Does Investors' Desire to Punish Misreporting Affect Their Litigation Decisions and Managers' and Investors' Welfare?
通过实验市场研究投资者在没有直接经济利益时是否仍会起诉经理人虚假报告，发现惩罚动机能有效抑制经理人偷懒和造假，并提升双方福利。
ABSTRACT Shareholder litigation is an important part of the regulation of securities markets that can influence corporate managers' reporting behavior. Prior research shows that conventional economic factors affect investors' litigation decisions. We use experimental markets to examine whether investors engage in costly litigation even without a direct financial incentive to do so and whether this affects managers' reporting decisions and managers' and investors' welfare. We find that investors frequently litigate when they can impose a financial penalty on managers for misreporting even though they cannot recover their legal fees or receive restitution for their losses. Moreover, this deters managers' shirking and misreporting and improves managers' and investors' welfare almost as effectively as when investors can recover their legal fees and receive restitution for their losses. Overall, our results indicate that, in addition to financial incentives, investors' desire to punish misreporting plays an important role in their litigation decisions, and that may yield substantial welfare benefits.