. The literature has, however, paid significantly less attention to the microeconomic consequences and few authors have considered if and how the euro has impacted firm-level decision-making. This paper explores if, how and in what way the euro has impacted one firm-level decision: whether to merge with or acquire another firm. This paper builds a sample of 19 362 acquisitions, announced in the period 1990–2014. It shows that the euro has dramatically increased the number, size and performance of European mergers and acquisitions. Importantly, it also notes that the euro has altered the geographic spread of European acquisitions. The paper reports that since the introduction of the euro, acquirers have made increasingly distant acquisitions and have preferred targets in peripheral regions to those in the core. The results also hint at the suggestion that the euro may have led acquirers to prefer Eurozone to non-Eurozone targets. From a policy perspective, it is concluded, therefore, that the euro has significantly impacted firm behaviour and has contributed, in a positive sense, to regional integration.

The G-Factor: Evidence of the Visable Hand in the Chinese Property Market, and the Implications for Managers

The aim of this research is to consider the effects of government intervention in the Chinese property market. We use data on the market performance of the real estate industry in the period 2000-2010, and find that models which exclude government intervention – a variable which we refer to as the G-Factor – explain as little as 1% of the variance in property sales. Including the G-Factor, however, raises the predictive power of our model to 87%, and in these models the significance of the price system disintegrates. Including the effects of the Chinese government’s ”visible hand” shows that it is government supply, rather than price, which is a significant determinant of sales. In the process, we illustrate that China remains a controlled economy, and a market in which Western investors should remain cautious. Furthermore, and because intervention in a functioning market can cause inefficiencies, and the limiting of supply drives up prices, intervention may fail to ”protect the people,” and as such may not be fit for purpose.

Globalisation, Tax Competition and the Harmonisation of Corporate Tax Rates in Europe: A Case of Killing the Patient to Cure the Disease?

This paper surveys the literature on tax competition, and uses it to analyse current European proposals to harmonise corporate tax rates. It begins, in the course of Section One, by introducing the phenomenon of international tax competition, and illustrates, with the use of secondary research, the reality of the regulatory ‘race to the bottom’. Section Two, however, demonstrates the harmful consequences of tax competition – with reference to the immobile factors of production – and makes obvious the necessity of effective intervention. Section Three then introduces and evaluates the calibre of the current proposals to tackle tax competition through collusion and harmonisation, and concludes negatively in the process. As illustrated in this discussion, any efforts to harmonise corporate taxes above the international equilibrium will not only fail to solve the problem at hand, but will exacerbate them, and may even serve to undermine and destabilise the political Union. Section Four then introduce an alternative solution to the problem – in the form of the residence principle – and Section Five concludes.

The emergence and performance of the Chinese merger market and the impact of partner location

Abstract Chinese acquirers spent

ONE SIZE (DOES NOT) FIT ALL: EVIDENCE OF SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES BETWEEN PRODUCT INNOVATION MANAGEMENT IN HIGH- AND LOW-TECH MANUFACTURING FIRMS

38 million on mergers and acquisitions in 1990, and

Das Phänomen Geldwäsche

666.1 billion on mergers and acquisitions in 2016. As the Chinese merger market has grown, so too has the literature on its performance. Little is known, however, about with whom Chinese firms can best do business. We aim to fill this gap. We suggest that because the liabilities of distance, foreignness, and outsideness complicate acquisition performance, targets in countries and regions which add fewer of these liabilities will outperform those that add more. We plot the overseas expansion of Chinese acquirers, and compare the performance of Chinese acquisitions, within the Greater China region, within the Confucian cultural sphere, and between Asian and the West. In each case, we predict that increasing cultural distance decreases performance. Then, because the Continental European governance system is institutionally more familiar to the Chinese system than it is to the Anglo-Saxon system, we consider the Chinese experience in each of these two systems. Our results largely support our hypotheses built on the partner location performance hierarchy argument, but we also point to the limits of the generalizability of existing literature in understanding the Chinese market.

Theorie: Glücksspiele und Geldwäsche

Most literature on product innovation management (PIM) has developed through a small number of high-tech manufacturer studies. It is assumed that, for other types of firms, ‘one size fits all’. This research addresses this issue by investigating PIM in both high- and low-tech firms. Building on Cormican and O’Sullivan’s (2004) Best Practice Model (BPM) this paper analyzes PIM of 112 high-tech in comparison to 184 low-tech manufacturing firms in the Netherlands. The empirical results show significant sector-level differences in the impact of the five constructs and, in some cases, insignificant and even opposite effects. Our findings show that one size does not fit all, and blindly following the theory can not only have a suboptimal effect but may even have a negative effect. Furthermore, there are some similarities in high- and low-tech PIM, for example Communication and Collaboration is the only construct that is positive and significant in all cases. The implications of these results in relation to high- and low-tech manufacturing firms are discussed.

Zusammenfassung und rechtspolitische Empfehlungen

So lange Straftaten begangen wurden, die Tatern Gewinne eingebracht haben, ist davon auszugehen, dass auch versucht wurde, das nicht rechtmasig erworbene Kapital als legitime Einnahmen zu tarnen, um es unbehelligt geniesen zu konnen. Die Mythologisierung des Charakters Al Capone in vielen Aufsatzen, die sich der Geldwasche widmen, kann auch u.a. nicht allein aus dem Grund verworfen werden, als dass es zu der Zeit noch keinen entsprechenden Straftatbestand im US-amerikanischen Recht gab.

Das Geldwäscherisiko bei einzelnen Glücksspielformen

Glucksspiele bergen aus drei Grunden ein hohes Potential fur Geldwasche: (1) Bei Glucksspielen finden viele Transaktionen in kurzer Zeit statt, die zu einer Vielzahl an Geldflussen fuhren, die Geldwascheaktivitaten als Tarnung dienen konnen. (2) Glucksspiele sind kein physisches Produkt, so dass ein Abgleich der angegebenen und echten Transaktionen erschwert ist. (3) Glucksspielgewinne sind in vielen Jurisdiktionen inklusive Deutschland steuerfrei.