연구논문 : 경영전략과 자본비용

유현수(제1저자) ( Hyun Soo Ryu ),김갑순(교신저자) ( Kap Soon Kim ),최규담(공동저자) ( Gyu Dam Choi ) 한국회계학회 2015 회계저널 Vol.24 No.6

본 연구는 Miles and Snow (1978, 2003) 경영전략 이론에 따라 기업의 전략을 선도형, 분석형 및 방어형으로 구분하고 각 유형에 따라 기업의 가중평균자본비용이 어떻게 달라지는지에 대하여 실증적으로 분석한 것이다. 즉, 각 기업의 최고경영진의 경영철학이 표출되어 있는 경영전략은 매우 포괄적이기는 하지만 기존의 개별적인 기업특성변수들이 제공하지 못하는 중요한 정보가치를 내포하고 있다면, 선행연구에서 자본비용을 설명하는 개별적인 요소들을 모두 통제한 후에도 경영전략이 자본비용을 설명할 수 있을 것이라는 것이 본 연구에서 확인하고자 하는 가설의 배경이다. 본 연구는 2000년부터 2013년까지 유가증권시장과 코스닥시장에 상장된 기업을 대상으로 6,005개의 표본을 대상으로 방어형(defender)보다 선도형(prospector)형에 가까울수록(즉, 경영전략지수가 높아질수록)자본비용 수준이 더 높을 것이라는 가설을 검증하였다. 자본비용은 NICE신용평가정보(주)가 제공하는 가중평균자본비용을 사용하였고 경영전략의 측정은 Miles and Snow(1978, 2003)이론에 따라 경영전략의 유형별 특성을 구분하여 측정할 수 있는 6가지 요소를 기초로 종합점수를 산출한 뒤 이를 연속변수로 사용하거나 선도형(prospector), 분석형(analyzer) 및 방어형(defender)으로 구분하여 더미변수로 활용하였다. 분석 결과, 연속변수인 경영전략지수가 높아지는 경우 1% 유의수준에서 자본비용이 증가하였고, 선도형인 경우가 유의하게 분석형 또는 방어형인 경우보다 자본비용이 더 높았다. 경영자지분율이 높은 수준을 5%, 10% 및 20% 이상으로 측정하여 경영자지분율을 추가로 통제한 경우에도 경영전략지수가 높아지는 경우 유의하게 자본비용이 증가하는 결과는 달라지지 않았다. 대부분의 통제변수는 유의성에 다소 차이는 있었지만 선행연구에 근거하여 예측한부호와 대체로 방향성이 일치하였다. 본 연구 결과는 자본비용에 영향을 미치는 요소로 선행연구와 같이 개별적인 기업특성변수 대신 보다 포괄적인 ``경영전략지수``라는 종합측정치를 사용하였다는 점에서 큰 의미가 있다. The ``tone at the top`` the executives set or the executives`` willingness to take strategic risks in their competitive markets spill over into specific operation areas including the business and financial risk, willingness to take the uncertainty, stability or complexity of organizational structure, the value of assets secured and attitude towards growth and corporate governance, etc. Furthermore, such top management``s tone are also most effectively implemented into a firm``s business strategy. Accordingly, it might be inferred that a firm``s business strategy has other separate and comprehensive information value than a firm``s specific individual information factors. While many prior studies are investigating what can more explain the level of cost of capital, a firm``s business strategy may provide the approach which is more comprehensive and generalizable across industries than those specific individual variables. The business strategy provides a theoretical background for an even broader understanding of the factors that are ex ante determinants of cost of capital level. Ittner et al.(1997), Higgins et al.(2015) and Bentley et al.(2013) are main prior accounting researches that used a comprehensive and composite measure of business strategy as an explanatory variables for the quality of accounting information. Such prior research are all based on Miles and Snow(1978, 2003)``s strategy theory. Prospectors defined by Miles and Snow(1978, 2003) focus on innovation, pursue new products and geographic markets and have high growth potential and high level of capital needs, which are positively related to the business and financial risks and the uncertainty demanding higher level of cost of capital. However, defenders focus on comparatively sound, stable and predictable areas and their aversion to risk and uncertainty would lead to be lower level of cost of capital. Using business strategy typology defined by Miles and Snow (1978, 2003), this study examines the relation between a firm``s business strategy and its cost of capital. We investigate whether a firm``s business strategy is associated with its cost of capital and predict that firms close to prospector show higher level of cost of capital than those close to analyzer and defender (Hypothesis 1). According to the Miles and Snow(1978, 2003), prospectors focus on innovation, pursue new products and geographic markets and are more likely to be aggressive, which have relatively more tax planning opportunities. Further, given that their products tend not to have readily available substitutes, prospectors are less concerned about negative publicity arising from tax avoidance. By contrast, defenders focus on comparatively sound, stable and predictable areas and put the stress on the economy of scale. defenders`` aversion to risk and uncertainty also suggests that given the set of tax opportunities available, they would avoid tax less aggressively. Since their products have viable substitutes, defenders could incur reputation costs associated with tax avoidance. To address our research questions, we used publicly available weighted averaged cost of capital (WACC). We also compute a discrete STRATEGY composite index measure (STRATEGY) based on variables from prior literature (Higgins et al. 2015) that reflect different facets of the strategy: (1) the ratio of research and development to sales, (2) the ratio of employees to sales, (3) a growth opportunity measure (market-to-book ratio), (4) the ratio of marketing (SG&A) to sales, (5) employee fluctuations (standard deviation of total number of employees), and (6) capital intensity (net PPE scaled by total assets). Each is intended to capture different elements of a firm``s business strategy. We find from the test of Hypothesis 1 that STRATEGY is positively related to WACC at 1% significance level and prospector``s WACC are higher than those of analyzer and defender, which is consistent with our anticipation. The results above suggest that a firm closer prospector(defender) group has higher(lower) cost of capital. From the robust test adding as control variable whether management ownership is higher level (which is defined as the shareholding by directors and officers exceeds 5%, 10% or 20%), we further find that adding management ownership does not change previous the main results(i.e., a firm closer prospector group has higher cost of capital) while the firms with higher level of management ownership show higher level of cost of capital. Our study contribute to a better understanding of a firm``s cost of capital. While prior studies have focused individual factors explaining the level of cost of capital, our study investigate a firm``s business strategy which plays a broader and more comprehensive role than those specific individual variables. The distinguishing feature of our study is that it is grounded in a theoretical framework that is used to make clear predictions regarding the link between a firm``s business strategy and its cost of capital.

경영전략과 발생액의 질

최규담 ( Gyu Dam Choi ),김갑순(교신저자) ( Kap Soon Kim ),유현수(공동저자) ( Hyun Soo Ryu ) 한국회계학회 2016 회계저널 Vol.25 No.3

본 연구는 발생액의 질이 기업에 대한 포괄적인 상황정보(underlying factor)인 경영전략에 의해 설명될 수 있는지에 대한 실증적 연구이다. 기업을 경영전략의 특성에 따라 구분하는 경우 개별적인 변수들이 제공하지 못하는 포괄적이고 중요한 정보를 제공할 가능성이 높다. 따라서, 경영자의 회계선택 결과가 반영된 발생액의 질을 분석함에 있어서도 경영전략에 따른 특성을 반영할 필요가 있는지를 확인하고자 하는 것이다. 즉, 발생액의 질에영향을 미치는 통제변수를 모두 통제하고서도 경영전략이 발생액의 질을 설명하는지 여부에 대하여 분석하였다. 한편, 일반기업과 기업규모, 정부지원제도 등 경영환경에 있어 그특성에 있어 차이가 있는 중소기업이라는 사실이 경영전략과 발생액의 질 간의 관계에 영향을 미치는지에 대하여도 추가적으로 검토를 하였다. 발생액의 질을 종속변수로 하고 경영전략지수를 설명변수로 한 (가설 1)에 대한 분석결과는 발생액의 질의 측정치와 경영전략지수는 유의한 양(+)의 관계가 있었고 선도형이 다른 유형보다 발생액의 질의 측정치가 더 높았다(즉, 발생액의 질이 더 낮았다). 즉, 선도형은 발생액 이익조정의 유인과 기회가 많아서 발생액 이익조정을 지속하여 재량적 발생액의 크기가 더 커서 발생액의 질이 더 낮고 방어형은 원가최소화와 위험회피에 주안점을 두므로 적발위험이 큰 발생액 이익조정을 지속하기가 어려워 상대적으로 재량적 발생액의 크기가 더 적어 발생액의 질이 더 높았다. 한편, (가설 2)의 분석결과 중소기업일 경우 경영전략이 발생액의 질에 미치는 영향이 확대(즉, 경영전략이 발생액의 질에 미치는 영향력이 상대적으로 더 증가)되는 것으로 나타났다. 본 연구의 결과는 개별적인 특성 정보가 아닌 포괄적인 상황정보인 경영전략이 발생액의 질과 관련성이 있을 수 있다는 점을 실증하였고, 중소기업인 경우에는 소유경영 등으로 그러한 관련성이 더 증가할 것이라는 점을 실증하였다는 점에서 큰 의미가 있다. We investigate whether a firm’s business strategy is associated with its accruals quality. We predict that accrual quality of a firm close to prospector is lower than close to analyzer and defender (Hypothesis 1). Further, we investigate whether the fact that a firm is a small and medium-sized enterprise under the Korean law affects the association between business strategy and accruals quality (Hypothesis 2). Our study is motivated by recent researches showing that business strategy measured by the Miles and Snow (1978, 2003)``s typology is associated with financial reporting decision-making activities (Bentley et al. 2013) and that accrual based earning management by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are bigger than by non-SMEs (Choi, et al 2010). While many prior studies have investigated what can more explain incentives and/or opportunities for accrual based earning management, a firm’s business strategy may play a certain role as an underlying factor for them since it is more comprehensive and generalizable across industries than those specific individual variables previously considered for accrual based earning management. The business strategy may provide an even broader understanding of the factors that are ex ante determinants of accrual based earning management. According to the Miles and Snow (1978, 2003), prospector focuses on innovation, pursue new products and geographic markets and is more likely to be aggressive. Therefore, prospector has high growth potential, long-term stock incentive schemes and high level of capital needs, which are positively related to incentives of accrual based earning management, and unstable organization process and complex structure, which are opportunities for accrual based earnings management. By contrast, defender focuses on comparatively sound, stable and predictable areas and their aversion to risk and uncertainty(e.g., reputation costs associated with earnings management) would lead them to be passive in aggressive accrual based earnings management. To address our research questions, we used DD (Dechow and Dichev 2002) for measuring accruals quality. We also classified each firm-year sample into three strategy types (i.e., prospector, analyzer and defender) whose STRATEGY score are 24-30, 13-23 and 6-12, respectively. STRATEGY score is measured based on six (6) factors from prior literature (e.g., Choi et al. 2015; Bentley, et al. 2013 and Higgins et al. 2015) that reflect different facets of the strategy: (1) the ratio of research and development to sales, (2) the ratio of employees to sales, (3) a growth opportunity measure (market-to-book ratio), (4) the ratio of marketing (SG&A) to sales, (5) employee fluctuations (standard deviation of total employees), and (6) capital intensity (net PPE scaled by total assets). Each of the six measures is intended to capture different elements of a firm’s business strategy. We find from the test of Hypothesis 1 that DD value (accrual quality is better (poorer) when DD value is lower (higher) (i.e., the size of accrual is lower (higher)) are positively (+) associated with the strategy score at 1% significance level, which is consistent with our anticipation. We also find that DD value under prospector group is higher than that under defender group. These results indicate that the accruals quality of the firms closer to prospector is significantly poorer than those closer to defender. However, we could not entirely rule out the possibility that the higher DD under prospector group is interpreted as signaling by the management``s expectation of the positive future economic substance. The results of Hypothesis 2 test show that the association between accruals quality and business strategy become stronger (i.e., positive (+)) when the firms are small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). In other words, the result indicates that accruals quality of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) become much poorer than non-small and medium-sized enterprises (non-SMEs) even if both have the same strategy score. Our study is important since it helps provide a better understanding of the factors that affect a firm’s accrual quality. Further, our study enhances the understanding of features of small and medium-sized enterprises by showing that the relation between the accrual quality and business strategy is strengthened by SME. However, our study is limited in that the possibility that such positive (+) relationship between business strategy and the size of discretionary accruals may be signaling of the positive future economic substance is not been empirically and separately studied.