The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of ownership structure on merger and acquisition (M&A) decisions of Brazilian listed companies.,This paper is an applied and explanatory research based on secondary data. The sample is comprises non-financial companies listed on the BM&FBovespa between 1998 and 2007. Considering that the dependent variable is binary, the authors estimate panel data logistic regression models. Considering the existence of conflicts of interest among those who have the decision-making power and the supplier of capital for M&A transactions, they draw upon the Agency Theory to develop the theoretical hypotheses.,The results show that, for a sample of Brazilian non-financial companies listed on the BM&FBovespa (B3), from 1998 to 2007, Brazilian firms present, on average, a highly concentrated ownership structure and the major controlling shareholders are families or the State. These characteristics are negatively related to the likelihood of M&A transactions, as most of these controlling shareholders are reluctant to adopt mechanisms that reduce their control.,With regard to the limitations, this study considered only the M&A definitions as stated by the Bureau van Dijk database. In this sense, future studies may analyze the effects of ownership structure based on other M&A definitions and typologies. In addition, the study is limited to the period from 1998 to 2007, which is prior to the international financial crisis. Future studies may extend the analysis period to include the post-crisis period (2008) to check if there are differences in M&A strategies before and after the crisis.,From a managerial perspective, the results show that minority shareholders have little or no influence over an M&A decision, so they cannot decide on the use of resources for fast growth and access to new markets through M&A. Thus, the investment decision must take into account the nature and the quality of the controlling shareholder.,This study shows a significant and negative effect of ownership concentration on the likelihood of M&A transactions. In part, this result demonstrates the importance of understanding the behavior of controlling shareholders before inferring on other key aspects that the M&A literature tends to make fundamental in explaining M&A decisions in publicly traded companies, particularly, in an environment of low minority shareholder protection.,Previous studies have partly found that the M&A decision is motivated by individual advantages obtained from increasing the size of the firm, or from managerial hubris. The results show that these hypotheses do not hold in the Brazilian context. Moreover, the results indicate that M&A decisions are associated with the characteristics of the controlling shareholder, their level of ownership concentration and their typology, contributing to the agency debate on whether the incentive or the entrenchment effect prevails in the context of the agency problem between controlling and minority shareholders, particularly, in an institutional environment of low shareholder protection.

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所有权结构对巴西企业并购决策的影响

本研究的目的是检验股权结构对巴西上市公司并购（M&A）决策的影响。本文是一项基于二手数据的应用性和解释性研究。样本包括 1998 年至 2007 年在 BM&FBovespa 上市的非金融公司。考虑到因变量是二元的，作者估计了面板数据逻辑回归模型。考虑到并购交易的决策权人和资金提供者之间存在利益冲突，他们借鉴代理理论提出了理论假设。在 BM&FBovespa (B3) 上市的金融公司，从 1998 年到 2007 年，巴西公司平均出现，股权结构高度集中，主要控股股东为家族或国家。这些特征与并购交易的可能性呈负相关，因为这些控股股东中的大多数不愿意采用减少其控制权的机制。,关于局限性，本研究仅考虑了 Bureau van Dijk 数据库中的并购定义. 从这个意义上说，未来的研究可能会基于其他并购定义和类型来分析所有权结构的影响。此外，该研究仅限于1998年至2007年期间，即国际金融危机之前。未来的研究可能会将分析期延长至危机后时期（2008 年），以检查危机前后的并购策略是否存在差异。从管理的角度来看，结果表明小股东对并购决策几乎没有影响力，因此他们无法决定如何利用资源实现快速增长以及通过并购进入新市场。因此,投资决策必须考虑控股股东的性质和质量。,本研究表明所有权集中度对并购交易的可能性有显着的负面影响。在某种程度上，这一结果表明，在推断其他关键方面之前了解控股股东的行为的重要性，并购文献往往在解释上市公司的并购决策时，特别是在少数股东保护程度较低的环境中，这些方面往往是这些方面的基础。先前的研究部分发现 M& 决策的动机是通过扩大公司规模或管理狂妄而获得的个人优势。结果表明，这些假设在巴西语境中不成立。此外，研究结果表明，并购决策与控股股东的特征、股权集中度和类型相关，这有助于在控股股东之间的代理问题背景下引发关于激励效应还是壁垒效应盛行的代理辩论。和小股东，特别是在股东保护低的制度环境中。