Governance In The Modern Global Corporate Environment Finance Essay - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 9 Words: 2564 Downloads: 2 Date added: 2017/06/26 Category Finance Essay Type Narrative essay Did you like this example? Over a past decade, the corporate governance has been considerably spotlighted by business people all over the globe. One of the reasons which sparked the anxiety on corporate governance is the collapse of one of the largest companies in the USA, Enron. The massive company was filed for bankruptcy in December 2001. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Governance In The Modern Global Corporate Environment Finance Essay" essay for you Create order The failure of corporate governance was claimed to be the cause of Enron ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s collapse (The Journal of Corporate Citizenship, 2002). Most of all aspects of Enron ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s corporate governance were identified as a poor level. From the top, number of people who were in the board of directors, were indicated to be willing to perform the deception. The failure of internal auditors, who did not execute its function effectively, caused a gap for the financial director and chief executive to make fraudulent accounts for the firm (Solomon, 2004). This corporate scandal has stimulated both local and across borders firms to earnestly examined their own corporate governance mechanism whether they had the similar issue like Enron, in order to fix before it was too late. Moreover, the policies to prevent further failures were developed by the number of regulators all over the world after the Enron saga (Veneeva, 2006). The downfall of Enron demonstrates that even the compa ny with a good financial result still might be bankrupt if the solid and effective corporate governance mechanism is absented. This essay is going to discuss about the corporate governance in globalization i.e. the definition of corporate governance, the important of effective corporate governance in globalization, the demonstration of corporate governance in globalization, and the explanation of why corporate governance structure is nearly similarly across countries. There are a number of definitions of corporate governance. The definitions can be classified into 2 main views. On one hand, the narrow view, defines the corporate governance as structure and relationships between a firm and its shareholders. Solomon argues that the corporate governance is  ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½the process of supervision and control intended to ensure that the company ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s management acts in accordance with the interests of shareholders ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½ (Solomon, 2004, P.13). On the other hand, broad view, the stakeholders are taken into account of corporate governance. In more inclusive way, broad view explains that the corporate governance is the system of structure and relationship between firm, its shareholder and also wide range of its stakeholders which including employees, suppliers, customers, creditors, communities, wider society, even the natural environment and so forth by encompassing laws, regulations and voluntary private sector practices tha t enable corporation to create the profit, attract capital and meet both legal standards and societal expectations.  ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½Corporate governance is concerned with holding the balance between economic and social goals and between individual and communal goals. The aim is to align as nearly as possible the interests of individuals, of corporations and of society ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½ (Waring, 2004, P. xii). Nevertheless, both narrow and broad views have the identical framework of corporate governance which is about how the company is managed, monitored and controlled in extent of balancing the interests and goals of all shareholders and stakeholders who can be affected by the company ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s activities. Corporate governance requires a transparency and disclosure from board of directors, managers and accountancy to report on the performance of the firm. Solomon (2004) also suggested that corporate governance requires a system of checks and balances both internally and externally in order to guarantee that the firm dispenses its accountability to all parties of corporate relations and also to ensure that the business transactions are performed in a social responsible way. The good and effective corporate governance system is substantially significant in present business globalization. Various modes of benefit are returned to the firms where effective corporate governance structure is adopted. Mohamad (2004) argues that the quality of corporate governance is crucial as it directly influences on efficiency of firm ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s assets utilization, capability of the firm to attract low-cost capital, firm ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s ability to satisfy the expectation of society and also firm ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s overall performance. The optimal utilization of the firm ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s assets and resources is able to be guaranteed by effective corporate governance. Under an effective corporate governance structure, debt and equity capital are conducted to be invested in the most efficient way for the production of both most demanded goods and services along with those with the highest rate of return (Mohamad, 2004). Moreover, it is more likely that incompetent manager, or who fails to utilize the resources and assets efficiently are replaced (Gregory, 1999). As the assets and resources of the firm are ensured to be utilized efficiently, consequently, the effective corporate governance supports the firm to attracting the low-cost capital by enhancing both internal and external borders investor confidence. McKinsey Report (2003) found that investors would willingly to pay a premium from 13 percent to 30 percent varies by region for the companies they believed had greater corporate governance. To be successful in long-term of business, the firm has to obey with the set of laws, regulations and also the societal expectations where it is operated. Numerous companies intensely comply with the corporate social responsibility practices and contribute to society (Stanwick, 2008). Although, some companies demonstrate the failure of corporate responsibility and corporate governance by attempt to make a profit from child labor or any other act that not take environment and society into account. This also exemplifies the failure of government to initiate the framework to conduct the corporate responsible for the issues that significantly impacts to society in wide range. The combination of efficient use of assets and resources, enhanced approach to low-cost capital, extended satisfaction of societal expectations and together with the overseeing on management people which are delivered by the effective corporate governance, leads to the enhancement on overall performance of the firm. The link between company overall performance and effective corporate governance makes significant intuitive sense (Ararat, 2007). Furthermore, by implementing effective corporate governance practice at a national level, foreign and local investors are likely to pay a premium for investment in that nation (Stanwick, 2008). As such, effective corporate governance leads to the improvement in financial stability markets and fosters the country to attract further financial investments. This is apparently strong incentives for both corporations and governments all over the globe to considerably make an effort for better governance. The governance practices vary across countries in accordance with their legal framework, financial system and the corporate ownership structure (Davies, 2008). Corporate governance can be broadly categorized into two main models which are outsider model and insider model. The outsider system is identified by distributed of firm ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s equity among a great quantity of outside investors. Bhasa (2004) suggests that USA and UK obey the outsider system. This system also involves with the separation of ownership from control. Main benefits of this system are explicit transparency, powerful investor protection. However, the desire of management and shareholder are potentially not aligned. In contrast, the insider system is existed where ownership is intensified with shares being owned by families, banks or state. This system provides the alignment of interests among management and shareholder, and also protects the firm from hostile takeovers. Nevertheless, drawbacks of this sys tem are weakness in investor protection, lack of transparency, abuse of power and funds. The insider system is existed in most countries of Continental Europe and East Asia (Hackethal, 2005). However, in recent years, important changes have been certainly appearing in corporate governance system. Globalization and rapid improvement on information technology has been resulting in enhancement of interconnection between people across countries which also present the opportunity to the firms for seeking the profit internationally. Multinational company can possibly gain a benefit across borders whether by international trade, foreign direct investment and etc. To run the multinational company, most of the firms have to access the capital markets of foreign country where they invested. By doing so, the firms are required to comply with the laws, regulatory and practices of that market. This demonstrates the convergence of corporate governance. Yoshikawa (2009) argues that the convergence of corporate governance trend has been growing continually in recent years. Three factors has been indicated to be the drivers of convergence of corporate governance which are the internationa l integration of financial markets, product market integration, and the spread of codes of good governance and harmonization of accounting rules. The international integration of financial markets is a main contributor of globalization process for driving changes in corporate governance practice. In the last two decades, international financial markets have become more integrated with remarkable implications for corporate governance (Davis, 2003). There are many forms of financial market integration e.g. listing by firms from one country in the stock exchanges of foreign countries, rising of foreign portfolio investment, cross-border mergers and acquisition, and etc. These forms of financial market integration transform the fundamental in the ownership structure of corporations (Yoshikawa, 2009). In recent years, the number of firms which list their share in multiple exchanges across borders has been growing rapidly. Important regulatory and compliance costs have been incurred to the foreign issuers who entering these exchanges (Bell, 2008). Furthermore, firms are engaging in a bonding mechanism and simultaneously transmit to the investors that they are willing to obey with higher standards of disclosure than required in their home country when they decide to list in a foreign market with higher disclosure practices. As a result, such bonding increases the firm ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s share value. Consequently, outcome of the foreign listing is the convergence as a by-product (Yoshikawa, 2009). Furthermore, substantial growth of foreign portfolio investment all over the world has been seen for a period of time. The regular demand of investors is to diversify their portfolio in order to reduce the risk and obtain more liquidity hence foreign investors essentially own small stakes and often trade their shares. Many companies take a lot of effort to attract foreign institutional investors because the resulting demand for the stock can lift up the prices and suddenly increase the value of the companies (Aguilera, 2003). On top of the attracting investors, retaining the existed and potential investors is extremely necessary. Parrino (2003) argues that selloffs by investors can impact the stock prices negatively and upraise the potential of hostile takeover. Therefore, in order to attract and retain the foreign investors, firms must comply with investor ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s expectation of good governance such as disclosure and protection of the rights of minority shareholders. Under the viewpoint of product market integration, corporate governance is seen as a new innovation or technology (Khanna, 2004). In present age of global business, high competition in both domestic and international, adopting of the most innovative practice is essential otherwise the firms possibly encounter the competitive failure. Countries and companies that are applying the under optimal governance practices will be less efficient and will suddenly fail or will have to adopt more efficient elements of governance practice (Yoshikawa, 2009). The spread of codes of good governance and harmonization of accounting rules also drives the convergence of governance system. Number of countries has used the Cadbury Committee report in the UK as a seminal development for similar evolution in their nations (Aguilera, 2004). Once the codes are published, they become an important paradigm for convergence in both local and international, regardless of who is the issuer. Yoshikawa (2009, P. 392) also states that  ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½integration in the global economy functions as a transmission belt for the need to innovate and facilitate the transfer of practices across countries ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½. When firms decide to list in a foreign exchange, they normally confront with the problems that their accounts are required to be restated based on the standards of that country. Likewise, international investors face the problem of understanding the accounting system in another country where they want to make portfolio investment. The harmonization of accounting standards is addressing these problems (Yoshikawa, 2009). It facilitates the firms in running their business internationally and also enhances the attraction of the investors to make investments.  ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½The harmonization of accounting standards can greatly facilitate the process of convergence, mainly through mandating uniform disclosure requirement ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½ (Yoshikawa, 2009, P. 392). Many countries are attempting to improve their governance practices to the somewhat similar area as there are a number of benefits. By improving the governance practices effectively which including efficient use of resources, ensure the corporate is in compliance with laws and societal expectation, transparency and disclosure and etc.; the confidence of investors are enhanced as such the corporate can simply access to low-cost capital. Also, when business transaction is occurred between two or more countries, it is favorable to the business where all participants adopting the similar effective governance practices. The similar standards of governance give a transparency and disclosure in a better level by uniform disclosure necessity (Yoshikawa, 2009). Recently, China has made a substantial progress in improving its governance practice based on Anglo-Saxon model (Dujuan, 2009). In 2006, China has changed from the Old Company Law to the New Company Law in order to encourage the investment. The New Company Law led to improve the shareholder rights, especially minority shareholders. In addition, it made a considerable progress in seven areas of corporate governance such as rights of shareholders and rules for shareholders ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½ meetings, duties and responsibilities of directors and independence of board of directors, performance assessment and incentive and disciplinary systems, information disclosure and transparency and the role of auditor. The laws, for instance, give the right equally among shareholders and, shareholders shall have the right to protect their interests and rights through other legal in accordance with laws and administrative (Dujuan, 2009). In addition, it also provides how minority shareholder can use their rights in the court. Moreover, it forces the directors and managers to faithfully execute their duties, protect the firm ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s interests, answer to the shareholders and must not use the firm ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s assets or resources or their position to seek personal gain. The board of directors takes the responsibility of appointing competent and removing incompetent management. Under the company law, competition with the company is forbidden (Dujuan, 2009). The improvement in New Company Law conducts the directors, managers to act legally and ethically and also delivers to protection to even the minority shareholders in order to encourage the investment and to gain other business advantages. The New Company Law exhibits the progress in convergence of China ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s corporate governance practice. It has been claimed to be one of the contributors of recent substantial economic growth of China (Dujuan, 2009). This essay exhibits the role of corporate governance in business globalization. The trend of convergence in governance practice is appeared even there ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s still a bit of impediments to convergence completely regarding the differences in legal framework, financial standards and the social norms. But, still, the basic characteristics of effective corporate governance is similarly comprised of protection of shareholder rights, independence of directors, the presence of audit, transparency and disclosure, and remuneration. The firms and even nations essentially require pursuing the effective governance practice which provides a number of business advantages in return. The corporate, where effective corporate governance is adopted, mostly surpasses other companies and has greater capabilities in attracting the investors to support in financial term of the company for further economic and business growth. The effective corporate governance is necessary in terms of controllin g and monitoring company management. It cannot prevent the illegal or unethical activity by management, but it can at least detect such activity before it is too late to be fixed. On the contrary, poor corporate governance mostly leads to the disadvantages of the firm ¿Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ ½s potential and, in worst case; the fraudulent activities might be appeared. Appendix