在資訊不對稱的環境下,因為融資單位可能無法充分了解公司投資計劃的報酬與所有可能風險,所以企業必須需保留較多的自有資金,以因應未來投資所需的資金。因此,本研究在投資(以固定資產變毛額來代表)方程式中加入流動性變數(以營業活動的現金流量來代表),觀察是否因為外部融資的限制,廠商投資的金額與其保有的現金流量間呈現統計上的顯著關係。另外,本文針對九種廠商屬性(其中五種根據資訊不對稱理論來區分,四種根據融資管道來區分),利用1991年-1994年121家台灣上市公司的Panel Data,將樣本廠商分為有面臨融資限制與未面臨融資限制二種,檢驗本研究所提出的假說:面臨融資限制的廠商,其流動性變數之係數應較未面臨融資限制的廠商顯著。實證結果顯示,在集團企業、所有權結構、上市時間、公司規模與是否現金增資等五組分類的結果支持本文的假設。就整體實證結果而言,流動性對廠商投資仍具有一定影響程度,因此「融資限制」在台灣仍是廠商決定投資的一項重要因素。
Classical investment theories, which presume a perfect capital market system, argue that a positive NPV project can always be financially supported, and there are different financing methods which are perfect substitutes. Recently, researchers argue that the financial market is far from perfect, with internal finance typically preferred to external financing, for which the behavior is referred to as financial hierarchy. This paper studies whether or not investment decisions are affected by financial constraints in asymmetric information. The testable hypothesis is that since financial constrainted firms are limited from external finance, their investment function is affected by the cash flow. Alternatively, the cash flow is not significant in the investment function from non-financial constrainted firms. A panel data of 121 Taiwan listed firms for the periods 1991-1994 is used. In general speaking, the evidence supports our cash flow liquidity hypothesis, which says that firms that are independent, have a scatter ownership, have a late IPO, and are smaller in size all suffer from financial constraints.