併購中“名人效應”、持續盈利能力與商譽研究 - 基於中國上市公司數據

Abstract

The sustainable profitability of related assets after M&A is the most direct and core standard to judge the success of M&A. Goodwill is the expression of the acquirer's excess expectation of the target company's sustainable profitability in the process of M&A. If such excess expectation fails, it will be shown as goodwill impairment in accounting after M&A. As a hot issue at present, goodwill impairment has been paid close attention by the academia and practice circles in the domestic and abroad. Xi Jinping (2017) made clear in the Party's Nineteen Report that we should "keep the bottom line of systemic financial risks". At the end of 2018, the book value of goodwill in China's capital market has accumulated to 3.1 trillion, which is doomed to be impaired. China's economy began to slow down and adjust from 2019, and the world began to encounter epidemic situation, at the beginning of 2020. On the one hand, the reality such as the decline of the company's profitability of goodwill impairment is prone to occur in that external economic environment. On the other hand, the slowing economic environment will induce the listed companies' subjective adjustment of goodwill impairment for the purpose of earnings management such as "taking a big bath", all of this will result in huge goodwill impairment risk in the market. In fact, there have been lots of phenomenon in many listed companies to carry out a large amount of goodwill impairment. Therefore, the problem of goodwill impairment needs to be studied and solved. 

There are two reasons for the rapid accumulation of goodwill: one is the increase of goodwill brought by the tide of M&A under the encouraging policy of "New Nine National Policies", The other is the "expending" difficulty of goodwill stock under the current accounting standards of "only impairment, no amortization". The increment of goodwill is not the inevitable result of M&A. In addition, celebrities of various fields frequently appear in the M&A activities in recent years. All of those causes my attention and interest. Based on the observation of the phenomenon of celebrities and on the consideration of goodwill, I decided to research the "celebrity effect", sustainable profitability and goodwill in M&A. 

Starting from the phenomenon of celebrities’ participation in M&A activities, this paper introduces the theory of "celebrity effect" in consumer goods market and redefines the definition of "celebrity". From the new perspectives of celebrity effect of different stakeholders such as the buyer, the seller, and even the target in the M&A activities, this paper researches on the influences of celebrities on the generation and the subsequent impairment of M&A goodwill. In addition, this paper further studies the sustained profitability as the path by which the celebrity effect could influence the generation and impairment of the goodwill, and how the difference between expectation and reality of the sustained profitability to be influenced by celebrities of different stakeholders. This paper focuses on the motivation of celebrities to participate in M&A, the mechanism of their consideration M&A, and the path of their influence on excess goodwill. 

Through theoretical derivation, model establishment and empirical test, this paper mainly finds that the celebrity effect in M&A can enhance the goodwill by transmitting the positive information of sustainable profitability. During M&A, investors hold negative expectation for the buyer's celebrity participation and positive expectation for the seller's and target's celebrity participation, but the performance of sustainable profitability after M&A of these assets is poor, which are more likely to cause goodwill impairment. 

n brief, celebrity effect can lead to a series of economic consequences in the capital market through signal transmission and changing the degree of information asymmetry. The conclusion of this paper can be used as reference for the practice of investment and regulators, broaden the perspective of resent research and enrich the literature of relevant research.

Date of Award	15 Jul 2020
Original language	Chinese (Traditional)
Awarding Institution	City University of Hong Kong
Supervisor	Yue MA (Supervisor) & Ruoshan LI (External Supervisor)