IPO Discount of State - owned Enterprises: Interpretation Based on the Theory of Policy Signaling
研究发现中国国有企业IPO折价平均比非国有企业高29.95%，并检验了政策信号理论，认为这是国家在私有化过程中主动传递政策信号以维持未来公司价值的行为。
IPO discount is an important part of equity financing cost. The authors find that IPO discounts of SOEs in China are on average 29. 95% higher than those of non-SOE firms. Most existing studies suggest agen- cy cost as the explanation for such phenomena, but few evidences are provided. Nevertheless, this paper at- tempts to test the policy signal theory as the explanation of the higher IPO discount of SOEs. The policy signal theory argues that the higher IPO discounts of SOEs are proactive behaviors of the state in the process of privati- zation , aiming to convey a policy signal to the market for maintaining firm value in the future. The authors also find that IPO discount of SOEs decreases significantly with the largest shareholding and the length of controlling chain, but there is no such pattern for non-SOE IPOs. Furthermore, SOEs, in particular SOEs with weaker pri- vatization strategy, tend to have higher IPO discounts and long-term buy-and-hold abnormal returns than other firms. Overall, the evidences are consistent with predictions of the policy signal theory, and cannot be fully ex- plained by the agency cost theory.