瑞士的股利政策外文翻译文档格式.docx

1、一、外文原文 原文: Dividend policy in Switzerland Dividend policy has long been a subject of research and debate. There are many theoretical and empirical results describing the decisions companies make in this area. At the same time, however, there is no generally accepted model describing payout policy. M

2、oreover, empirical findings are often contradictory or difficult to interpret in light of the theory. In the ideal world of Miller and Modigliani （1961）, dividends are irrelevant. The value of a firm is given by its investment opportunities. Dividends are just the residual, and investors faced with

3、consumption shocks can always get their own “homemade” dividends. In “real life”, however, dividend policy is one of the main concerns for managers and investors. Empirical studies have generally found that dividend increases are considered good news by investors, while dividend decreases lead to ne

4、gative reactions. Several explanations for the existence and importance of dividends have been suggested over the last decades. Dividends could be used as signals for the actual position of a firm. Companies could communicate their better quality by paying higher dividends: low-quality firms will no

5、t be able to imitate them since dividends involve costs in terms of foregone investment, taxes, or the need to attract external capital. Agency theory suggests that dividends may be a way to reduce the overinvestment problem or a means to keep firms in the capital markets. Dividends may also be used

6、 to attract institutional investors, who are better monitors and prefer dividends for regulatory reasons. Behavioral aspects, such as self-control, fairness, or regret aversion, may also be important parts of the picture. Each of the main theories concerning dividend policy has found at least some s

7、upport in actual data. However, empirical research has also revealed weaknesses of these explanations, and a broad consensus concerning the “best” theory of corporate payout seems far away. We may know more about the “dividend puzzle”, but we are still without a definite solution. The present paper

8、examines some of the characteristics of dividend policy using Swiss data. The first part presents factors that influence variations in dividend payments across companies at a given point in time. The second part analyzes the changes in dividends over time. The cross-sectional analysis for the 200020

9、03 periods compares the characteristics of dividend payers and non-payers. It then identifies several determinants of the differences between dividend payers in terms of payout ratios and dividend yields. The results show that companies that are less risky, larger, with lower growth opportunities, a

10、nd with lower leverage tend to pay higher dividends. Institutions show a preference for dividend-paying companies, but there is little evidence that they prefer higher payout ratios or dividend yields. Quite interestingly, the factor that turns out to have the strongest influence on payout ratios an

11、d dividend yields is price volatility. This may be interpreted as a sign that companies with higher earnings uncertainty are less likely to pay high dividends - or to pay dividends at all. Dividends per share are much more widespread as a headline indicator of dividend policy. The final section of t

12、he paper looks at changes in （split-adjusted） dividends per share and seeks to determine whether these changes have informational content. The results show that dividend increases follow periods of high earnings and cash flow growth, whereas dividend decreases follow declines. A closer look at the d

13、ata reveals that there may nevertheless be some information conveyed by dividend changes. The average future level of earnings after dividend increases is significantly higher than the mean over the previous few years. The earnings of companies that decrease the dividend decline slightly and remain

14、at a persistently low level around the dividend change. An important class of models is based on the idea that the assumption of perfect information may be unrealistic and that dividends can be used as signals of firm quality. Bhattacharya （1979） builds a two-period model with two types of firms. In

15、vestments are made during the first period; their expected profitability is known to management, but not to outside investors. In order to signal the quality of their investment, the managers of “good” firms （managers are assumed to act in the interest of initial shareholders） will commit to paying

16、high dividends in the second period. Since attracting outside financing （during the second period） is expensive due to transaction costs, “low-quality” firms will be unable to imitate “high-quality” ones. The alternative models of Miller and Rock （1985） and John and Williams （1985） consider the cost

17、 of dividends in terms of foregone investments and taxes, respectively. The signaling models provide an explanation for the positive stock price reaction to the announcement of dividend increases or initiations. However, the empirical evidence on this hypothesis is mixed. In an early study, Watts （1

18、973） found that unexpected changes in earnings and unexpected changes in dividends were related, although he remained skeptical about the possibility to make money by exploiting this regularity. Penman （1983） finds that “both dividend announcements and managements earnings forecasts possess informat

19、ion about managements expectations”. Using a sample of dividend initiations and omissions, Healy （1988） find that dividend initiations and omissions have informational content （the change in earnings is related to announcement-day returns, even when controlling for previous earnings）, but this only

20、holds for year 1. Yoon and Starks （1995） and Denis et al（1994） show that dividend change announcements are linked to revisions in analysts forecasts of current income. Based on the mixed results for the signaling theory, Grullon et al （2002） suggest that, rather than an increase in profitability, di

21、vidend increases could reflect a decrease in risk the “maturity hypothesis”. They find that while profitability declines following a dividend increase, systematic risk in a three-factor Fame French model decreases. They argue that as firms become more mature （and therefore less risky, but with lower

22、 growth opportunities）, they will be more likely to pay large dividends to their shareholders. Agency theory suggests that dividends can be used as a means to control a firms management. Distributing dividends reduces the free cash flow problem and increases the managements equity stake. Easterbrook

23、 （1984） also suggests that dividends can be used to keep firms in capital markets, where they are monitored by potential investors. This is useful since monitoring by existing shareholders can be hindered by coordination problems. Lang （1989） find that dividend increases are associated with higher p

24、ositive share price reactions for companies with Tobins q smaller than unity, i.e., for companies with lower growth opportunities. Other evidence, however, tends to qualify the agency explanation. Capital expenditures increase following dividend increases, and decrease following dividend decreases a

25、nd omissions compared to the previous average （This is in line with the findings of Yoon and Starks 1995 and Denis et al. 1994）. Moreover, companies that increase dividends have not had significantly higher increases in capital expenditure over the previous 2 years, while companies that omit dividen

26、ds show a significant slowdown over the same period. Thus, dividend increases do not follow an investment boom, while dividend cuts and omissions are not associated with subsequent higher investment that may indicate better growth opportunities. Cash flows and cash levels for dividend-increasing com

27、panies remain at a high level and even increase over the medium term. Dividends may thus become informative about earnings in a way not envisaged in classical signaling models. Since managers want to avoid dividend decreases, they will only increase dividends when they are reasonably sure that there

28、 has been a sustainable increase in earnings. They will also cut or omit dividends only when the firms earnings position has deteriorated considerably. As a result, a dividend increase will follow a period of significant earnings growth and confirm that the new, higher level of earnings is persisten

29、t. At the same time, dividend decreases will follow a slowdown and confirm that the firm will still be in a difficult position in the future. Indeed, although their study seriously challenges the role of dividend changes as a signal for future earnings, Benartzi et al. （1997） find that earnings are

30、less likely to decrease following dividend increases. The paper has examined several features of dividend policy for a sample of Swiss companies. Cross-sectional comparisons show negative relationships between dividend payments and market-to-book ratios, price volatility, and leverage, as well as po

31、sitive relationships with profitability and （to a lesser extent） firm size and institutional holdings. Ownership concentration does not seem to have significant effects. Companies that used repurchases over the recent years were riskier and less profitable than companies choosing dividends. While so

32、me of these relationships are expectable, the negative relationship between leverage and dividend payments, the weak influence of ownership structure, the strong influence of price volatility, and the contrast between dividends and repurchases are not obvious results in the light of theory and previous empirical studies and thus are important aspects to note. Signaling models suggest that dividend changes predict future profitability. Still, the analysis of the data indicates that when dividends increase, earnings have already increased. There are no obvious signs of faster growth