The Dynamics of Privately Held Business Assets in the United States

Although privately held businesses are central to the American economy, little is known about how their assets are distributed among the population. In this study, we describe the household distribution of private business assets in the United States and examine how it has changed over time. Using data from the 1989-2019 Survey of Consumer Finances, we show that the relative number of business owners has remained stagnant at low levels and that assets in privately held firms have become increasingly concentrated among the wealthiest owners over time. At the most recent wave of data collection, the top 1% of households controlled nearly 80% of private business assets, up from about 70% in the late 1980s. We attempt to explain this trend by evaluating how technological change, the financialization of banking, and rising market power have influenced the distribution of private business assets in recent decades. Our findings suggest that all three factors contributed to increasing asset concentration in this sector.

A bird in the hand is better than two in the bush: Investigating the relationship between financial slack and profitability in business groups

Using arguments from the behavioral theory of the firm, agency theory, and the literature on internal capital markets, this article investigates the relationship between financial slack and firms’ profitability in standalone versus business group–affiliated firms. Using a large sample of French privately held firms, we show that there is a quadratic, inverse U-shape relationship between financial slack and profitability for privately held firms. We observe that the relation is steeper for business group affiliated firms than for standalone firms, which is consistent with the idea that firms in business groups are in competition for the business groups resources. Moreover, we explore whether business groups characteristics and position and weight of a given affiliated firm in the business group organization influence the impact of financial slack on profitability. Our results show that for firms that are closest to the business group head firm and that have a higher weight in the business groups, the quadratic, inverse U-shaped relationship is steeper. These findings suggest that the bargaining power that firms have in business groups plays an important role in explaining the relation between financial slack and profitability. JEL CLASSIFICATION: G32, L22 and L25.

Does the CEO effect on performance differ in private versus public firms?

Scholars have long debated the effect CEOs have on firm performance, including a focus on how their effect shifts across industries, national settings, and time. Unexplored, however, is the possibility that the CEO effect might differ in publicly traded versus privately held firms. Drawing on a unique longitudinal sample of both publicly traded and large, privately held Swedish firms from 1997 to 2013, we replicate and build upon prior CEO effects studies and find that private-firm CEOs have a greater effect on firm performance, for good or for ill, than do their public firm counterparts. Our results are strengthened after controlling for industry, firm profitability, and size in a matched-pair sample. We discuss the implications and potential future research stemming from these findings.

COMPARISON OF ALTMAN'S Z - SCORE MODEL AND ALTMAN'S Z''- SCORE MODEL ON THE SAMPLE OF COMPANIES WHOSE SHARES ARE INCLUDED IN THE REPUBLIC OF SRPSKA STOCK EXCHANGE INDEX

In this paper, we analysed companies whose shares are included in the Republic of Srpska Stock Exchange Index (BIRS), using Altman's Z-Score model and Altman's Z"-Score model, in order to determine their insolvency risk. Altman's Z-Score is a combination of five weighted financial ratios used to estimate the likelihood of financial distress, and possible bankruptcy of the observed companies. It is used widely by auditors, accountants, commercial banks, and other organizations to assess the financial health of their clients. Altman also developed revised versions of the model to assess the financial health of privately-held firms and non-manufacturing companies, as well as companies in emerging markets - Altman's Z'- Score model and Altman's Z" - Score model. The results of our research on a sample of 14 companies whose shares are included in BIRS show that, although it is an emerging market, Altman's Z-Score model gives better results that indicate much-needed caution when drawing conclusions about the observed companies.

Female empowerment/participation in the workplace and firm performance: a study of privately-owned firms

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between female empowerment/participation and firm performance.Design/methodology/approachThe data are cross-sectional, extracted from the records of the Enterprise Surveys of the World Bank (ESWB). It covers 561 privately-owned firms from Lebanon. Tobit regressions are used in the analysis.FindingsThe findings show that firm performance is positively associated with one form of female empowerment (female involvement in management), and the positive and significant association remains significant when several control variables are considered. However, the positive association between firm performance and the other form of female empowerment (female involvement in ownership) does not hold the inclusion of control variables in the regression. Furthermore, there is a positive association between firm performance and female participation in the workplace (the percentage of female workers), which remains qualitatively unchanged when several control variables are considered.Originality/valueThis is one of the first research studies that examines the relationship between female empowerment/participation and firm performance, while differentiating between female involvement in management and female involvement in ownership. Notably, the study extends the authors’ limited understanding on that relationship in the context of a small and understudied country such as Lebanon, where privately-held firms dominate.