股東vs管理層:公司治理誰說了算?大綱

“Shareholders are stupid and impertinent — stupid because they give their money to somebody else without any effective control over what this person is doing with it, and impertinent because they ask for a dividend as a reward for their stupidity.”
“股東既愚蠢又無禮，說他們愚蠢是因爲他們把自己的錢交給了其他人，卻無法有效控制這個人怎麼用這筆錢，說他們無禮是因爲他們要求獲得股息來回報自己的愚蠢。”

So said the banker Carl Fürstenberg, who ran the Berliner Handels-Gesellschaft in the late 19th and early 20th century. His disdainful attitude to shareholders appears to live on today with many high-tech entrepreneurs, including the founders of Snap, the Californian company that runs the popular mobile messaging app Snapchat.
這是銀行家卡爾?弗斯滕伯格(Carl Fürstenberg)說過的話，他曾在19世紀末和20世紀初執掌Berliner Handels-Gesellschaft。他對股東的鄙視態度似乎傳承給了當今的很多高科技企業家，包括加州公司Snap創始人，該公司管理着頗受歡迎的移動消息應用Snapchat。

Snap’s initial public offering will be the first in the US to issue shares with no voting rights at all. Co-founders Evan Spiegel, chief executive, and Bobby Murphy, chief technology officer, have been transparent about their intentions, stating clearly in the prospectus that it has no intention of paying cash dividends for the foreseeable future.
Snap的首次公開發行(IPO)是美國首次發行毫無投票權的股票。該公司聯合創始人——首席執行官艾文?斯皮格爾(Evan Spiegel)和首席技術官鮑比?墨菲(Bobby Murphy)——對於他們的意圖並不隱晦，他們在招股說明書中明確表示，無意在可預見的未來支付現金股息。

Yet pricing of shares in the lossmaking company is expected to value it at up to $18.5bn, which was last week revised down in updated regulatory filings from $22.2bn.
然而預計這家虧損公司的估值將高達185億美元，這一數字還是在最新監管申報文件中從222億美元下修的。

By any standard Snap’s governance arrangements are flawed and its directors minimally accountable. Anne Simpson, a leading governance expert at the California pension fund Calpers, dubs this “a banana republic approach” to corporate governance.
無論按照什麼標準，Snap的治理安排都是存在缺陷的，其董事承擔的責任微乎其微。加州公務員退休基金(CalPERS)的領先治理專家安妮?辛普森(Anne Simpson)稱其爲公司治理的“香蕉共和國戰略”。

Yet the decision to prevent outside shareholders from exercising control rights over the company is also symptomatic of a deeper problem with modern corporate governance, as are the tiered voting structures that prevail at other tech companies such as Google, Facebook and Alibaba. Modern corporate governance practice sits uncomfortably with the business models employed in the more advanced sectors of the global economy. Taken together with changes in the structure of ownership, this has drastically weakened the accountability of management to shareholders.
然而，阻止外部股東對公司行使控制權的決定，也顯示出現代公司治理的更深層次問題，谷歌(Google)、Facebook和阿里巴巴(Alibaba)等其他科技公司普遍使用的分級投票結構也是如此。現代公司治理實踐與這些全球經濟中比較先進的行業採用的業務模式格格不入。再加上所有權結構的變化，這大大削弱了管理層對股東承擔的責任。

Sharing the spoils
利益分享

The big question underlying Snap’s challenge to conventional corporate governance turns on how the spoils of the capitalist system are shared. Today’s governance codes are rooted in a 19th century concept of the corporation, where the shareholder-capitalist is seen as the key stakeholder and risk-taker in the system. The implicit assumption is that the shareholder is entitled to the residual profits and net assets of the company after the claims of labour and all the other creditors have been met.
Snap挑戰傳統公司治理的根本問題在於資本主義制度的利益如何分享。如今的治理規則植根於19世紀的公司概念：股東-資本家被視爲這個制度的關鍵利益相關者和風險承擔者。其隱含的假設是，股東在公司支付員工工資和對其他所有債權人履行償還義務後，有權獲得剩餘利潤和公司淨資產。

This view of the limited liability company made sense in the 19th century, when capital was scarce and labour cheap and plentiful. That reality was captured in the way employers referred to their workers as “hands” — a form of linguistic reductionism that reflected the state of labour relations at the time.
這種有限責任公司的觀念在19世紀是合理的，當時資本短缺，而勞動力廉價而且充足。突顯這一現實的是，當時僱主將員工稱爲“人手”，這種語言上的簡化反映出那時的勞資關係狀況。

The 19th century company law framework allowed the shareholder-capitalist to exercise exclusively the control rights over the business. Shareholders could vote at the annual general meeting on issues such as the election of directors, while other stakeholders could not. Whether this is appropriate today when the world is awash with savings and finance capital is abundant — witness low or negative real interest rates in global bond markets — is moot. The real driver of high growth in the economy is increasingly human capital.
19世紀的公司法律框架允許股東-資本家對企業獨家行使控制權。股東可以就董事選舉等問題在年度股東大會上投票，而其他利益相關者不能。至於在如今全球儲蓄充裕和金融資本富足（看看全球債券市場極低或處於負數區間的實際利率吧）的情況下，這種模式還是否合理，那是一個懸而未決的問題。但是人力資本日趨成爲真正推動經濟高增長的因素。

These highly skilled people are at much greater risk from the bankruptcy of their employer than the fund managers or pension fund beneficiaries who hold investments in the company as part of widely diversified portfolios. Yet pension fund trustees or professional fund managers, who tend to take a narrowly financial view of corporate performance, still retain the control rights in most quoted companies.
相比那些作爲多元化投資組合的一部分投資於公司的基金經理或養老基金受益人，高技能人才面臨着高得多的僱主破產風險。然而，往往對公司業績抱有狹隘財務觀點的養老基金受託人或職業基金經理，仍然保留着多數上市公司的控制權。

But in technology-intensive sectors the balance of power between owners of capital and entrepreneurs has swung dramatically toward the entrepreneurs. With companies like Facebook, flotation was not prompted by any need for new capital. The purpose has rather been to secure an exit for venture capitalists who backed the fledgling businesses. Going public also provides a currency with which to pay employees or finance future acquisitions.
但在技術密集型的行業，資本所有者與企業家之間的力量平衡已經戲劇性轉向企業家。像Facebook這樣的公司，上市並非出於籌集新資本的需要，而是讓那些支持過這家新興公司的風險資本家退出。上市還爲支付員工薪酬或未來收購提供了一種貨幣。

Indeed, one of the reasons for excess global saving, which takes place in the corporate as well as the household sector, is the shift from physical to human capital in the modern economy. Brain power is not capital-intensive.
的確，全球儲蓄過剩（既出現在企業界，也出現在家庭）的一個原因在於，現代經濟的重心已從實物資本轉向人力資本。聰明才智並不需要密集資本。

With younger tech companies like Snap, the purpose of flotation is different: fresh equity fills the yawning gap between revenue and expenditure.
對於Snap這種較爲年輕的科技公司，上市目的有所不同：新股本將填補收入與支出之間越來越大的缺口。

In the technology sector the issue of fairness between the different stakeholders in the corporation has been unilaterally resolved by founding entrepreneurs who have retained voting control despite bringing in outside capital — the prime examples being Sergey Brin and Larry Page, co-founders of Google.
在科技行業，公司內部不同利益相關者之間的公平問題迄今由創始企業家們單方面解決；儘管引入外部資本，但他們仍持有投票控制權，最好的例子是谷歌聯合創始人謝爾蓋?布林(Sergey Brin)和拉里?佩奇(Larry page)。

In some companies the human capital contribution of employees has been properly recognised by the grant of stock with votes attached; in others, not. There is also a significant risk that in a rapidly evolving tech world — where some listed companies never make a profit and others lose their competitive edge — incumbent management cannot be fired to make way for new blood.
在一些公司，員工的人力資本投入得到了合理承認，他們獲得了附帶投票權的股票；而在其他公司則沒有。另一個重大風險是，在快速演變的科技界（一些上市公司從未盈利，還有一些喪失了競爭優勢），無法炒掉現有管理層，讓新鮮血液接手。

Reluctant to engage
不願接觸

Poor management accountability in the tech sector coincides with another weakening of governance arising from changes in the structure of ownership. The number of investors willing or able to monitor, engage and hold management to account is dwindling. High-profile activists such as Carl Icahn, Jeffrey Ubben of ValueAct and Bill Ackman of Pershing Square capture headlines, but the wider universe of conventional investors engaging with investee companies is going in a different direction.
在科技行業管理問責機制比較薄弱的同時，所有權結構的變化也導致治理削弱。願意或能夠監督、接觸管理層，並追究其責任的投資者數量在減少。卡爾?伊卡恩(Carl Icahn)、ValueAct的傑弗裏?烏本(Jeffrey Ubben)和Pershing Square 的比爾?阿克曼(Bill Ackman)等高調維權投資者搶佔新聞頭條，但從傳統投資者整體來看，與被投資公司接觸的人反而在減少。

Over the past half century, the structure of listed companies in most markets within the OECD, the Paris-based club of mostly rich nations, has moved from direct ownership to intermediary ownership by professional asset managers. In the UK, for example, direct individual ownership in listed companies decreased in the 50 years to 2014 from more than 50 per cent to just under 12 per cent. In the US, direct ownership has dropped from 84 per cent to 37 per cent.
過去半個世紀，在總部設在巴黎、主要由富國組成的經合組織(OECD)多數市場上市的公司，在所有權結構上已從直接所有轉向專業資產管理公司的中間所有。例如，在英國，在截至2014年的50年裏，個人直接持有的上市公司股份已從50%以上降至不到12%。在美國，直接所有的比重已從84%降至37%。

As Mats Isaksson and Serdar Celik of the OECD have pointed out, the great majority of intermediary investors lack the financial incentive to monitor and engage with managers. There is also a principal-agent problem: agents acting for pension scheme members are reluctant to engage in activism in relation to companies from whom they hope to win or retain pension fund mandates. At the same time newer types of investors, such as high-frequency traders and hedge fund short sellers, have no interest in exercising ownership rights.
正如經合組織的馬茨?伊薩克森(Mats Isaksson)和塞爾達爾?塞利克(Serdar Celik)所指出的，絕大多數中間投資者缺乏監督和接觸管理者的財務激勵。這裏還存在一個委託代理關係的問題：代表養老金計劃成員的代理，不願投入與他們希望贏得或保留養老基金投資委託的公司相關的維權活動。與此同時，高頻交易員和對衝基金賣空者等較新型投資者對於行使所有權毫無興趣。

The difficulties of engaging are particularly acute for the growing band of passive investors, such as index tracking funds and exchange traded funds that own baskets of shares, bonds or commodities that are traded on exchanges. They operate in highly competitive, low-margin markets. Because of the cost of collecting and analysing information and engaging with management at large numbers of companies, many professional investors rely on the recommendations of proxy advisers.
對於數量日益增多的被動投資者（例如指數跟蹤基金和擁有一籃子在交易所交易的股票、債券或大宗商品的交易所交易基金(ETF)）而言，接觸公司管理層的難度尤其大。它們在競爭激烈、利潤率較低的市場運作。由於收集和分析信息以及接觸公司管理層的成本高昂，很多專業投資者依賴代理顧問的建議。

“The business model and governance approach of many passive investors look incompatible with the growing expectation on institutional investors to act as active, well-informed owners,” says Simon Wong, a leading corporate governance expert at Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago.
芝加哥西北大學法學院(Northwestern University School of Law)領先的公司治理專家Simon Wong表示：“很多被動投資者的業務模式和治理方法，看上去與外界日益期望機構投資者充當活躍、瞭解情況的所有者不符。”

The exception to the rule of slavish adherence to the proxy advisers’ recommendations relates to conflicts of interest. Proxy Insight, a company that monitors the voting behaviour of investors, has examined voting by the top 10 global institutional investors and looked at the correlation with the recommendations of ISS and Glass Lewis, the two biggest proxy advisers.
不聽從代理顧問建議的例外情況涉及利益衝突。監督投資者投票行爲的Proxy Insight考察了全球10大機構投資者的投票行爲，研究它們與兩大代理顧問——機構股東服務(ISS)和Glass Lewis——建議的相關性。

In 2016 these investors voted 90.3 per cent in line with ISS and 83.2 per cent in line with Glass Lewis on all recommendations. Yet on contentious votes such as boardroom pay the respective percentages dropped to 51.4 per cent and 29.5 per cent. In other words, the fund managers supported company boards against the advice of ISS and especially Glass Lewis, which is more aggressive on egregious pay awards. It is no coincidence that many fund managers have been attacked by proxy advisers for their own executive pay arrangements.
2016年，這些投資者的投票有90.3%與ISS的建議相符，有83.2%與Glass Lewis的建議相符。然而，在董事會薪資等備受爭議的投票上，兩者的比例分別降至51.4%和29.5%。換句話說，相對於ISS的建議，基金經理更支持公司董事會，忽視了ISS和Glass Lewis（特別是後者）的建議，這兩大代理顧問對過分的薪酬態度更嚴厲。並非巧合的是，很多基金管理公司本身的高管薪資安排也受到代理顧問的抨擊。

Restoring oversight
恢復監督

All of this points to a growing governance vacuum. The resulting weakness in accountability is exacerbated by the growth of public sector investors such as sovereign wealth funds. With the notable exception of Norway’s fund, the world’s biggest, these secretive institutions are often reluctant to engage with companies in foreign jurisdictions because they fear being accused of meddling in other countries’ affairs.
所有這些都顯示治理真空日益擴大，而由此造成的問責機制薄弱，則因爲公共部門投資者（如主權財富基金）的增多而加劇。除全球最大的主權財富基金挪威主權財富基金外，這些行事隱祕的機構往往不願接觸海外司法管轄地的公司，生怕自己被指責插手他國事務。

An extreme example of public investment leading to a governance vacuum concerns the Bank of Japan’s quantitative easing measures. The BoJ’s asset buying programme now extends to equities, which it is hoovering up at a rate of ￥6tn ($53bn) a year through purchases of ETFs.
公共投資導致治理真空的一個極端例子與日本央行(Bank of Japan)的量化寬鬆舉措有關。日本央行的資產購買計劃現在擴大到股票，它正以每年6萬億日元（合530億美元）的規模通過購買ETF大舉購入股票。

The central bank is thus a dominant player in the Japanese stock market. Yet the voting rights to its shares are retained by the companies running the ETFs, which have no incentive to engage in costly monitoring of corporate performance or to exercise their votes. The BoJ has thus diluted oversight of the Japanese corporate sector, which is notorious for its lack of accountability to shareholders, while blunting the impetus of the governance reforms pushed by Shinzo Abe, the prime minister.
因此，日本央行是日本股市的主要參與者。然而，這些股票的投票權由管理ETF的公司保留，而它們沒有興趣投入大量人力物力監督公司表現或行使投票權。因此，日本央行稀釋了對日本企業界的監督（日本企業本來就以缺乏股東問責機制出名），也妨礙了日本首相安倍晉三(Shinzo Abe)推動的治理改革努力。

Today’s corporate governance agenda in the Anglosphere and Japan is heavily oriented towards stewardship by institutional investors. Yet insurance companies and pension funds — the natural long-term potential stewards — have been retreating from the equity market while less governance-minded institutions such as public sector funds and passive funds take over. The Office for National Statistics said British insurers and pension funds owned 8.9 per cent of the domestic equity market in 2014 compared with 43.3 per cent in 1998.
如今，英語國家和日本的公司治理議程大大側重於機構投資者的看管。然而，天然的長期潛在管家——保險公司和養老基金——正從股市退卻，公共部門基金和被動型基金等治理意識較弱的機構正在補位。英國國家統計局(ONS)稱，2014年，英國保險公司和養老基金佔國內股市的8.9%，而1998年爲43.3%。

This dwindling rump of conventional institutional investors is, in effect, acting as a Platonic guardian of the corporate sector while lacking the Greek philosopher’s wisdom — witness their inability to address the excesses of boardroom pay and their shortcomings before the financial crisis, where they connived in excessive risk-taking and failed to constrain chief executives at failing banks, most notably Dick Fuld of Lehman Brothers and Fred Goodwin of RBS.
實際上，這些日漸式微的傳統機構投資者正成爲企業界的“柏拉圖”式守護者，只是缺乏這位希臘哲學家的智慧，看看他們無力解決董事會薪資過高的問題，以及金融危機之前的缺陷吧，那時他們默許了過度的冒險行爲，而且未能制約一些失敗銀行的首席執行官，最引人注目的是雷曼兄弟(Lehman Brothers)的迪克?富爾德(Dick Fuld)和蘇格蘭皇家銀行(RBS)的弗雷德?古德溫(Fred Goodwin)。

Corporate governance is not yet a lost cause. Since Sir Adrian Cadbury’s committee produced its pioneering report in the UK in 1992, boards have become more professional. The ranks of shareholder activists are swelling, although many have a short-term focus. Conventional institutions are increasingly willing to oppose management on issues such as excessive pay.
然而，公司治理並非毫無希望。自從1992年阿德里安?卡德伯裏爵士(Sir Adrian Cadbury)的委員會在英國發表那份開拓性的報告以來，董事會已變得更爲專業。維權股東的行列在壯大，儘管很多人關注短線。傳統機構越來越願意在薪資過分等問題上反對管理層。

Yet in much of the world the system remains overdependent on a shrinking band of shareholders whose willingness and ability to hold management to account is questionable — or, as in the case of Snap, who are forcibly excluded from any stewardship role.
然而，在這個世界的很多地方，整個體制仍過於依賴一羣日益減少的股東，而後者追究管理層責任的意願和能力是帶有問號的，或者就像在Snap的例子中，他們被排除在看管角色以外。