IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/reveco/v52y2017icp127-146.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

How institutional monitoring creates value: Evidence for the free cash flow hypothesis

Author

Listed:
  • Karpavičius, Sigitas
  • Yu, Fan

Abstract

Institutional ownership of U.S. equities increased from 9.4% in 1980 to 42.9% in 2009. This paper analyzes the indirect role of institutional investors in monitoring firm managers and in the process of shareholder wealth maximization. Institutional monitoring reduces the agency problem of free cash flow. Controlling for reverse causality, we find that increased institutional ownership results in lower leverage and dividend payout that consequently lead to greater cash holdings and firm value. The results are consistent with the free cash flow hypothesis and provide an alternative explanation for why firms hold so much cash and why debt and dividends have decreased during the last thirty years.

Suggested Citation

  • Karpavičius, Sigitas & Yu, Fan, 2017. "How institutional monitoring creates value: Evidence for the free cash flow hypothesis," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 127-146.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:reveco:v:52:y:2017:i:c:p:127-146
    DOI: 10.1016/j.iref.2017.10.016
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1059056017307529
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.iref.2017.10.016?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Balamuralikrishnan Chakkravarthy & Francis Gnanasekar Irudayasamy & Arul Ramanatha Pillai & Rajesh Elangovan & Natarajan Rengaraju & Satyanarayana Parayitam, 2023. "The Relationship between Promoters’ Holdings, Institutional Holdings, Dividend Payout Ratio and Firm Value: The Firm Age and Size as Moderators," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 16(11), pages 1-15, November.
    2. Chintrakarn, Pandej & Chatjuthamard, Pattanaporn & Tong, Shenghui & Jiraporn, Pornsit, 2018. "How do powerful CEOs view dividends and stock repurchases? Evidence from the CEO pay slice (CPS)," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 49-64.
    3. Chung, Chune Young & Liu, Chang & Wang, Kainan, 2018. "Do firms have target capital structures? Evidence from institutional monitoring," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 65-77.
    4. Guangying Xie & Shengyan Wu & Zhengjiang Song, 2022. "Focus on Innovation or Focus on Sales? The Influences of the Government of China’s Demand-Side Reform during COVID-19 and Their Sustainability Consequences in the Consumer Products Industry," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(20), pages 1-21, October.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Agency problem; Free cash flow hypothesis; Institutional ownership; Cash holdings; Capital structure; Dividends; G23; G32; G35;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G23 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Non-bank Financial Institutions; Financial Instruments; Institutional Investors
    • G32 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Financing Policy; Financial Risk and Risk Management; Capital and Ownership Structure; Value of Firms; Goodwill
    • G35 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Payout Policy

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:reveco:v:52:y:2017:i:c:p:127-146. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/620165 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.