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Journal of Corporate Finance Vol. 65 2020

State ownership and stock liquidity: Evidence from privatization

Narjess Boubakri1; Ruiyuan Chen2; Sadok El Ghoul; Omrane Guedhami3; Robert Nash4

1 American University of Sharjah · 2 West Virginia University · 3 University of South Carolina · 4 Wake Forest University

open access

Abstract

We provide unique firm-level evidence of the relation between state ownership and stock liquidity. Using a broad sample of newly privatized firms (NPFs) from 53 countries over the period 1994–2014, our study identifies a non-monotonic association between state ownership and stock liquidity. The inverse U-shaped relation is consistent with trade-offs between costs and benefits of state ownership and suggests an optimal level of government shareholdings that maximizes stock liquidity of NPFs. We further identify that the inflection point from the cost/benefit trade-off is contingent upon characteristics of the nation's institutional environment.

DOI
10.1016/j.jcorpfin.2020.101763
Volume
65
Pages
101763
Language
en
Sources
bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex crossref

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