我国高校教育基金会现金持有逻辑的实证研究

An Empirical Study on the Cash Holding Behavior of China’s University Endowment Funds

我国高校教育基金所持现金占资产的比重约为80%,远超美国高校教育基金不到10%的水平,也高于我国上市民营公司约20%的水平。为探究我国高校教育基金持有大量现金的行为逻辑,本文在分析了2013年261家教育基金会的财务数据后发现:其逻辑既不是如权衡理论预测的为提高教育项目的投资业绩,也不是如代理理论预测的管理者有自身利益诉求,更不是如融资优序理论预测的旨在拓宽基金募资渠道,而是要通过额外现金支出来达到提升本校综合声誉排名之目的,从而吸引更优秀的生源、谋求高质量的发展。

The cash held by China’s university endowment funds as a proportion of total asset is at about 80%,which is far above their U.S.counterparties’ ratio of less than 10% and is also much higher than the Chinese private listed companies’ 20% level.In order to explore the logic behind this phenomenon,i.e.,Chinese university endowment funds hold a large extra amount of cash,this paper analyzes the financial statement and governance data of 261 university endowments in 2013 across China.We find that the reason behind is neither predicted by the trade-off or agency theory,nor predicted by the financing priority theory.Our empirics support an alternative mechanism of reputation.In other words,the ultimate goal of holding excessive cash by endowment funds in China is to expend on advertising and improving their host universities’,rankings,in anticipation to attract better students and to seek for high-quality development.