民营企业的政治关联能降低权益资本成本吗

Can Political Connections Decrease Private Firms' Cost of Equity Capital

以中国民营上市公司为样本,以自建的政治关联指数衡量政治关联程度的强弱,分析资本市场上政治关联对民营上市公司权益资本成本的影响。实证研究发现,政治关联可以显著降低民营上市公司的权益资本成本,并且"地方政府背景"政治关联的这种降低作用比"中央政府背景"政治关联更显著;在政府干预越严重的地区,政治关联对民营上市公司的权益资本成本的降低效应越显著。这表明,政治关联作为一种非正式机制可以缓解落后制度对民企发展的阻碍作用,从而有助于降低权益资本成本。但是,政治关联对全社会来说是有成本的,本研究发现政治关联和法制水平负相关,因此,国家可以通过完善法律体系,提高执法水平,以限制政治关联的作用空间。

This paper constructs political connections index which can measure the degree of political connections and examines the effects of political connections on cost of equity capital in Chinese capital market by using private listed firms as samples.Results show that political connections can significantly reduce the cost of equity capital of private listed companies,and the effect of ＂local government background＂ political connections is more significant than ＂central government background＂ political connections.Further results show that the more severe the government＇s intervention is,the more noticeable reducing effect of political connections put on private listed firms＇ cost of equity capital.The results indicate that,political connections can serve as an informal substitute mechanism to help private listed firms alleviate the obstruction caused by the backward institution to private firms＇ development,which contributes to lower risk assessments by capital market investors and thereby reduces private firms＇ cost of equity capital.