Stock Option Plans Research Articles

Pengaruh Penerapan Employee Stock Option Plan (Esop) Terhadap Kinerja Perusahaan Dan Nilai Perusahaan Dengan Profitabilitas Sebagai Variabel Moderasi

The Employee Stock Option Plan (ESOP) is a share ownership program implemented in the company, this ESOP program aims to serve as a reward for employees who have good performance where the criteria for receiving this ESOP have been determined by each company, United States of America. is the first country to implement this ESOP program, with various benefits for employees through this share ownership program, the ESOP itself began to be implemented by certain companies in Indonesia regulated by PSAK No. 53 which according to PSAK, payments by companies to employees are not only in the form of monetary value but can be in the form of share options that can be used as opportunities by companies that aim to increase employee motivation, performance and loyalty to the company which will ultimately have an impact on the value of the company itself. In Indonesia, company management has its own rules in the process of implementing the ESOP, one of which is to use the vesting method, this method contains that every employee who receives the option right is prohibited from selling his shares unless requested by the company or an employee has retired. From the results of statistical tests whether the variable current ratio (X1) and Price Book Value (X2) have an effect if the company carries out the ESOP program but the results show that if a company implements the ESOP, it has no effect on the current ratio or price book value, but the existence of ESOP can strengthen these ratios. Variable current ratio, price book value and return on assets have an effect on the ESOP only 33%.

Employee behavior in employee stock option plans: Why do some employees acquire company stock?

AbstractThe article focuses on decisions to exercise and hold company stock at the maturity of a broad‐based employee stock options plan. It investigates why some participants choose an uncertain and risky future reward when an immediate and certain increase in wealth could be secured at exercise. It draws on and expands the “mixed gambles” perspective in behavioral agency theory, utilizing a combination of stock price data and employee survey data from British companies with tax‐approved stock option plans. It is found that the decision to take a gamble is influenced (negatively) by the extent of stock price lows (relative to prices at exercise) in the year prior to exercise, and by the risk preferences of the option holder. The findings contribute to further development of the “mixed gambles” perspective as an explanation of stock option behavior, showing that individual characteristics as well as some stock price movements affect behavior.

Influence of Behavioral Factors on Early Exercise of Employee Stock Option: A Literature Review

Employee Stock Option Plans (ESOPs) have gained prominence as a successful HR strategy that improves the employees’ performance and enables the company to have an economic and strategic advantage. However, the time at which employees decide to exercise their options determines the incentive that they derive from the stock options granted to them. It is one of the crucial financial decisions which can have immense implications for both employers and employees. According to the Black Scholes Model, an option's value is maximum when it is held until maturity. But most employees exercise their options early, which comes with a cost to both the employee and the company. It can be attributed to the fact that when faced with financial decisions the individuals do not always refer to complex finance models and formulas and make decisions rationally. Instead they resort to mental accounting and shortcuts leading to bounded rationality that can unconsciously impact their decision-making process. This paper explores the literature available on behavioral factors and biases that in addition to rational factors can affect the exercise of employee stock options.

Stock options: do they influence dividend payments?

Purpose This study aims to investigate whether there is any influence of the option plan to purchase shares protected from dividends to determine the distribution of dividends in Brazilian companies. Design/methodology/approach The authors used a Tobit dynamic and regressive regression model because their sample has an index higher than 30% of companies that do not pay dividends. The sample includes companies that pay dividends or not and pay their executives with executive stock option plans and is composed of 1,990 observations from 356 companies from 2010 to 2016. Findings The results indicated that the presence of a dividend protection clause has a positive association with the distribution of dividends. The authors sought to clarify that companies with a stock option plan protected by the distribution of dividends face fewer restrictions on the distribution of dividends. The authors found that most companies still use only stock options to benefit middle-ranking positions and fit the plan in their remuneration policy. The monitoring of these plans lasts an average of seven years, and specific acquisition conditions are not established with their beneficiaries, who must remain in the company and observe performance metrics. Originality/value This study is relevant because the relationship between dividends and stock options has not yet been analyzed in Brazil, especially concerning a dividend-protected option plan, which is a relatively recent modality, even unknown to some companies.

Why more restricted stocks, less stock options?--An explanation based on the preference of regulators of China?

This paper provides an empirical explanation of the more frequent use of restricted stock plans for executives than stock option plans, to reveal the determinants of a restricted stock plan and understand its subsequent effects. We find that firms with higher growth opportunity, smaller size, higher executive ownership, smaller rent-seeking probably, and dividend payment prefer to grant restricted stock plans. Moreover, the preference of regulators drives the tendency of using restricted stock plans, designed to have higher pay-performance sensitivity (delta) and lower pay-risk sensitivity (vega). Under the intensive regulation, the restricted stock plans designed by firms with executive ownerships and large agency debt costs are more sensitive to risk. As a result, granting restricted stock plans rather than stock options helps improve firm performance and the preference of regulators on restricted stock plans can also enhance firm performance and decrease firm risks.

Impact of Employee Stock Ownership Plans on Productivity in Video Game Companies

The article deals with the importance of ESOPs (employee stock option plan) for the motivation of key employees of companies producing and publishing computer games. The conducted literature review led to the identification of a motivation model that explains how ESOPs can affect the motivation of employees in this industry. An analysis of the available studies on the importance of ESOPs for employee motivation revealed the existence of at least one key success factor of ESOPs—psychological ownership. The empirical study includes an ESOP analysis of five computer game companies listed on the Warsaw Stock Exchange in terms of changes in the dynamics of employee productivity caused by an ESOP. One of the most important discoveries is the relationship between productivity and the structure of the ESOP, in particular the percentage of company shares that were offered to its participants.

The Optimization Of Employee Stock Option Plan In Achieving Financial Performance

This study aimed to examine the effects of Intellectual Capital proxied by Human Capital (HC), Structural Capital (SC), and Customer Capital (CC) on the company's financial performance. It also investigated stock-based compensation's impact through employees' stock options programs and Intellectual Capital on the company's economic performance. The research samples were 36 companies that implemented the Employee Stock Option Plans as a compensation scheme during the 2016-2019 period. There were 144 observations. The partial test used multiple regression, while the moderating variable test applied residual analysis by examining the effect of deviation from a model. As a result, this study indicated that Human Capital partially influenced its financial performance. Stock-based compensation impacts the effect of Human Capital on financial performance. The shares ownership of employees with competencies, knowledge, skills, and behavior will support organizational structures' optimization in achieving work performance. Human capital is the source of innovation and knowledge that can solve a company’s problems. The implication of this research is that information about intellectual capital (Human Capital, Structural Capital, and Employee Capital) is needed by the company to determine the effectiveness of implementing the employee stock option plan in achieving better wealth in the future.

Why walk away from an easy gain in wealth? Evidence from a UK stock option plan

The paper examines the extent and potential reasons for non-exercise of ‘in the money’ stock options, drawing on employee-level data from the UK Save-As-You-Earn stock option plan. 14 per cent of participants choose not to exercise, and failure to exercise in these circumstances can be costly in terms of foregone increases in wealth. Lesser experience of the option plan, perceived lack of financial knowledge, and greater reliance on friends for advice is associated with failure to exercise. These findings offer challenges to the use of sophisticated reward and benefit schemes by companies when potential participants lack financial capabilities, and add to the literature by showing that financial literacy can remain problematic even when employees have surmounted initial obstacles to joining plans.

After the Stock Options Boom: Changes in Equity-Based Pay Following the Mandatory Adoption of IFRS 2

This paper investigates the economic consequences of the mandatory adoption of International Financial Reporting Standard 2 (hereafter, “IFRS 2”) on firms’ choices between alternative executive compensation instruments. With a unique, hand-collected dataset that contains design elements of stock option plans, we find that the adoption of IFRS 2 affects both the decision to keep or to give up stock options and the choice of alternative equity compensation instruments. In contrast to recent evidence from the United States, we find that the majority of firms replacing stock options by other equity instruments switched to performance shares, not to restricted stock. Our dataset allows us to relate firms’ reactions to IFRS 2 to the three major rationales explaining stock option compensation practice, namely, optimal contracting, managerial rent extraction, and perceived cost. Our results suggest that all three rationales contribute to explaining changes in compensation design because firms with sophisticated option plans tend to keep their options, whereas design decisions by firms abandoning options are related to a lack of shareholder power.

Corporate governance and IPO underpricing: evidence from the italian market

This paper aims to analyse the impact of firms’ corporate governance characteristics on the degree of first-day returns (i.e., underpricing) in the Italian initial public offering (IPO) market. In particular, this work investigates the impacts of the characteristics of boards of directors (BoDs) and ownership structure on the underpricing of newly offered shares. By studying a sample of 128 Italian IPOs between 2000 and 2016, it is concluded that corporate governance characteristics affect the degree of first-day returns following a company’s IPO. More specifically, the size of the BoD negatively affects underpricing, while the ownership of institutional investors and board members has a positive effect on the degree of underpricing. Conversely, no significant evidence is found with regard to board independence, the number of female directors in the boardroom, the implementation of stock option plans and ownership concentration.

Executive Compensation and Firm Performance in New Zealand: The Role of Employee Stock Option Plans

We examine the role of employee stock option plans (ESOPs) in mitigating agency problems in New Zealand firms. We find that ESOPs have a significant and positive effect on firm performance relative to their non-ESOP counterparts. This relation appears within a year from the first ESOP announcement, and for two to four years after the announcement. Our results show that ESOPs improve corporate performance by 10 times the cost of the ESOPs’ adoption in the first year of issue. The improvement persists for four years after the first issuance. These findings confirm the effectiveness of employee stock option plans for companies issuing ESOPs compared with companies that do not issue ESOPs, and show how much the value creation of ESOPs contributes to these firms.

The Effects of Employee Stock Options on Employee Mobility and Employee Entrepreneurship

Many knowledge-intensive sectors are home to employees that frequently change employers or quit to become entrepreneurs. Such sectors are also home to firms that widely use stock options to compensate rank-and-file employees. One rationale for stock option grants to the rank-and-file suggests that they support employee retention. Another rationale suggests that they promote goal alignment and innovation. We draw on these rationales to explain the effect of nonexecutive stock option grants on mobility and employee entrepreneurship. The retention logic plainly implies a binding effect that limits mobility and entrepreneurship. Alternatively, we build on the incentive logic to argue that stock option grants can trigger mobility and encourage employee entrepreneurship because the experimentation and risk-taking they induce can also contribute to learning about employment fit and new opportunities. We analyze these effects by examining the distribution of and the risk-taking incentives embedded in stock options grants to rank-and-file employees on their movement to existing firms as well as to entrepreneurship in the US semiconductor industry. We find that stock options grants to rank-and-file employees negatively affect employee mobility to other firms, but positively impact employee entrepreneurship. We also find that risk-inducing stock option plans drive employees’ transition to entrepreneurship. Our findings suggest that long-term equity-linked compensation practices designed to support innovation may drive employees to become entrepreneurs.

Kinerja Perusahaan sebagai Pemediasi Pengaruh Penerapan Employee Stock Option Plan (ESOP) pada Nilai Perusahaan

Limited liability company (Ltd) based on a contract cooperative relationship which is the basis of agency theory with the risk of conflict. The solution to minimize is the employee stock ownership program with the Employee Stock Option Plan (ESOP) strategy. The purpose of this study is to obtain empirical evidence of the relationship of stock options granted’s number to the firm value through firm performance. This research was conducted at companies listed in the BEI and conducted ESOP grants in 2014-2018. Samples obtained using purposive sampling were 48 observations. Data analysis technique used is path analysis. The results showed that the number of stock options granted had a positive effect on firm performance, firm performance had a positive effect on firm value, the number of shares options granted had a positive effect on firm value, and firm performance mediated the relationship between the number of shares options granted and firm value.
 Keywords: Employee Stock Option Plan; Firm Performance; Firm Value.

Employee Stock Option Plans: A Meta-Analysis (Understanding Impact of Esops Through Literature)

Abstract The usage of psychological ownership as an HR practice has been of a relatively recent origin. It is fast being recognized as a useful tool in the area of human resource management. Employee Stock Option Plans are being used as a technique to propagate psychological ownership and gain many advantages including a competitive edge. This paper explores the available literature on psychological ownership in general and Employee Stock Option plans in particular over a thirty year period from 1988 till 2018. An attempt has been made to integrate all matter into a theoretical model indicating the effect of such plans on individuals and organizations. In the study, several empirical as well as theoretical papers have been studied and the impact of Employee Stock Option Plans on several parameters like organizational productivity, individual performance, absenteeism, employee turnover and organizational citizenship behaviour have been reported. Several job attitudes like job satisfaction and commitment of employees towards their organization have also been reported. The studies reporting conditions of these plans that make them successful have been covered comprehensively.

Stock-based compensation plan: an analysis of the determinants of its use

ABSTRACT This study’s aim was to investigate the main aspects that determined the use of the stock-based compensation model and the variables that influence the amount paid. The article fills the gap in the previous debate regarding the variables that affect the decision to offer stock-based remuneration, as well as revealing the factors that impact its magnitude and providing a more robust statistical treatment with regards to endogeny. Brazil is known to be a country where the agency conflict between controlling and minority shareholders predominates, and so it is important to understand the determinants of adoption and of the amount paid to managers using stock options, since remuneration can be used as a form of tunneling. This study identified a possible trade-off between cash and stock compensation, in view of increased company indebtedness. It also found that in the Brazilian market this type of remuneration is not related to governance and performance. A panel data regression was used with fixed effects in the firm and industry*year to eliminate the possible bias arising from constant heterogeneities in time for the firms and shocks in the industries in a particular year. In addition, to identify the determinants, we used a logistic regression with panel data and fixed effect in industry*year. The study sample comprised 287 companies listed on the Bolsa, Brasil, Balcão (B3) exchange. This research shows that 40% of the companies in the period from 2010 to 2016 adopted stock-based compensation plans; however, the amount paid is still low, at 0.03% of total company assets. The results indicate that in the Brazilian market variables such as investment opportunities and company size increase the likelihood of adopting the employee stock options plan (ESOP). In addition, regarding the amount paid, this is negatively related to company leverage, indicating that in possible liquidity shocks the companies opt to compensate managers with shares to reduce their exposure to systematic risks.

Serbia Introduces New Tax Incentives to Boost the Knowledge-Based Economy

In this article, the authors examine recently introduced legislative amendments in Serbia establishing a tax incentive regime for the knowledge-based economy. With the aim of supporting businesses doing R&D in Serbia, the following tax incentives were instituted: an IP box, double deduction of R&D expenditures, a tax credit for investments in innovative start-ups and a beneficial treatment of employee stock option plans. This article analyses these incentives in detail.

Evaluating the Effect of Employee Stock Option Plans on the Financial Performance of Indian Construction and Infrastructure Companies

Competitive pressures to improve productivity continue to place significant demand upon organizations globally. To respond to these competitive pressures with the developed countries like USA, ESOPs (Employee Stock Ownership Plans) have also been adopted in developing country like India to increase the firm’s and employee’s performance and productivity by retaining the employees to a large extent. Employee Stock Ownership Plans are majorly utilized by many successful and competent companies across the world. The successes of the ESOP companies in countries like USA, Japan and UK etc. may largely be attributed to enhancement of firm’s performance and Employee productivity. These effects are becoming increasingly noticed across the world in recent years. Thus, this research is an empirical study carried out to evaluate the impact of ESOP on financial performance of ten listed Indian Construction and Infrastructural companies based on for a period of six years. The study analyzes three years pre and post period to the adoption of ESOPs for the selected companies and is based upon secondary data collected from company annual reports of the respective years. Company-wise Pre- and Post-ESOP adoption Analysis and Regression Analysis is carried out in the selected selector.

Transaction Costs, Option Prices, and Model Risk in Fair Value Accounting

This paper examines the reliability of option fair value estimates in the presence of transaction costs. The Black Scholes Merton (BSM) framework assumes zero transaction costs and thus might not provide a reasonable approximation in this context. We investigate the model adjustments companies make to their BSM models to deal with these transaction costs. We specifically examine Employee Stock Option (ESO) plans listed on the French stock exchange, as detailed disclosure on modeling is available for these ESOs. Our analysis questions the reliability of these model adjustments, especially their bias and the extent to which they provide a faithful representation of option fair values. Holding parameter values constant, we find that the model adjustments lead to a median understatement of 52% compared to the BSM model price, higher than the discount we observe for the opportunistic determination of model parameters (below 20%). The paper contributes to the fair value literature by highlighting model risk in the fair valuation of options. This model risk stems from assumptions made about the size of transaction costs and complements the notion of parameter risk analyzed in previous literature. As a result, the model itself might be a possible channel for fair value management.

Entrepreneurs’ Legal Status Choices and the C Corporation Survival Penalty

Foundational to the American Dream is the ability to easily and rapidly start a new business. Over the past quarter century, the introduction of the limited liability company (LLC) dramatically shifted and complicated the choice-of-legal-status calculus for entrepreneurs, and in its wake a consensus against the use of traditional C corporations by closely-held firms emerged. The C corporation, scholars argued, had fatal drawbacks despite its simplicity: tax disadvantages as well as governance inflexibility. Due to historically limited sources of data, there has been little empirical research on choice-of-entity generally and none that explores the anti-C corporation thesis in particular. Have C corporations underperformed as compared to similarly situated businesses with alternative legal statuses? This paper exploits a large panel dataset that contains legal status, owner, business, financing, and other firm-specific information collected from an eight-year survey of nearly 5,000 enterprises that were formed in 2004. It presents four main results. First, C corporation status is associated with firm failure rates that are 38 percent higher (significant at 0.1 percent) than those of non-C corporations with similar characteristics. Second, this C corporation survival penalty persists at nearly the same magnitude and significance even after a subset of “anticipated cash-exit” C corporations with (a) venture capital investors or (b) employee stock option plans are separated out. Third, nonwhite and foreign-born entrepreneurs have a significantly higher likelihood of choosing C corporation status. Fourth, within the subset of firms that appear eligible to elect out of the default (Subchapter C) corporate tax classification and into the tax-advantaged Subchapter S classification, nonwhite and older entrepreneurs are significantly more likely to remain in C corporation status. These findings suggest that increasing legal status complexity is unlikely to be neutral from a distributive perspective, and may be disproportionately burdensome for marginalized entrepreneurs.

Effect of Employ Stock Option Plan (ESOP) on Company Performance with Good Corporate Govrnance as Moderation

Effect of Employ Stock Option Plan (ESOP) on Company Performance with Good Corporate Govrnance as Moderation