Concentration Of Ownership - Its Effect On Property Firm Performance

Studies and literature documenting ownership structure in Asian economies are scarce, especially in examining its relation with firm performance. The limited literature and empirical work on Asian companies showed that the pattern of ownership in these companies differs dramatically from that of Western countries where Asian companies exhibit a very high concentration of ownership. Whilst the impact of ownership concentration on firm performance varies with the level of economic and institutional development of a country and also with the variation across industries and differing securities laws across countries, this study, which focuses on the property industry in Malaysia gives an insight into the ownership structure and its effect on performance. Furthermore, previous studies on East Asian economies concentrated on periods before the crisis and since ownership concentration in Malaysia is reported in the hands of a few well connected families, this study on the post-crisi s sheds some light on the situation after the crisis where major amendments on securities laws have been introduced. Examining 81 Malaysian property firms during 1999-2005 period, results from ordinary least squares and two stage least squares regression within a simultaneous equation system suggests firms with high block ownership has a negative impact on firm performance. The results indicate that the market does not reward firms with block owners as the market fears large shareholders would impose their wills in order to improve their own positions at the expense of other shareholders, thus favoring a dispersed ownership structure.