Purpose

This paper aims to examine whether agency costs predict disciplinary takeover likelihood for the UK listed companies between 1986 and 2015.

Design/methodology/approach

Using survival analysis, the approach is to identify candidates for disciplinary takeover on the basis of Tobin’s Q (TQ), which is consistent with the approach advocated by Manne (1965). This study then examines how indicators of agency costs affect takeover likelihood within the set of disciplinary candidates.

Findings

This paper provides evidence of the effectiveness of TQ, rather than excess return, in identifying disciplinary takeover candidates. Takeover hazard for disciplinary candidates is higher for companies with higher levels of asset utilization and sales growth in particular. Companies with stronger agency problems are relatively less susceptible to disciplinary takeover.

Practical implications

Given the UK context of the study, where anti-takeover provisions are disallowed and when compared to findings of US studies, the results imply some support for the effectiveness of an open merger policy.

Originality/value

While the connection between takeover likelihood and the market for corporate control has been made in previous studies, the study adopts a more explicit agency theory framework than previous studies of takeover likelihood. A key component of the contribution follows from differentiating candidates for disciplinary takeovers from other forms of mergers and acquisitions.

中文翻译：

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公司控制市场中的代理成本：来自英国收购的证据

目的

本文旨在研究代理成本是否能预测 1986 年至 2015 年英国上市公司的纪律性收购可能性。

设计/方法/方法

使用生存分析，该方法是根据 Tobin's Q (TQ) 确定学科接管的候选人，这与 Manne (1965) 提倡的方法一致。然后，本研究检查代理成本指标如何影响纪律候选人集内的收购可能性。

发现

本文提供了 TQ 而不是超额回报在识别纪律接管候选人方面的有效性的证据。特别是对于资产利用率和销售额增长水平较高的公司，纪律候选人的收购风险更高。代理问题比较严重的公司相对来说不太容易受到纪律处分。

实际影响

鉴于该研究的英国背景，禁止反收购条款，并且与美国的研究结果相比，结果暗示了对开放合并政策有效性的一些支持。

原创性/价值

虽然先前的研究已经建立了收购可能性与公司控制市场之间的联系，但本研究采用了比先前的收购可能性研究更明确的代理理论框架。贡献的一个关键组成部分来自将纪律接管的候选人与其他形式的兼并和收购区分开来。