William L. Megginson

The financial and operating performance of privatized firms during the 1990s

This study compares the pre- and postprivatization financial and operating performance of 85 companies from 28 industrialized countries that were privatized through public share offerings for the period from 1990 through 1996. We document significant increases in profitability, output, operating efficiency, and dividend payments-and significant decreases in leverage ratios-for our full sample of firms after privatization, and for most subsamples examined. Capital expenditures increase significantly in absolute terms, but not relative to sales. Employment declines, but insignificantly. Combined with results from two previous, directly comparable studies, these findings strongly suggest that privatization yields significant performance improvements. Copyright The American Finance Association 1999.

The Role of Asset Structure, Ownership Structure, and Takeover Defenses in Determining Acquisition Likelihood

This paper extends the Palepu (1986) acquisition likelihood model by incorporating measures of insider and institutional shareholdings, by examining the deterrent effect of various takeover defenses, and by considering the effect of varying proportions of fixed (tangible) assets in a firms total asset structure. We find that the probability of receiving a takeover bid is positively related to tangible assets, and negatively related to firm size and to the net change in institutional holdings. Blank-check preferred stock authorizations are the only common takeover defense significantly (negatively) correlated with acquisition likelihood.

Privatization and the sources of performance improvement in the global telecommunications industry

Abstract This paper examines the financial and operating performance of 31 national telecommunication companies in 25 countries that were fully or partially privatized through public share offering. Using conventional pre- versus post-privatization comparisons and panel data estimation techniques, we find that the financial and operating performance of telecommunications companies improves significantly after privatization, but that a sizable fraction of the observed improvement results from regulatory changes—alone or in combination with major ownership changes—rather than from privatization alone.

Corporate Governance in India

This study describes the Indian corporate governance system and examines how the system has both supported and held back Indias ascent to the top ranks of the worlds economies. While on paper the countrys legal system provides some of the best investor protection in the world, enforcement is a major problem with slow, over-burdened courts and significant corruption. Ownership remains concentrated and family business groups continue to be the dominant business model. There is significant pyramiding and tunneling among Indian business groups and, notwithstanding copious reporting requirements, evidence of earnings management. However, corporate governance in India does not compare unfavorably with any of the other major emerging economies: Brazil, China and Russia. India ranks high on the ease of getting credit, and has a well-functioning banking sector with one of the lowest proportions of nonperforming assets. The two main Stock Exchanges have among the highest number of trades in the world, and the relatively young Securities and Exchanges Board of India has a rigorous regulatory regime to ensure fairness, transparency and good practice. Most importantly, the corporate governance landscape in the country has been changing fast over the past decade, particularly with the enactment of Sarbanes-Oxley type measures and legal changes to improve the enforceability of creditors rights. If this trend is maintained, India should have the quality of corporate governance necessary to sustain its impressive current growth rates.

Privatization and the Rise of Global Capital Markets

We examine the growth in global capital market valuation, trading volume and security issuance over the past two decades. After estimating the impact of share issue privatizations on the growth of stock markets, we find that privatizations have significantly increased market liquidity, as measured by the turnover ratio. We examine the effect privatizations have had on the pattern of share ownership by individuals and institutional investors and find that privatizations have dramatically increased the number of shareholders in many countries. However, the extremely large numbers of shareholders created by many share issue privatizations are not a stable ownership structure.

The Long-Run Return to Investors in Share Issue Privatizations

We examine the long-run returns earned by domestic, international, and US investors who purchase shares at the first open-market price in 158 share issue privatizations (SIPs) from 33 countries during the period 1981-1997. We compute one-, three-, and five-year net returns for domestic, international, and US market indexes, and industry-matched comparison samples. We find statistically significant positive net returns for the 158 unseasoned SIPs for all holding periods and compared with all benchmarks. Our findings contrast with the patterns reported in previous research for equity offerings of private firms in the US and other countries.

Sources of Performance Improvements in Privatized Firms: A Clinical Study of the Global Telecommunications Industry

This paper examines the financial and operating performance of 31 national telecommunication companies in 25 countries that were fully or partially privatised through public share offering between October 1981 and November 1998. Using conventional pre- versus post-privatisation comparisons, we find that profitability, output, operating efficiency and capital investment spending increase significantly after privatisation, while employment and leverage decline significantly. However, these univariate comparisons do not account for separate regulatory and ownership effects (retained government stake), and almost all telecoms are subjected to material new regulatory regimes around the time they are privatised. We examine these separate effects using both random and fixed-effect panel data estimation techniques for a seven-year period around privatisation. We verify that privatisation is significantly related to higher profitability, output and efficiency, and with significant declines in leverage. However, we also find numerous separable effects for variables measuring regulation, competition, retained government ownership and foreign listing (on U.S. and U.K. exchanges). Competition significantly reduces profitability, employment and, surprisingly, efficiency after privatisation, while creation of an independent regulatory agency significantly increases output. Mandating third party access to an incumbent - network is associated with a significant decrease in the incumbent - investment and an increase in employment. Retained government ownership is associated with a significant increase in leverage and a significant decrease in employment, while price regulation significantly increases profitability. Major efficiency gains result from better incentives and productivity, rather than from wholesale firing of employees and profitability increases appear to be caused by significant reductions in costs - rather than price increases. On balance, we conclude that the financial and operating performance of telecommunications companies improves significantly after privatisation, but that a sizeable fraction of the observed improvement results from regulatory changes - alone or in combination with ownership changes - rather than from privatisation alone.

Does Government Ownership Affect the Cost of Debt? Evidence from Privatization

We explore whether government ownership affects the cost of debt using a sample of fully and partially privatized companies. On average across firms, a one-percentage-point decrease in government ownership is associated with an increase in the credit spread, used as a proxy for the cost of debt, by three-quarters of a basis point. However, fully privatized companies exhibit lower credit spreads than partially privatized firms, indicating the cost of a lengthy privatization process. Empirical evidence suggests that these findings result from decreasing government guarantees, firm performance improvements, ownership uncertainty, and bondholder-shareholder conflicts. The Author 2011. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Society for Financial Studies. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com., Oxford University Press.

The Value of Investment Banking Relationships: Evidence from the Collapse of Lehman Brothers

We examine the long-standing question of whether firms derive value from investment bank relationships by studying how the Lehman collapse affected industrial firms that received underwriting, advisory, analyst, and market-making services from Lehman. Equity underwriting clients experienced an abnormal return of around -5%, on average, in the seven days surrounding Lehman’s bankruptcy, amounting to

The Rise of Accelerated Seasoned Equity Underwritings

23 billion in aggregate, risk-adjusted losses. Losses were especially severe for companies that had stronger and broader security underwriting relationships with Lehman or were smaller, younger, and more financially constrained. Other client groups were not adversely affected.