Corporate Risk Management under Information Asymmetry
研究了2001-2006年间美国制药和生物技术公司如何通过金融和运营对冲缓解研发投资带来的信息不对称问题，发现对冲能提升企业价值，尤其对信息不对称严重和增长机会好的公司效果更明显。
Abstract This paper examines the financial and operational hedging activities of US pharmaceutical and biotech firms that are subject to a high level of information asymmetry stemming from R&D investments during 2001–2006. We find evidence in support of the information asymmetry hypothesis à la Froot, Scharfstein and Stein (1993) that hedging helps mitigate the under‐investment problem. Specifically, we find that the use of financial derivatives is associated with greater firm value and that the value enhancement is larger for firms subject to greater information asymmetry and better growth opportunities. There is a synergy between financial hedging and operational hedging where the latter is used to counter product development risk. The results are robust with respect to alternative performance measures, industry‐specific growth measures, and the endogeneity problem. Our work is differentiated from existing studies that examined commodity‐based industries without addressing information asymmetry.