I conduct international panel-data regressions to investigate the determinants of cash holdings by publicly-traded firms for 20 countries over the period 2007–2017. The precautionary, transaction-costs, and agency motives explained ratios of the firms' aggregate cash to their total assets. On the last motive, higher cash ratios were associated with managers with worse ethical behavior, lower accountability, weaker investor protection, harsher auditing and reporting standards, and greater potential to face holdup problems by lending banks. The agency motive had a greater marginal impact than the precautionary and transaction-costs motives while having a limited explanatory power over total variation in the cash ratios.

我进行了国际面板数据回归，以调查 2007-2017 年期间 20 个国家的上市公司现金持有量的决定因素。预防、交易成本和代理动机解释了公司总现金与其总资产的比率。在最后一个动机上，较高的现金比率与道德行为更差、责任感更低、投资者保护更弱、审计和报告标准更严格以及面临贷款银行拖延问题的可能性更大的经理有关。代理动机比预防和交易成本动机具有更大的边际影响，同时对现金比率的总变化具有有限的解释力。