The Multinational Advantage - SMU School of Accountancy · for measuring valuation effects in a multinational context. 5 This method, in effect, compares the value of the firm as

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The Multinational Advantage

Presented by

Dr Jonathan Rogers

Associate Professor University of Chicago

Booth School of Business

201314-07

The views and opinions expressed in this working paper are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of the School of Accountancy Singapore Management University

We thank Phil Berger Andy Bernard Marianne Bertrand Alan Bester Chris Hansen Chang-Tai Hsieh Rafael La Porta Christian Leuz Jon Lewellen Abbie Smith Doug Skinner and Jerry Zimmerman for helpful discussions and comments This paper has benefited from the comments of workshop participants at Chicago Cornell Dartmouth Florida Illinois at Chicago INSEAD LBS Michigan MIT Northwestern Rochester Syracuse University Texas UCLA and the EAA Annual Congress We thank William Steciak of KPMG for helpful discussions related to segment reporting We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the University of Chicago Booth School of Business the Fama-Miller Center and the Neubauer Family Foundation The statistical analysis of firm-level data on US multinational firms was conducted at the International Investment Division Bureau of Economic Analysis US Department of Commerce under arrangements that maintain legal confidentiality requirements The views expressed are those of the authors and do not reflect official positions of the US Department of Commerce

The Multinational Advantage

Drew D Creal

University of Chicago Booth School of Business

Leslie A Robinson Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth

Jonathan L Rogers

University of Chicago Booth School of Business

Sarah L C Zechman University of Chicago Booth School of Business

February 2013

Chicago Booth Research Paper No 11-37

Abstract Using a proprietary dataset we evaluate whether the degree of foreign operations affects firm value by comparing actual value to imputed value for US multinational corporations (MNCs) We argue that using benchmark firms operating in the same country and industry as each MNC segment controls for differences in discount rates and expected growth rates across countries and industries This allows us to isolate the value effects of organizing a set of otherwise independent activities within a multinational network We find robust evidence that multinational networks trade at a premium relative to a benchmark portfolio of independent firms JEL Classification F23 G32 G34 M41 Keywords firm valuation multinational corporations diversification

1

1 Introduction

We investigate whether the degree of international diversification affects firm value for US

multinational corporations (MNCs) Specifically we determine whether the relative size of the

foreign operation has a positive negative or no association with the difference between the

actual observed firm value and an imputed value of the firm (called excess value)1 Our analysis

points to a statistically and economically significant positive excess value or premium to

increased foreign operations This is akin to finding that the value of the MNC is greater than the

sum of its individual parts We subject this finding to a battery of robustness tests to help

determine whether it is simply an artifact of endogeneity or measurement error problems We fail

to find evidence that this is the case The finding of a premium is robust across all specifications

examined In terms of magnitude a one percent increase in the size of the foreign operation is

associated with an increase of between 019 and 037 in excess value Collectively the

evidence suggests that on average MNCs create value by organizing a set of otherwise

independent activities within a multinational network

A large literature examines whether firms that are industrially diversified trade at a discount

or premium to non-diversified firms This literature typically finds that industrially diversified

firms trade at a discount2 A popular method to quantify this valuation effect was developed by

Berger and Ofek (1995) who compare the actual value of an industrially diversified firm with a

hypothetical firm whose value is the sum of the imputed values of its individual industrial

segments As the individual segments of the diversified firm are not traded the imputed value of

each segment is the observable median firm value of a single-segment (non-diversified) firm

1 As we study US-based multinational firms throughout the paper we refer to the US as lsquodomesticrsquo and any other country as lsquoforeignrsquo 2 Examples include Lang and Stulz (1994) Berger and Ofek (1995) Laeven and Levine (2007) Schmid and Walter (2009) Ammann Hoechle and Schmid (2012) and Hoechle Schmid Walter and Yermack (2012)

2

operating in the same industry The difference between the actual value and the imputed value is

an estimate of the premium (if positive) or discount (if negative) Evidence of a negative

association between this excess value measure and a measure of industrial diversification is

consistent with industrial diversification destroying firm value on average

While the finding of an industrial diversification discount is quite robust there is

considerable debate about the interpretation Some argue that the discount is evidence that the

costs of operating in multiple industries outweigh the benefits (eg Berger and Ofek 1995)

Others argue that the discount is driven by the types of firms that choose to diversify or the types

of businesses they invest in when diversifying (Campa and Kedia 2002 Villalonga 2004b) The

literature that uses this methodology continues to evolve improving our understanding of the

forces that drive the industrial diversification discount For example the recent study by Hoechle

et al (2012) finds that a substantial proportion of the discount can be explained by variation in

corporate governance proxies

In contrast to the literature on the industrial diversification discount comparatively few

studies examine how foreign operations affect firm value3 This contrast is surprising because

descriptive data for US firms indicates that industrial diversification has stagnated while foreign

expansion continues at a rapid pace We develop a method to quantify the value effects of

foreign operations along the lines of Berger and Ofek (1995) but that remains applicable to the

multinational setting While Berger and Ofek (1995) divide each firm into industry segments we

divide each MNC into geographic-industry segments (ie separate country-industry

components)4 We then compare the actual value of the firm to the imputed value of the firm

3 Denis Denis and Yost (2002) is a notable exception 4 In our setting we refer to a lsquosingle-segmentrsquo firm as a firm that operates in only one country and one industry Accordingly we use the term lsquoexcess valuersquo to denote the difference between the actual (observed) firm value and the hypothetical firm value computed as the sum of the imputed values of the individual country-industry segments

3

Using a method similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we determine the imputed value for each

country-industry component by using the median single-segment firm operating exclusively in

the same country and industry (ie single-segment foreign (domestic) firms in the same industry

and country are used as benchmarks for the foreign (domestic) operations of US MNCs) In

other words our approach uses data on the observed firm values of single-segment US firms

(from Compustat) and foreign firms (from Worldscope)

This approach to measuring excess value differs from previous methods to impute the firm

value of MNCs Denis et al (2002) use single-segment domestic firms (ie US firms) in the

same industry as a benchmark for both domestic and foreign MNC operations Similarly studies

using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs rely only on domestic benchmarks

(eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

As growth rates and discount rates vary by country we believe our method is more appropriate

for measuring valuation effects in a multinational context5 This method in effect compares the

value of the firm as a whole to the sum of the parts In addition our method is conceptually

consistent with theories on foreign direct investment (FDI) which note that an MNC exists when

a firm seeks to exploit its advantages and remove conflict arising in external market transactions

by combining a firm of one nationality that might otherwise exist independently under the

ownership of a firm of a different nationality (Dunning and Rugman 1985)

Our approach leverages data maintained by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) which

provides detailed accounting information about FDI allowing measurement of sales for each

5 Denis et al (2002) contemplate the use of single-segment foreign firms as a benchmark noting three constraints to implementing such a procedure (1) the country location of firmsrsquo foreign operations cannot be reliably identified using Compustat data (2) the industry membership of firmsrsquo foreign operations cannot be identified reliably using Compustat data and (3) valuation ratios may differ across countries due to differences in accounting standards As described in our study we overcome each of these constraints and find that the different benchmark is important and reverses prior findings

4

country-industry in which US-based MNCs operate These data provide a substantial advantage

over the Compustat database used by prior research While Compustat provides some

information about the countries and industries in which these firms operate it is not as detailed

about either of these dimensions (or their interaction) and heavily relies on managerial disclosure

choices which could induce measurement bias (Villalonga 2004a) In addition to the new

method of estimating the value effects of foreign operations we provide evidence that MNCs

trade at a premium which stands in contrast to the discount documented in Denis et al (2002)

This difference is primarily attributed to our use of foreign benchmarks to construct the imputed

values of foreign operations6

Our finding of a premium better reconciles with the findings in the international trade

literature By focusing on nonpublic establishment level (eg factory store or office) data the

trade literature is able to generate relatively precise proxies for total factor productivity (TFP)

and provides robust evidence that firms engaging in international trade are more productive than

those that do not (see Helpman 2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Furthermore

productivity differences tend to be highly persistent even within narrowly defined industries

(Syverson 2011) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately measure TFP at the firm

level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor countries Nevertheless

Helpman Melitz and Yeaple (2004) provide some evidence that US firms engaging in FDI

have labor productivity advantages over firms that do not Reconciling the discount to

multinational operations found by Denis et al (2002) to the trade literature requires that the

persistent productivity advantages of firms engaged in international trade must be more than

offset by some other cost (eg agency costs) While this relation is possible it is difficult to

6 We repeat the analysis of Denis et al (2002) for our sample and confirm that differences in value effects of foreign operations are driven by the different methods for measuring the imputed value of foreign operations

5

conjecture why the most productive firms would have the largest agency costs In contrast the

finding of a premium easily reconciles with the trade literature

Given our result we investigate whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate

characteristics of firms that choose to invest abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present

a simple model with heterogeneous productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest

productivity endowments are the ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign

subsidiary To the extent productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type

of firms that choose to invest abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of their

foreign investments After including firm fixed effects to control for time invariant firm

characteristics (eg innate productivity advantages) we continue to find economically and

statistically significant evidence of a premium to foreign operations

To further account for the endogenous nature of FDI we estimate a dynamic panel data

model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator developed by Arellano and

Bond (1991) Arellano and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) This estimator allows

us to simultaneously account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and

firm value This method also yields a significant premium which is of similar magnitude and

significance to that estimated using fixed effects

We also perform a series of additional robustness tests First we examine whether the

measured excess value premium is driven by operations in countries with large control premiums

(Dyck and Zingales 2004) In countries with large control premiums using stock price in the

calculation of total firm value could underestimate the true value of the benchmark firms and

thereby induce an excess value premium We fail to find evidence that the excess value premium

is driven by such countries

6

Second we examine whether access to a low cost of capital is a meaningful source of the

US MNC advantage We incorporate foreign benchmarks in our method of estimating firm

excess value as it allows us to incorporate attributes of operating in those foreign countries ndash a

key attribute being the cost of capital Relative to the local benchmarks in foreign countries US

MNCs have the ability to obtain funds outside the local operating environments either by

borrowing in the US market or transferring capital internally When competing against firms in

shallow capital markets with high costs of capital MNCs may have a competitive advantage

over local foreign companies due to these alternative sources of capital However investors and

lenders are likely to expect higher rates of return from the additional risk associated with

operating in these environments making it unclear whether a multinational network will enhance

value in countries with a high cost of capital In addition foreign firms have some ability to

access international capital markets which mitigates the advantages to US firms To examine

whether the cost of capital plays a role in our finding of a premium we include a proxy for the

extent of operations in countries with higher costs of capital Our results are unaffected by the

inclusion of the proxy

Finally we control for several corporate governance proxies which Hoechle et al (2012)

find to be correlated with excess values (and industrial diversification) While magnitude of the

premium is virtually unaffected by including these proxies the significance level does decline

due to the reduced sample size

Our study contributes to the literature on multinational firms Our new method of estimating

excess values for multinational firms provides strong evidence of a statistically and economically

significant premium associated with increased international operations The premium is robust to

a variety of specifications and controls designed to evaluate alternative explanations In addition

7

this result easily reconciles with the international trade literature that establishes a link between

greater productivity and international operations though we do not find results supporting this as

the only source of the premium As segment disclosures improve and as new data sources

become available on multinational activity (eg Bureau Van Dijk) our empirical approach can

be used to investigate the extent to which the home country of the parent might influence the

extent with which foreign operations affect firm value (ie by examining non-US based

MNCs)7 Future studies could also examine the underlying forces affecting the excess value

premiums across countries

We also contribute to the understanding of international accounting standards and their

comparability Many studies seek to compare firms using different accounting standards These

comparisons generally rely on information generated by a particular accounting regime By

comparing commonly used metrics (total assets net income and sales) reported for the same

firm and year across different regimes we provide insights as to the relative comparability across

standards In particular we find that sales is reported significantly more consistently across

accounting regimes than the other metrics examined This finding should aid researchers in

reducing measurement error when comparing accounting information in multinational settings

The paper proceeds as follows Section 2 discusses the motivation for finding a premium or

discount to multinational operations Section 3 describes our data and how the excess value of a

firm is measured A discussion of our independent variables and primary findings is presented in

Section 4 with additional robustness tests provided in Section 5 Finally Section 6 concludes

7 As MNCs are ultimately bound by the tax regulatory and legal frameworks of their home country the valuation effect of foreign operations that we document for US-based MNCs may be different in a sample of non-US based MNCs with the same country-industry footprint Theorists refer to these as lsquolocational advantagesrsquo enjoyed by all multinational firms of a given nationality and obtained irrespective of skills or capabilities unique to a particular firm (Yamin 1991) There is also evidence of locational advantages in the market for corporate control (Huizinga and Voget 2009)

8

2 Premium versus discount

In a frictionless world where managers maximize firm value and markets are efficient there

should be no discount or premium to operating in foreign countries However there are a number

of forces that may cause actual firm value to deviate from the implied firm value

On one hand MNCs may have comparative advantages that generate premiums (ie positive

excess values) relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Having operations in a variety

of locations that access different supplies of inputs and customers allows the firm to take

advantage of changing market conditions by shifting operations or products to maximize firm

value more so than a firm operating in a single country Similarly having access to a variety of

institutional settings such as different tax codes legal regimes and financial markets can provide

MNCs with options beyond those available to firms located in a single country

Another possible factor associated with a premium to multinational operations is the cost of

capital For operations located in countries with shallow capital markets or weaker creditor

rights operating within a conglomerate can provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for

investments and expansion for at least two reasons First as our MNCs are domiciled in the US

their foreign segments have greater access to US capital markets relative to local competitors in

the foreign jurisdiction Second cash rich segments with few investment opportunities can

finance investments in cash poor segments with positive net present value projects (eg Myers

and Majluf 1984) Consequently diversified firms should be less liquidity constrained and better

able to shift resources to the most valuable investment opportunities Research has found that

internal financing is used more often when diversified firms have operations in countries with

more costly external financing (Desai Foley and Hines 2004) Multinational firms may also be

relatively more protected than single-country firms when negative shocks hit external capital

9

markets (Foley Desai and Forbes 2008) In a recent study Matvos and Seru (2011) find that

industrially diversified firms perform better than non-diversified firms when external capital

markets are impaired

While these arguments suggest that MNCs enjoy certain advantages when the foreign cost of

capital is high these benefits should be reduced by the additional risk associated with operating a

business in a high cost of capital environment For example Verizon is a multinational firm

operating in a number of countries One of the higher cost of capital locations in which they

operated was Venezuela While the multinational structure of Verizon may have mitigated some

of the risks associated with operating in a higher cost of capital location the firms was unable to

eliminate all of these risks In fact in 2007 Verizonrsquos operations in that country were

nationalized resulting in a net extraordinary loss of $131 million that year8 In other words

MNC investors are likely to expect higher rates of return to compensate for higher risk which

likely offsets some (if not all) of the potential excess value premium

On the other hand multinational firms may incur a discount (ie negative excess values)

relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Potential reasons for a discount largely rely on

the existence of agency costs Multinational firms tend to be larger more complex and less

transparent The combination of complexity and opacity inherent in MNCs reduces a firmrsquos

reliance on external capital as the cost of such capital increases due to agency costs (Desai et al

2004) As a result of the reduced reliance on external funds MNCs face a reduced level of

monitoring As noted by Jensen (1986) managers have incentives to increase firm size beyond

that which is optimal with overinvestment or misallocation of funds to pet projects If this lack of

monitoring is in combination with available internal capital empire building becomes easier

(Hope and Thomas 2008) Furthermore the current segment reporting standards under US 8 See the 10-K of Verizon Communications Inc dated December 31 2007 (footnote 2)

10

GAAP only require highly aggregated disclosures of foreign operations and allow for

considerable managerial discretion As a result operating in multiple countries makes it easier

for management to hide poor performance ndash either their own or that of a division ndash such that low

quality managers are more likely to be retained and overcompensated and poorly performing

divisions retained longer than optimal Other reasons one might expect a discount to be applied

to multinational firms include higher coordination costs (eg coordinating across different

cultures and languages) as well as additional risks These risks include exposure to multiple

political regimes legal regimes economic regulations and currency fluctuations

Past studies investigate whether foreign operations of US firms enhance or reduce firm

value However all of these studies benchmark the value of the foreign operations of an MNC to

US domestic firms For instance Denis et al (2002) determine the implied value of a US

MNC using domestic (US) single-segment firms in the same industry as a benchmark Studies

using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs also rely on domestic benchmarks

(eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

However using a US domestic firm as a benchmark for the value of foreign operations

implicitly makes two assumptions First this method assumes that the risks and expected growth

rates of foreign operations are equivalent to those of domestic operations This assumption is

inconsistent with the findings of Hail and Leuz (2009) which provides evidence that the cost of

capital varies substantially across countries Second this method assumes that there is excess

domestic capacity to allow for expansion with profitability similar to current domestic

operations We relax these assumptions by measuring the imputed value of a foreign component

of a US firm as if that component operated autonomously within that foreign country (rather

than in the US) Specifically our multiples allow the cost of capital and expected growth rates

11

to vary across not just industry but also country Furthermore our counterfactual does not

require the assumption that operations be relocated mitigating the production and sales capacity

concerns

3 Measuring excess value

31 Description of excess value

Figure 1 shows the average percent of foreign sales (based on segment disclosures under US

GAAP) across firms through time and illustrates that firms are continuing to expand

internationally9 This expansion highlights the importance of understanding whether the decision

to operate internationally is on average a value enhancing corporate strategy We contribute to

this understanding by evaluating whether the firm as a whole is worth more or less than its

imputed value (ie the firm is valued in excess of the sum of its individual components)

We measure the excess value of a firm as the logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to

imputed value based on the method used in Berger and Ofek (1995) The imputed value is the

hypothetical value of the MNC under the assumption that its country-industry components

operate as independent entities A key innovation of our study is an alternative approach to

imputing the value of the foreign operations of an MNC Components of MNCs operating in a

given industry and country are imputed using the value of single-segment firms operating in the

same industry and country Thus we ensure the discount rates and expected growth rates are

applicable to each given industry and location in estimating the implied values of the MNC

segments

9 The discontinuity in industrial diversification (the percent of sales outside the primary industry) between 1997 and 1998 is the result of a change in segment reporting rules

12

The actual firm values are observable for all firms in our sample The hypothetical firm

values for multi-segment firms are imputed using market value to sales ratios herein referred to

as lsquomultiplesrsquo of the median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry Thus

these single country-industry firms serve as benchmarks for an MNCrsquos operations within that

same country-industry The imputed value of the country-industry component can be viewed as

an estimate of what that component would be worth if it operated independently The sum of the

imputed values across all country-industry components represents the hypothetical value that the

multi-segment firm would be worth if it were broken apart

32 Data

Four primary data sources play a distinct role in carrying out our analysis i) Bureau of

Economic Analysis (BEA) data ii) Compustat Segment data iii) Worldscope data and iv)

Compustat Fundamentals Annual data Broadly speaking BEA data provide information about

the diversified nature of MNCs Compustat Segment data provide information about the

industrial diversification of US domiciled firms Worldscope data are used to compute

multiples for single-segment foreign firms that serve as benchmarks for the foreign operations of

MNCs (ie foreign benchmarks) and Compustat Fundamentals Annual data are used to

compute multiples for single-segment domestic firms that serve as benchmarks for the domestic

operations of multinational firms We also use the latter data source to construct our primary

control variables

13

Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

14

accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

affiliate13

The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

(1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

our data requirements

33 Measuring excess value

The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

15

Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

(ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

annually

Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

sales data are measured most consistently

To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

16

GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

17

means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

18

the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

4 Empirical results

41 Independent variables

Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

control variables (discussed below)

We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

for firms that operate in a single business segment

Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

19

advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

firm level

42 Primary regression analysis

In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

(Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

46 in column (2)20

Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

20

countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

(Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

and Denis et al 2002)

The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

21

more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

value implications of a multinational network

5 Robustness

51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

values

Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

22

present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

treated as endogenous

Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

(2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

23

serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

24

typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

these reasons we do not implement an event study

53 Control premium

A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

extract large control premiums

23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

25

54 Cost of capital

As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

markets in which it operates

We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

(Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

26

55 Corporate governance

In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

(Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

(Governance Index)

As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

27

6 Conclusion

Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

28

industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

remains significant

Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

what factors influence the premium

29

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Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

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Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

31

Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

165-186

Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

32

Appendix A Variable Definitions

We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

Dependent variable

Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

Independent variables

Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

33

CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

34

Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

35

Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

2003

4 6

2004

25 38

2005

8 12

2006

6 9

2007

7 11

2008

5 8

2009

5 8

2010

5 8

2011

1 2

66

Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

IFRS

47 71

Canadian GAAP

12 18

Israeli GAAP

2 3

Dutch GAAP

1 2

Indian GAAP

1 2

Japanese GAAP

1 2

Norwegian GAAP

1 2

Swiss GAAP

1 2

66

36

(Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

Percent different from US GAAP

Comparison to sales (p-values)

N Mean Median

Mean Median

Full Sample (2001-2011)

Sales

66 236 000

Net Income

66 10653 647

005 lt001

Assets

66 1162 126

lt001 lt001

Study Sample (2001-2008)

Sales

55 257 000

Net Income

55 10303 589

011 lt001

Assets

55 1047 099

003 lt001

37

Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

Test of Diff (p-value) Value

Test of Diff (p-value)

Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

38

Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

Country

N (1)

Sales (millions)

(2)

Total Sales (3)

N (4)

Sales (million)

(5)

Total Sales (6)

Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

39

Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

40

Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

41

Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

42

Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

43

Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

Governance

No Governance (same sample)

Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

  • Cover for paperpdf
  • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

    We thank Phil Berger Andy Bernard Marianne Bertrand Alan Bester Chris Hansen Chang-Tai Hsieh Rafael La Porta Christian Leuz Jon Lewellen Abbie Smith Doug Skinner and Jerry Zimmerman for helpful discussions and comments This paper has benefited from the comments of workshop participants at Chicago Cornell Dartmouth Florida Illinois at Chicago INSEAD LBS Michigan MIT Northwestern Rochester Syracuse University Texas UCLA and the EAA Annual Congress We thank William Steciak of KPMG for helpful discussions related to segment reporting We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the University of Chicago Booth School of Business the Fama-Miller Center and the Neubauer Family Foundation The statistical analysis of firm-level data on US multinational firms was conducted at the International Investment Division Bureau of Economic Analysis US Department of Commerce under arrangements that maintain legal confidentiality requirements The views expressed are those of the authors and do not reflect official positions of the US Department of Commerce

    The Multinational Advantage

    Drew D Creal

    University of Chicago Booth School of Business

    Leslie A Robinson Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth

    Jonathan L Rogers

    University of Chicago Booth School of Business

    Sarah L C Zechman University of Chicago Booth School of Business

    February 2013

    Chicago Booth Research Paper No 11-37

    Abstract Using a proprietary dataset we evaluate whether the degree of foreign operations affects firm value by comparing actual value to imputed value for US multinational corporations (MNCs) We argue that using benchmark firms operating in the same country and industry as each MNC segment controls for differences in discount rates and expected growth rates across countries and industries This allows us to isolate the value effects of organizing a set of otherwise independent activities within a multinational network We find robust evidence that multinational networks trade at a premium relative to a benchmark portfolio of independent firms JEL Classification F23 G32 G34 M41 Keywords firm valuation multinational corporations diversification

    1

    1 Introduction

    We investigate whether the degree of international diversification affects firm value for US

    multinational corporations (MNCs) Specifically we determine whether the relative size of the

    foreign operation has a positive negative or no association with the difference between the

    actual observed firm value and an imputed value of the firm (called excess value)1 Our analysis

    points to a statistically and economically significant positive excess value or premium to

    increased foreign operations This is akin to finding that the value of the MNC is greater than the

    sum of its individual parts We subject this finding to a battery of robustness tests to help

    determine whether it is simply an artifact of endogeneity or measurement error problems We fail

    to find evidence that this is the case The finding of a premium is robust across all specifications

    examined In terms of magnitude a one percent increase in the size of the foreign operation is

    associated with an increase of between 019 and 037 in excess value Collectively the

    evidence suggests that on average MNCs create value by organizing a set of otherwise

    independent activities within a multinational network

    A large literature examines whether firms that are industrially diversified trade at a discount

    or premium to non-diversified firms This literature typically finds that industrially diversified

    firms trade at a discount2 A popular method to quantify this valuation effect was developed by

    Berger and Ofek (1995) who compare the actual value of an industrially diversified firm with a

    hypothetical firm whose value is the sum of the imputed values of its individual industrial

    segments As the individual segments of the diversified firm are not traded the imputed value of

    each segment is the observable median firm value of a single-segment (non-diversified) firm

    1 As we study US-based multinational firms throughout the paper we refer to the US as lsquodomesticrsquo and any other country as lsquoforeignrsquo 2 Examples include Lang and Stulz (1994) Berger and Ofek (1995) Laeven and Levine (2007) Schmid and Walter (2009) Ammann Hoechle and Schmid (2012) and Hoechle Schmid Walter and Yermack (2012)

    2

    operating in the same industry The difference between the actual value and the imputed value is

    an estimate of the premium (if positive) or discount (if negative) Evidence of a negative

    association between this excess value measure and a measure of industrial diversification is

    consistent with industrial diversification destroying firm value on average

    While the finding of an industrial diversification discount is quite robust there is

    considerable debate about the interpretation Some argue that the discount is evidence that the

    costs of operating in multiple industries outweigh the benefits (eg Berger and Ofek 1995)

    Others argue that the discount is driven by the types of firms that choose to diversify or the types

    of businesses they invest in when diversifying (Campa and Kedia 2002 Villalonga 2004b) The

    literature that uses this methodology continues to evolve improving our understanding of the

    forces that drive the industrial diversification discount For example the recent study by Hoechle

    et al (2012) finds that a substantial proportion of the discount can be explained by variation in

    corporate governance proxies

    In contrast to the literature on the industrial diversification discount comparatively few

    studies examine how foreign operations affect firm value3 This contrast is surprising because

    descriptive data for US firms indicates that industrial diversification has stagnated while foreign

    expansion continues at a rapid pace We develop a method to quantify the value effects of

    foreign operations along the lines of Berger and Ofek (1995) but that remains applicable to the

    multinational setting While Berger and Ofek (1995) divide each firm into industry segments we

    divide each MNC into geographic-industry segments (ie separate country-industry

    components)4 We then compare the actual value of the firm to the imputed value of the firm

    3 Denis Denis and Yost (2002) is a notable exception 4 In our setting we refer to a lsquosingle-segmentrsquo firm as a firm that operates in only one country and one industry Accordingly we use the term lsquoexcess valuersquo to denote the difference between the actual (observed) firm value and the hypothetical firm value computed as the sum of the imputed values of the individual country-industry segments

    3

    Using a method similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we determine the imputed value for each

    country-industry component by using the median single-segment firm operating exclusively in

    the same country and industry (ie single-segment foreign (domestic) firms in the same industry

    and country are used as benchmarks for the foreign (domestic) operations of US MNCs) In

    other words our approach uses data on the observed firm values of single-segment US firms

    (from Compustat) and foreign firms (from Worldscope)

    This approach to measuring excess value differs from previous methods to impute the firm

    value of MNCs Denis et al (2002) use single-segment domestic firms (ie US firms) in the

    same industry as a benchmark for both domestic and foreign MNC operations Similarly studies

    using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs rely only on domestic benchmarks

    (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

    As growth rates and discount rates vary by country we believe our method is more appropriate

    for measuring valuation effects in a multinational context5 This method in effect compares the

    value of the firm as a whole to the sum of the parts In addition our method is conceptually

    consistent with theories on foreign direct investment (FDI) which note that an MNC exists when

    a firm seeks to exploit its advantages and remove conflict arising in external market transactions

    by combining a firm of one nationality that might otherwise exist independently under the

    ownership of a firm of a different nationality (Dunning and Rugman 1985)

    Our approach leverages data maintained by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) which

    provides detailed accounting information about FDI allowing measurement of sales for each

    5 Denis et al (2002) contemplate the use of single-segment foreign firms as a benchmark noting three constraints to implementing such a procedure (1) the country location of firmsrsquo foreign operations cannot be reliably identified using Compustat data (2) the industry membership of firmsrsquo foreign operations cannot be identified reliably using Compustat data and (3) valuation ratios may differ across countries due to differences in accounting standards As described in our study we overcome each of these constraints and find that the different benchmark is important and reverses prior findings

    4

    country-industry in which US-based MNCs operate These data provide a substantial advantage

    over the Compustat database used by prior research While Compustat provides some

    information about the countries and industries in which these firms operate it is not as detailed

    about either of these dimensions (or their interaction) and heavily relies on managerial disclosure

    choices which could induce measurement bias (Villalonga 2004a) In addition to the new

    method of estimating the value effects of foreign operations we provide evidence that MNCs

    trade at a premium which stands in contrast to the discount documented in Denis et al (2002)

    This difference is primarily attributed to our use of foreign benchmarks to construct the imputed

    values of foreign operations6

    Our finding of a premium better reconciles with the findings in the international trade

    literature By focusing on nonpublic establishment level (eg factory store or office) data the

    trade literature is able to generate relatively precise proxies for total factor productivity (TFP)

    and provides robust evidence that firms engaging in international trade are more productive than

    those that do not (see Helpman 2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Furthermore

    productivity differences tend to be highly persistent even within narrowly defined industries

    (Syverson 2011) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately measure TFP at the firm

    level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor countries Nevertheless

    Helpman Melitz and Yeaple (2004) provide some evidence that US firms engaging in FDI

    have labor productivity advantages over firms that do not Reconciling the discount to

    multinational operations found by Denis et al (2002) to the trade literature requires that the

    persistent productivity advantages of firms engaged in international trade must be more than

    offset by some other cost (eg agency costs) While this relation is possible it is difficult to

    6 We repeat the analysis of Denis et al (2002) for our sample and confirm that differences in value effects of foreign operations are driven by the different methods for measuring the imputed value of foreign operations

    5

    conjecture why the most productive firms would have the largest agency costs In contrast the

    finding of a premium easily reconciles with the trade literature

    Given our result we investigate whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate

    characteristics of firms that choose to invest abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present

    a simple model with heterogeneous productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest

    productivity endowments are the ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign

    subsidiary To the extent productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type

    of firms that choose to invest abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of their

    foreign investments After including firm fixed effects to control for time invariant firm

    characteristics (eg innate productivity advantages) we continue to find economically and

    statistically significant evidence of a premium to foreign operations

    To further account for the endogenous nature of FDI we estimate a dynamic panel data

    model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator developed by Arellano and

    Bond (1991) Arellano and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) This estimator allows

    us to simultaneously account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and

    firm value This method also yields a significant premium which is of similar magnitude and

    significance to that estimated using fixed effects

    We also perform a series of additional robustness tests First we examine whether the

    measured excess value premium is driven by operations in countries with large control premiums

    (Dyck and Zingales 2004) In countries with large control premiums using stock price in the

    calculation of total firm value could underestimate the true value of the benchmark firms and

    thereby induce an excess value premium We fail to find evidence that the excess value premium

    is driven by such countries

    6

    Second we examine whether access to a low cost of capital is a meaningful source of the

    US MNC advantage We incorporate foreign benchmarks in our method of estimating firm

    excess value as it allows us to incorporate attributes of operating in those foreign countries ndash a

    key attribute being the cost of capital Relative to the local benchmarks in foreign countries US

    MNCs have the ability to obtain funds outside the local operating environments either by

    borrowing in the US market or transferring capital internally When competing against firms in

    shallow capital markets with high costs of capital MNCs may have a competitive advantage

    over local foreign companies due to these alternative sources of capital However investors and

    lenders are likely to expect higher rates of return from the additional risk associated with

    operating in these environments making it unclear whether a multinational network will enhance

    value in countries with a high cost of capital In addition foreign firms have some ability to

    access international capital markets which mitigates the advantages to US firms To examine

    whether the cost of capital plays a role in our finding of a premium we include a proxy for the

    extent of operations in countries with higher costs of capital Our results are unaffected by the

    inclusion of the proxy

    Finally we control for several corporate governance proxies which Hoechle et al (2012)

    find to be correlated with excess values (and industrial diversification) While magnitude of the

    premium is virtually unaffected by including these proxies the significance level does decline

    due to the reduced sample size

    Our study contributes to the literature on multinational firms Our new method of estimating

    excess values for multinational firms provides strong evidence of a statistically and economically

    significant premium associated with increased international operations The premium is robust to

    a variety of specifications and controls designed to evaluate alternative explanations In addition

    7

    this result easily reconciles with the international trade literature that establishes a link between

    greater productivity and international operations though we do not find results supporting this as

    the only source of the premium As segment disclosures improve and as new data sources

    become available on multinational activity (eg Bureau Van Dijk) our empirical approach can

    be used to investigate the extent to which the home country of the parent might influence the

    extent with which foreign operations affect firm value (ie by examining non-US based

    MNCs)7 Future studies could also examine the underlying forces affecting the excess value

    premiums across countries

    We also contribute to the understanding of international accounting standards and their

    comparability Many studies seek to compare firms using different accounting standards These

    comparisons generally rely on information generated by a particular accounting regime By

    comparing commonly used metrics (total assets net income and sales) reported for the same

    firm and year across different regimes we provide insights as to the relative comparability across

    standards In particular we find that sales is reported significantly more consistently across

    accounting regimes than the other metrics examined This finding should aid researchers in

    reducing measurement error when comparing accounting information in multinational settings

    The paper proceeds as follows Section 2 discusses the motivation for finding a premium or

    discount to multinational operations Section 3 describes our data and how the excess value of a

    firm is measured A discussion of our independent variables and primary findings is presented in

    Section 4 with additional robustness tests provided in Section 5 Finally Section 6 concludes

    7 As MNCs are ultimately bound by the tax regulatory and legal frameworks of their home country the valuation effect of foreign operations that we document for US-based MNCs may be different in a sample of non-US based MNCs with the same country-industry footprint Theorists refer to these as lsquolocational advantagesrsquo enjoyed by all multinational firms of a given nationality and obtained irrespective of skills or capabilities unique to a particular firm (Yamin 1991) There is also evidence of locational advantages in the market for corporate control (Huizinga and Voget 2009)

    8

    2 Premium versus discount

    In a frictionless world where managers maximize firm value and markets are efficient there

    should be no discount or premium to operating in foreign countries However there are a number

    of forces that may cause actual firm value to deviate from the implied firm value

    On one hand MNCs may have comparative advantages that generate premiums (ie positive

    excess values) relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Having operations in a variety

    of locations that access different supplies of inputs and customers allows the firm to take

    advantage of changing market conditions by shifting operations or products to maximize firm

    value more so than a firm operating in a single country Similarly having access to a variety of

    institutional settings such as different tax codes legal regimes and financial markets can provide

    MNCs with options beyond those available to firms located in a single country

    Another possible factor associated with a premium to multinational operations is the cost of

    capital For operations located in countries with shallow capital markets or weaker creditor

    rights operating within a conglomerate can provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for

    investments and expansion for at least two reasons First as our MNCs are domiciled in the US

    their foreign segments have greater access to US capital markets relative to local competitors in

    the foreign jurisdiction Second cash rich segments with few investment opportunities can

    finance investments in cash poor segments with positive net present value projects (eg Myers

    and Majluf 1984) Consequently diversified firms should be less liquidity constrained and better

    able to shift resources to the most valuable investment opportunities Research has found that

    internal financing is used more often when diversified firms have operations in countries with

    more costly external financing (Desai Foley and Hines 2004) Multinational firms may also be

    relatively more protected than single-country firms when negative shocks hit external capital

    9

    markets (Foley Desai and Forbes 2008) In a recent study Matvos and Seru (2011) find that

    industrially diversified firms perform better than non-diversified firms when external capital

    markets are impaired

    While these arguments suggest that MNCs enjoy certain advantages when the foreign cost of

    capital is high these benefits should be reduced by the additional risk associated with operating a

    business in a high cost of capital environment For example Verizon is a multinational firm

    operating in a number of countries One of the higher cost of capital locations in which they

    operated was Venezuela While the multinational structure of Verizon may have mitigated some

    of the risks associated with operating in a higher cost of capital location the firms was unable to

    eliminate all of these risks In fact in 2007 Verizonrsquos operations in that country were

    nationalized resulting in a net extraordinary loss of $131 million that year8 In other words

    MNC investors are likely to expect higher rates of return to compensate for higher risk which

    likely offsets some (if not all) of the potential excess value premium

    On the other hand multinational firms may incur a discount (ie negative excess values)

    relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Potential reasons for a discount largely rely on

    the existence of agency costs Multinational firms tend to be larger more complex and less

    transparent The combination of complexity and opacity inherent in MNCs reduces a firmrsquos

    reliance on external capital as the cost of such capital increases due to agency costs (Desai et al

    2004) As a result of the reduced reliance on external funds MNCs face a reduced level of

    monitoring As noted by Jensen (1986) managers have incentives to increase firm size beyond

    that which is optimal with overinvestment or misallocation of funds to pet projects If this lack of

    monitoring is in combination with available internal capital empire building becomes easier

    (Hope and Thomas 2008) Furthermore the current segment reporting standards under US 8 See the 10-K of Verizon Communications Inc dated December 31 2007 (footnote 2)

    10

    GAAP only require highly aggregated disclosures of foreign operations and allow for

    considerable managerial discretion As a result operating in multiple countries makes it easier

    for management to hide poor performance ndash either their own or that of a division ndash such that low

    quality managers are more likely to be retained and overcompensated and poorly performing

    divisions retained longer than optimal Other reasons one might expect a discount to be applied

    to multinational firms include higher coordination costs (eg coordinating across different

    cultures and languages) as well as additional risks These risks include exposure to multiple

    political regimes legal regimes economic regulations and currency fluctuations

    Past studies investigate whether foreign operations of US firms enhance or reduce firm

    value However all of these studies benchmark the value of the foreign operations of an MNC to

    US domestic firms For instance Denis et al (2002) determine the implied value of a US

    MNC using domestic (US) single-segment firms in the same industry as a benchmark Studies

    using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs also rely on domestic benchmarks

    (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

    However using a US domestic firm as a benchmark for the value of foreign operations

    implicitly makes two assumptions First this method assumes that the risks and expected growth

    rates of foreign operations are equivalent to those of domestic operations This assumption is

    inconsistent with the findings of Hail and Leuz (2009) which provides evidence that the cost of

    capital varies substantially across countries Second this method assumes that there is excess

    domestic capacity to allow for expansion with profitability similar to current domestic

    operations We relax these assumptions by measuring the imputed value of a foreign component

    of a US firm as if that component operated autonomously within that foreign country (rather

    than in the US) Specifically our multiples allow the cost of capital and expected growth rates

    11

    to vary across not just industry but also country Furthermore our counterfactual does not

    require the assumption that operations be relocated mitigating the production and sales capacity

    concerns

    3 Measuring excess value

    31 Description of excess value

    Figure 1 shows the average percent of foreign sales (based on segment disclosures under US

    GAAP) across firms through time and illustrates that firms are continuing to expand

    internationally9 This expansion highlights the importance of understanding whether the decision

    to operate internationally is on average a value enhancing corporate strategy We contribute to

    this understanding by evaluating whether the firm as a whole is worth more or less than its

    imputed value (ie the firm is valued in excess of the sum of its individual components)

    We measure the excess value of a firm as the logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to

    imputed value based on the method used in Berger and Ofek (1995) The imputed value is the

    hypothetical value of the MNC under the assumption that its country-industry components

    operate as independent entities A key innovation of our study is an alternative approach to

    imputing the value of the foreign operations of an MNC Components of MNCs operating in a

    given industry and country are imputed using the value of single-segment firms operating in the

    same industry and country Thus we ensure the discount rates and expected growth rates are

    applicable to each given industry and location in estimating the implied values of the MNC

    segments

    9 The discontinuity in industrial diversification (the percent of sales outside the primary industry) between 1997 and 1998 is the result of a change in segment reporting rules

    12

    The actual firm values are observable for all firms in our sample The hypothetical firm

    values for multi-segment firms are imputed using market value to sales ratios herein referred to

    as lsquomultiplesrsquo of the median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry Thus

    these single country-industry firms serve as benchmarks for an MNCrsquos operations within that

    same country-industry The imputed value of the country-industry component can be viewed as

    an estimate of what that component would be worth if it operated independently The sum of the

    imputed values across all country-industry components represents the hypothetical value that the

    multi-segment firm would be worth if it were broken apart

    32 Data

    Four primary data sources play a distinct role in carrying out our analysis i) Bureau of

    Economic Analysis (BEA) data ii) Compustat Segment data iii) Worldscope data and iv)

    Compustat Fundamentals Annual data Broadly speaking BEA data provide information about

    the diversified nature of MNCs Compustat Segment data provide information about the

    industrial diversification of US domiciled firms Worldscope data are used to compute

    multiples for single-segment foreign firms that serve as benchmarks for the foreign operations of

    MNCs (ie foreign benchmarks) and Compustat Fundamentals Annual data are used to

    compute multiples for single-segment domestic firms that serve as benchmarks for the domestic

    operations of multinational firms We also use the latter data source to construct our primary

    control variables

    13

    Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

    domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

    observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

    important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

    the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

    identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

    limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

    An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

    not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

    consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

    and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

    Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

    The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

    and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

    due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

    Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

    affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

    interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

    10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

    14

    accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

    we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

    affiliate13

    The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

    (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

    and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

    exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

    utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

    sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

    year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

    ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

    US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

    accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

    data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

    have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

    firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

    our data requirements

    33 Measuring excess value

    The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

    logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

    13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

    15

    Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

    observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

    (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

    Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

    operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

    components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

    by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

    value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

    multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

    obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

    annually

    Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

    multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

    ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

    multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

    for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

    need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

    sales data are measured most consistently

    To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

    accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

    14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

    16

    GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

    prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

    changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

    are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

    A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

    under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

    standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

    though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

    non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

    assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

    standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

    that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

    The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

    estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

    the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

    measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

    Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

    includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

    segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

    higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

    benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

    15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

    17

    means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

    multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

    To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

    firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

    only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

    those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

    We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

    of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

    benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

    the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

    and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

    multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

    To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

    we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

    the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

    represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

    five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

    France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

    firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

    16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

    18

    the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

    representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

    4 Empirical results

    41 Independent variables

    Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

    multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

    of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

    multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

    approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

    analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

    control variables (discussed below)

    We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

    value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

    Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

    and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

    firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

    we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

    for firms that operate in a single business segment

    Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

    long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

    sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

    the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

    19

    advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

    control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

    use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

    firm level

    42 Primary regression analysis

    In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

    activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

    Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

    foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

    (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

    indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

    remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

    column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

    Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

    effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

    46 in column (2)20

    Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

    firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

    2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

    measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

    20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

    20

    countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

    result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

    whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

    abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

    productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

    ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

    To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

    firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

    their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

    productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

    effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

    (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

    on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

    and Denis et al 2002)

    The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

    on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

    methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

    different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

    diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

    a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

    extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

    benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

    21

    more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

    value implications of a multinational network

    5 Robustness

    51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

    Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

    value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

    Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

    their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

    likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

    Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

    robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

    control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

    the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

    and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

    previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

    values

    Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

    lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

    lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

    channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

    Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

    periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

    22

    present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

    dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

    the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

    estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

    We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

    industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

    Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

    treated as endogenous

    Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

    model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

    model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

    explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

    with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

    variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

    (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

    this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

    variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

    The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

    the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

    excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

    diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

    Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

    model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

    23

    serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

    correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

    model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

    test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

    indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

    known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

    the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

    52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

    Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

    value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

    fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

    sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

    expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

    and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

    coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

    operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

    21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

    24

    typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

    these reasons we do not implement an event study

    53 Control premium

    A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

    source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

    enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

    prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

    ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

    firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

    the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

    such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

    MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

    Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

    weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

    included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

    Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

    when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

    value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

    extract large control premiums

    23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

    25

    54 Cost of capital

    As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

    network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

    capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

    establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

    and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

    is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

    between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

    markets in which it operates

    We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

    rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

    imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

    of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

    significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

    (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

    we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

    A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

    do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

    capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

    24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

    26

    55 Corporate governance

    In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

    we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

    governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

    discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

    governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

    are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

    of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

    ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

    (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

    (Governance Index)

    As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

    almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

    None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

    on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

    conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

    sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

    2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

    virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

    the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

    governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

    27

    6 Conclusion

    Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

    domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

    degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

    examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

    incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

    important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

    Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

    increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

    value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

    This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

    firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

    firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

    The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

    whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

    panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

    account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

    we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

    control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

    premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

    in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

    multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

    corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

    28

    industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

    explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

    remains significant

    Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

    evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

    international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

    to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

    premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

    what factors influence the premium

    29

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    365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

    Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

    Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

    Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

    corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

    32

    Appendix A Variable Definitions

    We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

    Dependent variable

    Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

    Independent variables

    Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

    Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

    Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

    Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

    CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

    EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

    RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

    Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

    Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

    Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

    33

    CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

    Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

    Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

    Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

    34

    Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

    35

    Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

    2003

    4 6

    2004

    25 38

    2005

    8 12

    2006

    6 9

    2007

    7 11

    2008

    5 8

    2009

    5 8

    2010

    5 8

    2011

    1 2

    66

    Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

    IFRS

    47 71

    Canadian GAAP

    12 18

    Israeli GAAP

    2 3

    Dutch GAAP

    1 2

    Indian GAAP

    1 2

    Japanese GAAP

    1 2

    Norwegian GAAP

    1 2

    Swiss GAAP

    1 2

    66

    36

    (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

    Percent different from US GAAP

    Comparison to sales (p-values)

    N Mean Median

    Mean Median

    Full Sample (2001-2011)

    Sales

    66 236 000

    Net Income

    66 10653 647

    005 lt001

    Assets

    66 1162 126

    lt001 lt001

    Study Sample (2001-2008)

    Sales

    55 257 000

    Net Income

    55 10303 589

    011 lt001

    Assets

    55 1047 099

    003 lt001

    37

    Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

    Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

    Test of Diff (p-value) Value

    Test of Diff (p-value)

    Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

    38

    Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

    This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

    Country

    N (1)

    Sales (millions)

    (2)

    Total Sales (3)

    N (4)

    Sales (million)

    (5)

    Total Sales (6)

    Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

    39

    Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

    40

    Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

    41

    Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

    42

    Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

    43

    Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

    Governance

    No Governance (same sample)

    Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

    CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

    Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

    • Cover for paperpdf
    • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

      1

      1 Introduction

      We investigate whether the degree of international diversification affects firm value for US

      multinational corporations (MNCs) Specifically we determine whether the relative size of the

      foreign operation has a positive negative or no association with the difference between the

      actual observed firm value and an imputed value of the firm (called excess value)1 Our analysis

      points to a statistically and economically significant positive excess value or premium to

      increased foreign operations This is akin to finding that the value of the MNC is greater than the

      sum of its individual parts We subject this finding to a battery of robustness tests to help

      determine whether it is simply an artifact of endogeneity or measurement error problems We fail

      to find evidence that this is the case The finding of a premium is robust across all specifications

      examined In terms of magnitude a one percent increase in the size of the foreign operation is

      associated with an increase of between 019 and 037 in excess value Collectively the

      evidence suggests that on average MNCs create value by organizing a set of otherwise

      independent activities within a multinational network

      A large literature examines whether firms that are industrially diversified trade at a discount

      or premium to non-diversified firms This literature typically finds that industrially diversified

      firms trade at a discount2 A popular method to quantify this valuation effect was developed by

      Berger and Ofek (1995) who compare the actual value of an industrially diversified firm with a

      hypothetical firm whose value is the sum of the imputed values of its individual industrial

      segments As the individual segments of the diversified firm are not traded the imputed value of

      each segment is the observable median firm value of a single-segment (non-diversified) firm

      1 As we study US-based multinational firms throughout the paper we refer to the US as lsquodomesticrsquo and any other country as lsquoforeignrsquo 2 Examples include Lang and Stulz (1994) Berger and Ofek (1995) Laeven and Levine (2007) Schmid and Walter (2009) Ammann Hoechle and Schmid (2012) and Hoechle Schmid Walter and Yermack (2012)

      2

      operating in the same industry The difference between the actual value and the imputed value is

      an estimate of the premium (if positive) or discount (if negative) Evidence of a negative

      association between this excess value measure and a measure of industrial diversification is

      consistent with industrial diversification destroying firm value on average

      While the finding of an industrial diversification discount is quite robust there is

      considerable debate about the interpretation Some argue that the discount is evidence that the

      costs of operating in multiple industries outweigh the benefits (eg Berger and Ofek 1995)

      Others argue that the discount is driven by the types of firms that choose to diversify or the types

      of businesses they invest in when diversifying (Campa and Kedia 2002 Villalonga 2004b) The

      literature that uses this methodology continues to evolve improving our understanding of the

      forces that drive the industrial diversification discount For example the recent study by Hoechle

      et al (2012) finds that a substantial proportion of the discount can be explained by variation in

      corporate governance proxies

      In contrast to the literature on the industrial diversification discount comparatively few

      studies examine how foreign operations affect firm value3 This contrast is surprising because

      descriptive data for US firms indicates that industrial diversification has stagnated while foreign

      expansion continues at a rapid pace We develop a method to quantify the value effects of

      foreign operations along the lines of Berger and Ofek (1995) but that remains applicable to the

      multinational setting While Berger and Ofek (1995) divide each firm into industry segments we

      divide each MNC into geographic-industry segments (ie separate country-industry

      components)4 We then compare the actual value of the firm to the imputed value of the firm

      3 Denis Denis and Yost (2002) is a notable exception 4 In our setting we refer to a lsquosingle-segmentrsquo firm as a firm that operates in only one country and one industry Accordingly we use the term lsquoexcess valuersquo to denote the difference between the actual (observed) firm value and the hypothetical firm value computed as the sum of the imputed values of the individual country-industry segments

      3

      Using a method similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we determine the imputed value for each

      country-industry component by using the median single-segment firm operating exclusively in

      the same country and industry (ie single-segment foreign (domestic) firms in the same industry

      and country are used as benchmarks for the foreign (domestic) operations of US MNCs) In

      other words our approach uses data on the observed firm values of single-segment US firms

      (from Compustat) and foreign firms (from Worldscope)

      This approach to measuring excess value differs from previous methods to impute the firm

      value of MNCs Denis et al (2002) use single-segment domestic firms (ie US firms) in the

      same industry as a benchmark for both domestic and foreign MNC operations Similarly studies

      using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs rely only on domestic benchmarks

      (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

      As growth rates and discount rates vary by country we believe our method is more appropriate

      for measuring valuation effects in a multinational context5 This method in effect compares the

      value of the firm as a whole to the sum of the parts In addition our method is conceptually

      consistent with theories on foreign direct investment (FDI) which note that an MNC exists when

      a firm seeks to exploit its advantages and remove conflict arising in external market transactions

      by combining a firm of one nationality that might otherwise exist independently under the

      ownership of a firm of a different nationality (Dunning and Rugman 1985)

      Our approach leverages data maintained by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) which

      provides detailed accounting information about FDI allowing measurement of sales for each

      5 Denis et al (2002) contemplate the use of single-segment foreign firms as a benchmark noting three constraints to implementing such a procedure (1) the country location of firmsrsquo foreign operations cannot be reliably identified using Compustat data (2) the industry membership of firmsrsquo foreign operations cannot be identified reliably using Compustat data and (3) valuation ratios may differ across countries due to differences in accounting standards As described in our study we overcome each of these constraints and find that the different benchmark is important and reverses prior findings

      4

      country-industry in which US-based MNCs operate These data provide a substantial advantage

      over the Compustat database used by prior research While Compustat provides some

      information about the countries and industries in which these firms operate it is not as detailed

      about either of these dimensions (or their interaction) and heavily relies on managerial disclosure

      choices which could induce measurement bias (Villalonga 2004a) In addition to the new

      method of estimating the value effects of foreign operations we provide evidence that MNCs

      trade at a premium which stands in contrast to the discount documented in Denis et al (2002)

      This difference is primarily attributed to our use of foreign benchmarks to construct the imputed

      values of foreign operations6

      Our finding of a premium better reconciles with the findings in the international trade

      literature By focusing on nonpublic establishment level (eg factory store or office) data the

      trade literature is able to generate relatively precise proxies for total factor productivity (TFP)

      and provides robust evidence that firms engaging in international trade are more productive than

      those that do not (see Helpman 2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Furthermore

      productivity differences tend to be highly persistent even within narrowly defined industries

      (Syverson 2011) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately measure TFP at the firm

      level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor countries Nevertheless

      Helpman Melitz and Yeaple (2004) provide some evidence that US firms engaging in FDI

      have labor productivity advantages over firms that do not Reconciling the discount to

      multinational operations found by Denis et al (2002) to the trade literature requires that the

      persistent productivity advantages of firms engaged in international trade must be more than

      offset by some other cost (eg agency costs) While this relation is possible it is difficult to

      6 We repeat the analysis of Denis et al (2002) for our sample and confirm that differences in value effects of foreign operations are driven by the different methods for measuring the imputed value of foreign operations

      5

      conjecture why the most productive firms would have the largest agency costs In contrast the

      finding of a premium easily reconciles with the trade literature

      Given our result we investigate whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate

      characteristics of firms that choose to invest abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present

      a simple model with heterogeneous productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest

      productivity endowments are the ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign

      subsidiary To the extent productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type

      of firms that choose to invest abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of their

      foreign investments After including firm fixed effects to control for time invariant firm

      characteristics (eg innate productivity advantages) we continue to find economically and

      statistically significant evidence of a premium to foreign operations

      To further account for the endogenous nature of FDI we estimate a dynamic panel data

      model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator developed by Arellano and

      Bond (1991) Arellano and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) This estimator allows

      us to simultaneously account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and

      firm value This method also yields a significant premium which is of similar magnitude and

      significance to that estimated using fixed effects

      We also perform a series of additional robustness tests First we examine whether the

      measured excess value premium is driven by operations in countries with large control premiums

      (Dyck and Zingales 2004) In countries with large control premiums using stock price in the

      calculation of total firm value could underestimate the true value of the benchmark firms and

      thereby induce an excess value premium We fail to find evidence that the excess value premium

      is driven by such countries

      6

      Second we examine whether access to a low cost of capital is a meaningful source of the

      US MNC advantage We incorporate foreign benchmarks in our method of estimating firm

      excess value as it allows us to incorporate attributes of operating in those foreign countries ndash a

      key attribute being the cost of capital Relative to the local benchmarks in foreign countries US

      MNCs have the ability to obtain funds outside the local operating environments either by

      borrowing in the US market or transferring capital internally When competing against firms in

      shallow capital markets with high costs of capital MNCs may have a competitive advantage

      over local foreign companies due to these alternative sources of capital However investors and

      lenders are likely to expect higher rates of return from the additional risk associated with

      operating in these environments making it unclear whether a multinational network will enhance

      value in countries with a high cost of capital In addition foreign firms have some ability to

      access international capital markets which mitigates the advantages to US firms To examine

      whether the cost of capital plays a role in our finding of a premium we include a proxy for the

      extent of operations in countries with higher costs of capital Our results are unaffected by the

      inclusion of the proxy

      Finally we control for several corporate governance proxies which Hoechle et al (2012)

      find to be correlated with excess values (and industrial diversification) While magnitude of the

      premium is virtually unaffected by including these proxies the significance level does decline

      due to the reduced sample size

      Our study contributes to the literature on multinational firms Our new method of estimating

      excess values for multinational firms provides strong evidence of a statistically and economically

      significant premium associated with increased international operations The premium is robust to

      a variety of specifications and controls designed to evaluate alternative explanations In addition

      7

      this result easily reconciles with the international trade literature that establishes a link between

      greater productivity and international operations though we do not find results supporting this as

      the only source of the premium As segment disclosures improve and as new data sources

      become available on multinational activity (eg Bureau Van Dijk) our empirical approach can

      be used to investigate the extent to which the home country of the parent might influence the

      extent with which foreign operations affect firm value (ie by examining non-US based

      MNCs)7 Future studies could also examine the underlying forces affecting the excess value

      premiums across countries

      We also contribute to the understanding of international accounting standards and their

      comparability Many studies seek to compare firms using different accounting standards These

      comparisons generally rely on information generated by a particular accounting regime By

      comparing commonly used metrics (total assets net income and sales) reported for the same

      firm and year across different regimes we provide insights as to the relative comparability across

      standards In particular we find that sales is reported significantly more consistently across

      accounting regimes than the other metrics examined This finding should aid researchers in

      reducing measurement error when comparing accounting information in multinational settings

      The paper proceeds as follows Section 2 discusses the motivation for finding a premium or

      discount to multinational operations Section 3 describes our data and how the excess value of a

      firm is measured A discussion of our independent variables and primary findings is presented in

      Section 4 with additional robustness tests provided in Section 5 Finally Section 6 concludes

      7 As MNCs are ultimately bound by the tax regulatory and legal frameworks of their home country the valuation effect of foreign operations that we document for US-based MNCs may be different in a sample of non-US based MNCs with the same country-industry footprint Theorists refer to these as lsquolocational advantagesrsquo enjoyed by all multinational firms of a given nationality and obtained irrespective of skills or capabilities unique to a particular firm (Yamin 1991) There is also evidence of locational advantages in the market for corporate control (Huizinga and Voget 2009)

      8

      2 Premium versus discount

      In a frictionless world where managers maximize firm value and markets are efficient there

      should be no discount or premium to operating in foreign countries However there are a number

      of forces that may cause actual firm value to deviate from the implied firm value

      On one hand MNCs may have comparative advantages that generate premiums (ie positive

      excess values) relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Having operations in a variety

      of locations that access different supplies of inputs and customers allows the firm to take

      advantage of changing market conditions by shifting operations or products to maximize firm

      value more so than a firm operating in a single country Similarly having access to a variety of

      institutional settings such as different tax codes legal regimes and financial markets can provide

      MNCs with options beyond those available to firms located in a single country

      Another possible factor associated with a premium to multinational operations is the cost of

      capital For operations located in countries with shallow capital markets or weaker creditor

      rights operating within a conglomerate can provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for

      investments and expansion for at least two reasons First as our MNCs are domiciled in the US

      their foreign segments have greater access to US capital markets relative to local competitors in

      the foreign jurisdiction Second cash rich segments with few investment opportunities can

      finance investments in cash poor segments with positive net present value projects (eg Myers

      and Majluf 1984) Consequently diversified firms should be less liquidity constrained and better

      able to shift resources to the most valuable investment opportunities Research has found that

      internal financing is used more often when diversified firms have operations in countries with

      more costly external financing (Desai Foley and Hines 2004) Multinational firms may also be

      relatively more protected than single-country firms when negative shocks hit external capital

      9

      markets (Foley Desai and Forbes 2008) In a recent study Matvos and Seru (2011) find that

      industrially diversified firms perform better than non-diversified firms when external capital

      markets are impaired

      While these arguments suggest that MNCs enjoy certain advantages when the foreign cost of

      capital is high these benefits should be reduced by the additional risk associated with operating a

      business in a high cost of capital environment For example Verizon is a multinational firm

      operating in a number of countries One of the higher cost of capital locations in which they

      operated was Venezuela While the multinational structure of Verizon may have mitigated some

      of the risks associated with operating in a higher cost of capital location the firms was unable to

      eliminate all of these risks In fact in 2007 Verizonrsquos operations in that country were

      nationalized resulting in a net extraordinary loss of $131 million that year8 In other words

      MNC investors are likely to expect higher rates of return to compensate for higher risk which

      likely offsets some (if not all) of the potential excess value premium

      On the other hand multinational firms may incur a discount (ie negative excess values)

      relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Potential reasons for a discount largely rely on

      the existence of agency costs Multinational firms tend to be larger more complex and less

      transparent The combination of complexity and opacity inherent in MNCs reduces a firmrsquos

      reliance on external capital as the cost of such capital increases due to agency costs (Desai et al

      2004) As a result of the reduced reliance on external funds MNCs face a reduced level of

      monitoring As noted by Jensen (1986) managers have incentives to increase firm size beyond

      that which is optimal with overinvestment or misallocation of funds to pet projects If this lack of

      monitoring is in combination with available internal capital empire building becomes easier

      (Hope and Thomas 2008) Furthermore the current segment reporting standards under US 8 See the 10-K of Verizon Communications Inc dated December 31 2007 (footnote 2)

      10

      GAAP only require highly aggregated disclosures of foreign operations and allow for

      considerable managerial discretion As a result operating in multiple countries makes it easier

      for management to hide poor performance ndash either their own or that of a division ndash such that low

      quality managers are more likely to be retained and overcompensated and poorly performing

      divisions retained longer than optimal Other reasons one might expect a discount to be applied

      to multinational firms include higher coordination costs (eg coordinating across different

      cultures and languages) as well as additional risks These risks include exposure to multiple

      political regimes legal regimes economic regulations and currency fluctuations

      Past studies investigate whether foreign operations of US firms enhance or reduce firm

      value However all of these studies benchmark the value of the foreign operations of an MNC to

      US domestic firms For instance Denis et al (2002) determine the implied value of a US

      MNC using domestic (US) single-segment firms in the same industry as a benchmark Studies

      using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs also rely on domestic benchmarks

      (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

      However using a US domestic firm as a benchmark for the value of foreign operations

      implicitly makes two assumptions First this method assumes that the risks and expected growth

      rates of foreign operations are equivalent to those of domestic operations This assumption is

      inconsistent with the findings of Hail and Leuz (2009) which provides evidence that the cost of

      capital varies substantially across countries Second this method assumes that there is excess

      domestic capacity to allow for expansion with profitability similar to current domestic

      operations We relax these assumptions by measuring the imputed value of a foreign component

      of a US firm as if that component operated autonomously within that foreign country (rather

      than in the US) Specifically our multiples allow the cost of capital and expected growth rates

      11

      to vary across not just industry but also country Furthermore our counterfactual does not

      require the assumption that operations be relocated mitigating the production and sales capacity

      concerns

      3 Measuring excess value

      31 Description of excess value

      Figure 1 shows the average percent of foreign sales (based on segment disclosures under US

      GAAP) across firms through time and illustrates that firms are continuing to expand

      internationally9 This expansion highlights the importance of understanding whether the decision

      to operate internationally is on average a value enhancing corporate strategy We contribute to

      this understanding by evaluating whether the firm as a whole is worth more or less than its

      imputed value (ie the firm is valued in excess of the sum of its individual components)

      We measure the excess value of a firm as the logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to

      imputed value based on the method used in Berger and Ofek (1995) The imputed value is the

      hypothetical value of the MNC under the assumption that its country-industry components

      operate as independent entities A key innovation of our study is an alternative approach to

      imputing the value of the foreign operations of an MNC Components of MNCs operating in a

      given industry and country are imputed using the value of single-segment firms operating in the

      same industry and country Thus we ensure the discount rates and expected growth rates are

      applicable to each given industry and location in estimating the implied values of the MNC

      segments

      9 The discontinuity in industrial diversification (the percent of sales outside the primary industry) between 1997 and 1998 is the result of a change in segment reporting rules

      12

      The actual firm values are observable for all firms in our sample The hypothetical firm

      values for multi-segment firms are imputed using market value to sales ratios herein referred to

      as lsquomultiplesrsquo of the median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry Thus

      these single country-industry firms serve as benchmarks for an MNCrsquos operations within that

      same country-industry The imputed value of the country-industry component can be viewed as

      an estimate of what that component would be worth if it operated independently The sum of the

      imputed values across all country-industry components represents the hypothetical value that the

      multi-segment firm would be worth if it were broken apart

      32 Data

      Four primary data sources play a distinct role in carrying out our analysis i) Bureau of

      Economic Analysis (BEA) data ii) Compustat Segment data iii) Worldscope data and iv)

      Compustat Fundamentals Annual data Broadly speaking BEA data provide information about

      the diversified nature of MNCs Compustat Segment data provide information about the

      industrial diversification of US domiciled firms Worldscope data are used to compute

      multiples for single-segment foreign firms that serve as benchmarks for the foreign operations of

      MNCs (ie foreign benchmarks) and Compustat Fundamentals Annual data are used to

      compute multiples for single-segment domestic firms that serve as benchmarks for the domestic

      operations of multinational firms We also use the latter data source to construct our primary

      control variables

      13

      Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

      domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

      observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

      important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

      the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

      identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

      limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

      An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

      not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

      consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

      and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

      Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

      The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

      and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

      due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

      Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

      affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

      interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

      10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

      14

      accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

      we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

      affiliate13

      The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

      (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

      and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

      exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

      utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

      sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

      year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

      ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

      US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

      accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

      data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

      have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

      firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

      our data requirements

      33 Measuring excess value

      The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

      logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

      13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

      15

      Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

      observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

      (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

      Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

      operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

      components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

      by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

      value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

      multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

      obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

      annually

      Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

      multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

      ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

      multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

      for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

      need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

      sales data are measured most consistently

      To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

      accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

      14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

      16

      GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

      prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

      changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

      are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

      A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

      under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

      standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

      though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

      non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

      assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

      standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

      that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

      The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

      estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

      the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

      measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

      Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

      includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

      segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

      higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

      benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

      15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

      17

      means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

      multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

      To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

      firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

      only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

      those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

      We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

      of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

      benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

      the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

      and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

      multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

      To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

      we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

      the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

      represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

      five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

      France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

      firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

      16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

      18

      the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

      representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

      4 Empirical results

      41 Independent variables

      Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

      multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

      of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

      multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

      approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

      analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

      control variables (discussed below)

      We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

      value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

      Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

      and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

      firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

      we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

      for firms that operate in a single business segment

      Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

      long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

      sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

      the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

      19

      advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

      control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

      use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

      firm level

      42 Primary regression analysis

      In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

      activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

      Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

      foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

      (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

      indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

      remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

      column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

      Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

      effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

      46 in column (2)20

      Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

      firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

      2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

      measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

      20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

      20

      countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

      result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

      whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

      abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

      productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

      ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

      To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

      firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

      their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

      productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

      effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

      (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

      on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

      and Denis et al 2002)

      The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

      on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

      methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

      different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

      diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

      a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

      extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

      benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

      21

      more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

      value implications of a multinational network

      5 Robustness

      51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

      Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

      value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

      Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

      their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

      likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

      Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

      robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

      control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

      the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

      and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

      previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

      values

      Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

      lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

      lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

      channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

      Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

      periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

      22

      present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

      dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

      the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

      estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

      We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

      industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

      Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

      treated as endogenous

      Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

      model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

      model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

      explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

      with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

      variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

      (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

      this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

      variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

      The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

      the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

      excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

      diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

      Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

      model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

      23

      serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

      correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

      model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

      test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

      indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

      known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

      the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

      52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

      Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

      value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

      fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

      sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

      expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

      and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

      coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

      operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

      21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

      24

      typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

      these reasons we do not implement an event study

      53 Control premium

      A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

      source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

      enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

      prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

      ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

      firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

      the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

      such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

      MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

      Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

      weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

      included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

      Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

      when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

      value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

      extract large control premiums

      23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

      25

      54 Cost of capital

      As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

      network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

      capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

      establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

      and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

      is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

      between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

      markets in which it operates

      We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

      rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

      imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

      of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

      significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

      (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

      we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

      A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

      do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

      capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

      24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

      26

      55 Corporate governance

      In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

      we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

      governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

      discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

      governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

      are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

      of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

      ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

      (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

      (Governance Index)

      As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

      almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

      None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

      on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

      conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

      sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

      2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

      virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

      the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

      governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

      27

      6 Conclusion

      Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

      domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

      degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

      examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

      incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

      important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

      Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

      increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

      value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

      This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

      firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

      firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

      The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

      whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

      panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

      account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

      we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

      control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

      premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

      in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

      multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

      corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

      28

      industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

      explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

      remains significant

      Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

      evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

      international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

      to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

      premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

      what factors influence the premium

      29

      References

      Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

      Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

      evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

      Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

      components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

      reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

      Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

      Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

      data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

      Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

      and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

      choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

      destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

      Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

      Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

      wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

      International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

      30

      Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

      Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

      Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

      Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

      Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

      Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

      diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

      Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

      Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

      Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

      US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

      firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

      44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

      American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

      discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

      of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

      border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

      Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

      31

      Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

      Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

      of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

      Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

      market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

      Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

      comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

      Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

      165-186

      Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

      Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

      Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

      Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

      365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

      Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

      Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

      Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

      corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

      32

      Appendix A Variable Definitions

      We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

      Dependent variable

      Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

      Independent variables

      Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

      Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

      Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

      Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

      CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

      EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

      RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

      Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

      Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

      Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

      33

      CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

      Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

      Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

      Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

      34

      Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

      35

      Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

      2003

      4 6

      2004

      25 38

      2005

      8 12

      2006

      6 9

      2007

      7 11

      2008

      5 8

      2009

      5 8

      2010

      5 8

      2011

      1 2

      66

      Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

      IFRS

      47 71

      Canadian GAAP

      12 18

      Israeli GAAP

      2 3

      Dutch GAAP

      1 2

      Indian GAAP

      1 2

      Japanese GAAP

      1 2

      Norwegian GAAP

      1 2

      Swiss GAAP

      1 2

      66

      36

      (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

      Percent different from US GAAP

      Comparison to sales (p-values)

      N Mean Median

      Mean Median

      Full Sample (2001-2011)

      Sales

      66 236 000

      Net Income

      66 10653 647

      005 lt001

      Assets

      66 1162 126

      lt001 lt001

      Study Sample (2001-2008)

      Sales

      55 257 000

      Net Income

      55 10303 589

      011 lt001

      Assets

      55 1047 099

      003 lt001

      37

      Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

      Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

      Test of Diff (p-value) Value

      Test of Diff (p-value)

      Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

      38

      Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

      This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

      Country

      N (1)

      Sales (millions)

      (2)

      Total Sales (3)

      N (4)

      Sales (million)

      (5)

      Total Sales (6)

      Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

      39

      Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

      40

      Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

      41

      Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

      42

      Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

      43

      Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

      Governance

      No Governance (same sample)

      Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

      CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

      Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

      • Cover for paperpdf
      • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

        2

        operating in the same industry The difference between the actual value and the imputed value is

        an estimate of the premium (if positive) or discount (if negative) Evidence of a negative

        association between this excess value measure and a measure of industrial diversification is

        consistent with industrial diversification destroying firm value on average

        While the finding of an industrial diversification discount is quite robust there is

        considerable debate about the interpretation Some argue that the discount is evidence that the

        costs of operating in multiple industries outweigh the benefits (eg Berger and Ofek 1995)

        Others argue that the discount is driven by the types of firms that choose to diversify or the types

        of businesses they invest in when diversifying (Campa and Kedia 2002 Villalonga 2004b) The

        literature that uses this methodology continues to evolve improving our understanding of the

        forces that drive the industrial diversification discount For example the recent study by Hoechle

        et al (2012) finds that a substantial proportion of the discount can be explained by variation in

        corporate governance proxies

        In contrast to the literature on the industrial diversification discount comparatively few

        studies examine how foreign operations affect firm value3 This contrast is surprising because

        descriptive data for US firms indicates that industrial diversification has stagnated while foreign

        expansion continues at a rapid pace We develop a method to quantify the value effects of

        foreign operations along the lines of Berger and Ofek (1995) but that remains applicable to the

        multinational setting While Berger and Ofek (1995) divide each firm into industry segments we

        divide each MNC into geographic-industry segments (ie separate country-industry

        components)4 We then compare the actual value of the firm to the imputed value of the firm

        3 Denis Denis and Yost (2002) is a notable exception 4 In our setting we refer to a lsquosingle-segmentrsquo firm as a firm that operates in only one country and one industry Accordingly we use the term lsquoexcess valuersquo to denote the difference between the actual (observed) firm value and the hypothetical firm value computed as the sum of the imputed values of the individual country-industry segments

        3

        Using a method similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we determine the imputed value for each

        country-industry component by using the median single-segment firm operating exclusively in

        the same country and industry (ie single-segment foreign (domestic) firms in the same industry

        and country are used as benchmarks for the foreign (domestic) operations of US MNCs) In

        other words our approach uses data on the observed firm values of single-segment US firms

        (from Compustat) and foreign firms (from Worldscope)

        This approach to measuring excess value differs from previous methods to impute the firm

        value of MNCs Denis et al (2002) use single-segment domestic firms (ie US firms) in the

        same industry as a benchmark for both domestic and foreign MNC operations Similarly studies

        using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs rely only on domestic benchmarks

        (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

        As growth rates and discount rates vary by country we believe our method is more appropriate

        for measuring valuation effects in a multinational context5 This method in effect compares the

        value of the firm as a whole to the sum of the parts In addition our method is conceptually

        consistent with theories on foreign direct investment (FDI) which note that an MNC exists when

        a firm seeks to exploit its advantages and remove conflict arising in external market transactions

        by combining a firm of one nationality that might otherwise exist independently under the

        ownership of a firm of a different nationality (Dunning and Rugman 1985)

        Our approach leverages data maintained by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) which

        provides detailed accounting information about FDI allowing measurement of sales for each

        5 Denis et al (2002) contemplate the use of single-segment foreign firms as a benchmark noting three constraints to implementing such a procedure (1) the country location of firmsrsquo foreign operations cannot be reliably identified using Compustat data (2) the industry membership of firmsrsquo foreign operations cannot be identified reliably using Compustat data and (3) valuation ratios may differ across countries due to differences in accounting standards As described in our study we overcome each of these constraints and find that the different benchmark is important and reverses prior findings

        4

        country-industry in which US-based MNCs operate These data provide a substantial advantage

        over the Compustat database used by prior research While Compustat provides some

        information about the countries and industries in which these firms operate it is not as detailed

        about either of these dimensions (or their interaction) and heavily relies on managerial disclosure

        choices which could induce measurement bias (Villalonga 2004a) In addition to the new

        method of estimating the value effects of foreign operations we provide evidence that MNCs

        trade at a premium which stands in contrast to the discount documented in Denis et al (2002)

        This difference is primarily attributed to our use of foreign benchmarks to construct the imputed

        values of foreign operations6

        Our finding of a premium better reconciles with the findings in the international trade

        literature By focusing on nonpublic establishment level (eg factory store or office) data the

        trade literature is able to generate relatively precise proxies for total factor productivity (TFP)

        and provides robust evidence that firms engaging in international trade are more productive than

        those that do not (see Helpman 2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Furthermore

        productivity differences tend to be highly persistent even within narrowly defined industries

        (Syverson 2011) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately measure TFP at the firm

        level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor countries Nevertheless

        Helpman Melitz and Yeaple (2004) provide some evidence that US firms engaging in FDI

        have labor productivity advantages over firms that do not Reconciling the discount to

        multinational operations found by Denis et al (2002) to the trade literature requires that the

        persistent productivity advantages of firms engaged in international trade must be more than

        offset by some other cost (eg agency costs) While this relation is possible it is difficult to

        6 We repeat the analysis of Denis et al (2002) for our sample and confirm that differences in value effects of foreign operations are driven by the different methods for measuring the imputed value of foreign operations

        5

        conjecture why the most productive firms would have the largest agency costs In contrast the

        finding of a premium easily reconciles with the trade literature

        Given our result we investigate whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate

        characteristics of firms that choose to invest abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present

        a simple model with heterogeneous productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest

        productivity endowments are the ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign

        subsidiary To the extent productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type

        of firms that choose to invest abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of their

        foreign investments After including firm fixed effects to control for time invariant firm

        characteristics (eg innate productivity advantages) we continue to find economically and

        statistically significant evidence of a premium to foreign operations

        To further account for the endogenous nature of FDI we estimate a dynamic panel data

        model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator developed by Arellano and

        Bond (1991) Arellano and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) This estimator allows

        us to simultaneously account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and

        firm value This method also yields a significant premium which is of similar magnitude and

        significance to that estimated using fixed effects

        We also perform a series of additional robustness tests First we examine whether the

        measured excess value premium is driven by operations in countries with large control premiums

        (Dyck and Zingales 2004) In countries with large control premiums using stock price in the

        calculation of total firm value could underestimate the true value of the benchmark firms and

        thereby induce an excess value premium We fail to find evidence that the excess value premium

        is driven by such countries

        6

        Second we examine whether access to a low cost of capital is a meaningful source of the

        US MNC advantage We incorporate foreign benchmarks in our method of estimating firm

        excess value as it allows us to incorporate attributes of operating in those foreign countries ndash a

        key attribute being the cost of capital Relative to the local benchmarks in foreign countries US

        MNCs have the ability to obtain funds outside the local operating environments either by

        borrowing in the US market or transferring capital internally When competing against firms in

        shallow capital markets with high costs of capital MNCs may have a competitive advantage

        over local foreign companies due to these alternative sources of capital However investors and

        lenders are likely to expect higher rates of return from the additional risk associated with

        operating in these environments making it unclear whether a multinational network will enhance

        value in countries with a high cost of capital In addition foreign firms have some ability to

        access international capital markets which mitigates the advantages to US firms To examine

        whether the cost of capital plays a role in our finding of a premium we include a proxy for the

        extent of operations in countries with higher costs of capital Our results are unaffected by the

        inclusion of the proxy

        Finally we control for several corporate governance proxies which Hoechle et al (2012)

        find to be correlated with excess values (and industrial diversification) While magnitude of the

        premium is virtually unaffected by including these proxies the significance level does decline

        due to the reduced sample size

        Our study contributes to the literature on multinational firms Our new method of estimating

        excess values for multinational firms provides strong evidence of a statistically and economically

        significant premium associated with increased international operations The premium is robust to

        a variety of specifications and controls designed to evaluate alternative explanations In addition

        7

        this result easily reconciles with the international trade literature that establishes a link between

        greater productivity and international operations though we do not find results supporting this as

        the only source of the premium As segment disclosures improve and as new data sources

        become available on multinational activity (eg Bureau Van Dijk) our empirical approach can

        be used to investigate the extent to which the home country of the parent might influence the

        extent with which foreign operations affect firm value (ie by examining non-US based

        MNCs)7 Future studies could also examine the underlying forces affecting the excess value

        premiums across countries

        We also contribute to the understanding of international accounting standards and their

        comparability Many studies seek to compare firms using different accounting standards These

        comparisons generally rely on information generated by a particular accounting regime By

        comparing commonly used metrics (total assets net income and sales) reported for the same

        firm and year across different regimes we provide insights as to the relative comparability across

        standards In particular we find that sales is reported significantly more consistently across

        accounting regimes than the other metrics examined This finding should aid researchers in

        reducing measurement error when comparing accounting information in multinational settings

        The paper proceeds as follows Section 2 discusses the motivation for finding a premium or

        discount to multinational operations Section 3 describes our data and how the excess value of a

        firm is measured A discussion of our independent variables and primary findings is presented in

        Section 4 with additional robustness tests provided in Section 5 Finally Section 6 concludes

        7 As MNCs are ultimately bound by the tax regulatory and legal frameworks of their home country the valuation effect of foreign operations that we document for US-based MNCs may be different in a sample of non-US based MNCs with the same country-industry footprint Theorists refer to these as lsquolocational advantagesrsquo enjoyed by all multinational firms of a given nationality and obtained irrespective of skills or capabilities unique to a particular firm (Yamin 1991) There is also evidence of locational advantages in the market for corporate control (Huizinga and Voget 2009)

        8

        2 Premium versus discount

        In a frictionless world where managers maximize firm value and markets are efficient there

        should be no discount or premium to operating in foreign countries However there are a number

        of forces that may cause actual firm value to deviate from the implied firm value

        On one hand MNCs may have comparative advantages that generate premiums (ie positive

        excess values) relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Having operations in a variety

        of locations that access different supplies of inputs and customers allows the firm to take

        advantage of changing market conditions by shifting operations or products to maximize firm

        value more so than a firm operating in a single country Similarly having access to a variety of

        institutional settings such as different tax codes legal regimes and financial markets can provide

        MNCs with options beyond those available to firms located in a single country

        Another possible factor associated with a premium to multinational operations is the cost of

        capital For operations located in countries with shallow capital markets or weaker creditor

        rights operating within a conglomerate can provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for

        investments and expansion for at least two reasons First as our MNCs are domiciled in the US

        their foreign segments have greater access to US capital markets relative to local competitors in

        the foreign jurisdiction Second cash rich segments with few investment opportunities can

        finance investments in cash poor segments with positive net present value projects (eg Myers

        and Majluf 1984) Consequently diversified firms should be less liquidity constrained and better

        able to shift resources to the most valuable investment opportunities Research has found that

        internal financing is used more often when diversified firms have operations in countries with

        more costly external financing (Desai Foley and Hines 2004) Multinational firms may also be

        relatively more protected than single-country firms when negative shocks hit external capital

        9

        markets (Foley Desai and Forbes 2008) In a recent study Matvos and Seru (2011) find that

        industrially diversified firms perform better than non-diversified firms when external capital

        markets are impaired

        While these arguments suggest that MNCs enjoy certain advantages when the foreign cost of

        capital is high these benefits should be reduced by the additional risk associated with operating a

        business in a high cost of capital environment For example Verizon is a multinational firm

        operating in a number of countries One of the higher cost of capital locations in which they

        operated was Venezuela While the multinational structure of Verizon may have mitigated some

        of the risks associated with operating in a higher cost of capital location the firms was unable to

        eliminate all of these risks In fact in 2007 Verizonrsquos operations in that country were

        nationalized resulting in a net extraordinary loss of $131 million that year8 In other words

        MNC investors are likely to expect higher rates of return to compensate for higher risk which

        likely offsets some (if not all) of the potential excess value premium

        On the other hand multinational firms may incur a discount (ie negative excess values)

        relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Potential reasons for a discount largely rely on

        the existence of agency costs Multinational firms tend to be larger more complex and less

        transparent The combination of complexity and opacity inherent in MNCs reduces a firmrsquos

        reliance on external capital as the cost of such capital increases due to agency costs (Desai et al

        2004) As a result of the reduced reliance on external funds MNCs face a reduced level of

        monitoring As noted by Jensen (1986) managers have incentives to increase firm size beyond

        that which is optimal with overinvestment or misallocation of funds to pet projects If this lack of

        monitoring is in combination with available internal capital empire building becomes easier

        (Hope and Thomas 2008) Furthermore the current segment reporting standards under US 8 See the 10-K of Verizon Communications Inc dated December 31 2007 (footnote 2)

        10

        GAAP only require highly aggregated disclosures of foreign operations and allow for

        considerable managerial discretion As a result operating in multiple countries makes it easier

        for management to hide poor performance ndash either their own or that of a division ndash such that low

        quality managers are more likely to be retained and overcompensated and poorly performing

        divisions retained longer than optimal Other reasons one might expect a discount to be applied

        to multinational firms include higher coordination costs (eg coordinating across different

        cultures and languages) as well as additional risks These risks include exposure to multiple

        political regimes legal regimes economic regulations and currency fluctuations

        Past studies investigate whether foreign operations of US firms enhance or reduce firm

        value However all of these studies benchmark the value of the foreign operations of an MNC to

        US domestic firms For instance Denis et al (2002) determine the implied value of a US

        MNC using domestic (US) single-segment firms in the same industry as a benchmark Studies

        using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs also rely on domestic benchmarks

        (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

        However using a US domestic firm as a benchmark for the value of foreign operations

        implicitly makes two assumptions First this method assumes that the risks and expected growth

        rates of foreign operations are equivalent to those of domestic operations This assumption is

        inconsistent with the findings of Hail and Leuz (2009) which provides evidence that the cost of

        capital varies substantially across countries Second this method assumes that there is excess

        domestic capacity to allow for expansion with profitability similar to current domestic

        operations We relax these assumptions by measuring the imputed value of a foreign component

        of a US firm as if that component operated autonomously within that foreign country (rather

        than in the US) Specifically our multiples allow the cost of capital and expected growth rates

        11

        to vary across not just industry but also country Furthermore our counterfactual does not

        require the assumption that operations be relocated mitigating the production and sales capacity

        concerns

        3 Measuring excess value

        31 Description of excess value

        Figure 1 shows the average percent of foreign sales (based on segment disclosures under US

        GAAP) across firms through time and illustrates that firms are continuing to expand

        internationally9 This expansion highlights the importance of understanding whether the decision

        to operate internationally is on average a value enhancing corporate strategy We contribute to

        this understanding by evaluating whether the firm as a whole is worth more or less than its

        imputed value (ie the firm is valued in excess of the sum of its individual components)

        We measure the excess value of a firm as the logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to

        imputed value based on the method used in Berger and Ofek (1995) The imputed value is the

        hypothetical value of the MNC under the assumption that its country-industry components

        operate as independent entities A key innovation of our study is an alternative approach to

        imputing the value of the foreign operations of an MNC Components of MNCs operating in a

        given industry and country are imputed using the value of single-segment firms operating in the

        same industry and country Thus we ensure the discount rates and expected growth rates are

        applicable to each given industry and location in estimating the implied values of the MNC

        segments

        9 The discontinuity in industrial diversification (the percent of sales outside the primary industry) between 1997 and 1998 is the result of a change in segment reporting rules

        12

        The actual firm values are observable for all firms in our sample The hypothetical firm

        values for multi-segment firms are imputed using market value to sales ratios herein referred to

        as lsquomultiplesrsquo of the median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry Thus

        these single country-industry firms serve as benchmarks for an MNCrsquos operations within that

        same country-industry The imputed value of the country-industry component can be viewed as

        an estimate of what that component would be worth if it operated independently The sum of the

        imputed values across all country-industry components represents the hypothetical value that the

        multi-segment firm would be worth if it were broken apart

        32 Data

        Four primary data sources play a distinct role in carrying out our analysis i) Bureau of

        Economic Analysis (BEA) data ii) Compustat Segment data iii) Worldscope data and iv)

        Compustat Fundamentals Annual data Broadly speaking BEA data provide information about

        the diversified nature of MNCs Compustat Segment data provide information about the

        industrial diversification of US domiciled firms Worldscope data are used to compute

        multiples for single-segment foreign firms that serve as benchmarks for the foreign operations of

        MNCs (ie foreign benchmarks) and Compustat Fundamentals Annual data are used to

        compute multiples for single-segment domestic firms that serve as benchmarks for the domestic

        operations of multinational firms We also use the latter data source to construct our primary

        control variables

        13

        Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

        domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

        observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

        important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

        the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

        identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

        limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

        An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

        not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

        consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

        and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

        Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

        The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

        and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

        due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

        Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

        affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

        interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

        10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

        14

        accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

        we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

        affiliate13

        The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

        (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

        and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

        exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

        utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

        sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

        year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

        ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

        US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

        accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

        data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

        have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

        firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

        our data requirements

        33 Measuring excess value

        The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

        logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

        13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

        15

        Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

        observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

        (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

        Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

        operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

        components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

        by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

        value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

        multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

        obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

        annually

        Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

        multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

        ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

        multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

        for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

        need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

        sales data are measured most consistently

        To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

        accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

        14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

        16

        GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

        prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

        changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

        are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

        A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

        under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

        standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

        though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

        non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

        assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

        standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

        that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

        The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

        estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

        the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

        measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

        Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

        includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

        segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

        higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

        benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

        15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

        17

        means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

        multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

        To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

        firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

        only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

        those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

        We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

        of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

        benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

        the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

        and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

        multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

        To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

        we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

        the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

        represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

        five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

        France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

        firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

        16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

        18

        the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

        representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

        4 Empirical results

        41 Independent variables

        Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

        multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

        of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

        multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

        approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

        analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

        control variables (discussed below)

        We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

        value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

        Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

        and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

        firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

        we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

        for firms that operate in a single business segment

        Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

        long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

        sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

        the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

        19

        advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

        control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

        use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

        firm level

        42 Primary regression analysis

        In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

        activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

        Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

        foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

        (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

        indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

        remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

        column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

        Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

        effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

        46 in column (2)20

        Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

        firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

        2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

        measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

        20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

        20

        countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

        result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

        whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

        abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

        productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

        ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

        To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

        firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

        their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

        productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

        effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

        (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

        on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

        and Denis et al 2002)

        The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

        on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

        methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

        different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

        diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

        a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

        extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

        benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

        21

        more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

        value implications of a multinational network

        5 Robustness

        51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

        Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

        value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

        Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

        their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

        likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

        Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

        robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

        control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

        the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

        and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

        previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

        values

        Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

        lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

        lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

        channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

        Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

        periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

        22

        present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

        dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

        the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

        estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

        We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

        industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

        Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

        treated as endogenous

        Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

        model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

        model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

        explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

        with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

        variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

        (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

        this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

        variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

        The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

        the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

        excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

        diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

        Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

        model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

        23

        serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

        correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

        model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

        test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

        indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

        known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

        the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

        52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

        Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

        value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

        fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

        sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

        expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

        and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

        coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

        operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

        21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

        24

        typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

        these reasons we do not implement an event study

        53 Control premium

        A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

        source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

        enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

        prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

        ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

        firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

        the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

        such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

        MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

        Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

        weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

        included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

        Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

        when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

        value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

        extract large control premiums

        23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

        25

        54 Cost of capital

        As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

        network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

        capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

        establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

        and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

        is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

        between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

        markets in which it operates

        We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

        rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

        imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

        of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

        significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

        (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

        we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

        A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

        do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

        capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

        24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

        26

        55 Corporate governance

        In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

        we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

        governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

        discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

        governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

        are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

        of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

        ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

        (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

        (Governance Index)

        As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

        almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

        None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

        on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

        conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

        sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

        2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

        virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

        the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

        governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

        27

        6 Conclusion

        Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

        domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

        degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

        examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

        incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

        important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

        Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

        increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

        value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

        This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

        firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

        firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

        The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

        whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

        panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

        account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

        we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

        control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

        premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

        in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

        multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

        corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

        28

        industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

        explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

        remains significant

        Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

        evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

        international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

        to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

        premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

        what factors influence the premium

        29

        References

        Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

        Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

        evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

        Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

        components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

        reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

        Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

        Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

        data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

        Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

        and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

        choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

        destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

        Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

        Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

        wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

        International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

        30

        Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

        Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

        Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

        Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

        Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

        Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

        diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

        Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

        Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

        Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

        US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

        firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

        44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

        American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

        discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

        of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

        border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

        Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

        31

        Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

        Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

        of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

        Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

        market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

        Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

        comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

        Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

        165-186

        Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

        Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

        Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

        Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

        365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

        Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

        Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

        Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

        corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

        32

        Appendix A Variable Definitions

        We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

        Dependent variable

        Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

        Independent variables

        Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

        Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

        Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

        Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

        CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

        EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

        RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

        Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

        Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

        Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

        33

        CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

        Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

        Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

        Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

        34

        Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

        35

        Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

        2003

        4 6

        2004

        25 38

        2005

        8 12

        2006

        6 9

        2007

        7 11

        2008

        5 8

        2009

        5 8

        2010

        5 8

        2011

        1 2

        66

        Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

        IFRS

        47 71

        Canadian GAAP

        12 18

        Israeli GAAP

        2 3

        Dutch GAAP

        1 2

        Indian GAAP

        1 2

        Japanese GAAP

        1 2

        Norwegian GAAP

        1 2

        Swiss GAAP

        1 2

        66

        36

        (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

        Percent different from US GAAP

        Comparison to sales (p-values)

        N Mean Median

        Mean Median

        Full Sample (2001-2011)

        Sales

        66 236 000

        Net Income

        66 10653 647

        005 lt001

        Assets

        66 1162 126

        lt001 lt001

        Study Sample (2001-2008)

        Sales

        55 257 000

        Net Income

        55 10303 589

        011 lt001

        Assets

        55 1047 099

        003 lt001

        37

        Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

        Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

        Test of Diff (p-value) Value

        Test of Diff (p-value)

        Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

        38

        Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

        This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

        Country

        N (1)

        Sales (millions)

        (2)

        Total Sales (3)

        N (4)

        Sales (million)

        (5)

        Total Sales (6)

        Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

        39

        Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

        40

        Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

        41

        Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

        42

        Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

        43

        Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

        Governance

        No Governance (same sample)

        Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

        CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

        Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

        • Cover for paperpdf
        • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

          3

          Using a method similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we determine the imputed value for each

          country-industry component by using the median single-segment firm operating exclusively in

          the same country and industry (ie single-segment foreign (domestic) firms in the same industry

          and country are used as benchmarks for the foreign (domestic) operations of US MNCs) In

          other words our approach uses data on the observed firm values of single-segment US firms

          (from Compustat) and foreign firms (from Worldscope)

          This approach to measuring excess value differs from previous methods to impute the firm

          value of MNCs Denis et al (2002) use single-segment domestic firms (ie US firms) in the

          same industry as a benchmark for both domestic and foreign MNC operations Similarly studies

          using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs rely only on domestic benchmarks

          (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

          As growth rates and discount rates vary by country we believe our method is more appropriate

          for measuring valuation effects in a multinational context5 This method in effect compares the

          value of the firm as a whole to the sum of the parts In addition our method is conceptually

          consistent with theories on foreign direct investment (FDI) which note that an MNC exists when

          a firm seeks to exploit its advantages and remove conflict arising in external market transactions

          by combining a firm of one nationality that might otherwise exist independently under the

          ownership of a firm of a different nationality (Dunning and Rugman 1985)

          Our approach leverages data maintained by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) which

          provides detailed accounting information about FDI allowing measurement of sales for each

          5 Denis et al (2002) contemplate the use of single-segment foreign firms as a benchmark noting three constraints to implementing such a procedure (1) the country location of firmsrsquo foreign operations cannot be reliably identified using Compustat data (2) the industry membership of firmsrsquo foreign operations cannot be identified reliably using Compustat data and (3) valuation ratios may differ across countries due to differences in accounting standards As described in our study we overcome each of these constraints and find that the different benchmark is important and reverses prior findings

          4

          country-industry in which US-based MNCs operate These data provide a substantial advantage

          over the Compustat database used by prior research While Compustat provides some

          information about the countries and industries in which these firms operate it is not as detailed

          about either of these dimensions (or their interaction) and heavily relies on managerial disclosure

          choices which could induce measurement bias (Villalonga 2004a) In addition to the new

          method of estimating the value effects of foreign operations we provide evidence that MNCs

          trade at a premium which stands in contrast to the discount documented in Denis et al (2002)

          This difference is primarily attributed to our use of foreign benchmarks to construct the imputed

          values of foreign operations6

          Our finding of a premium better reconciles with the findings in the international trade

          literature By focusing on nonpublic establishment level (eg factory store or office) data the

          trade literature is able to generate relatively precise proxies for total factor productivity (TFP)

          and provides robust evidence that firms engaging in international trade are more productive than

          those that do not (see Helpman 2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Furthermore

          productivity differences tend to be highly persistent even within narrowly defined industries

          (Syverson 2011) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately measure TFP at the firm

          level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor countries Nevertheless

          Helpman Melitz and Yeaple (2004) provide some evidence that US firms engaging in FDI

          have labor productivity advantages over firms that do not Reconciling the discount to

          multinational operations found by Denis et al (2002) to the trade literature requires that the

          persistent productivity advantages of firms engaged in international trade must be more than

          offset by some other cost (eg agency costs) While this relation is possible it is difficult to

          6 We repeat the analysis of Denis et al (2002) for our sample and confirm that differences in value effects of foreign operations are driven by the different methods for measuring the imputed value of foreign operations

          5

          conjecture why the most productive firms would have the largest agency costs In contrast the

          finding of a premium easily reconciles with the trade literature

          Given our result we investigate whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate

          characteristics of firms that choose to invest abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present

          a simple model with heterogeneous productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest

          productivity endowments are the ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign

          subsidiary To the extent productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type

          of firms that choose to invest abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of their

          foreign investments After including firm fixed effects to control for time invariant firm

          characteristics (eg innate productivity advantages) we continue to find economically and

          statistically significant evidence of a premium to foreign operations

          To further account for the endogenous nature of FDI we estimate a dynamic panel data

          model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator developed by Arellano and

          Bond (1991) Arellano and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) This estimator allows

          us to simultaneously account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and

          firm value This method also yields a significant premium which is of similar magnitude and

          significance to that estimated using fixed effects

          We also perform a series of additional robustness tests First we examine whether the

          measured excess value premium is driven by operations in countries with large control premiums

          (Dyck and Zingales 2004) In countries with large control premiums using stock price in the

          calculation of total firm value could underestimate the true value of the benchmark firms and

          thereby induce an excess value premium We fail to find evidence that the excess value premium

          is driven by such countries

          6

          Second we examine whether access to a low cost of capital is a meaningful source of the

          US MNC advantage We incorporate foreign benchmarks in our method of estimating firm

          excess value as it allows us to incorporate attributes of operating in those foreign countries ndash a

          key attribute being the cost of capital Relative to the local benchmarks in foreign countries US

          MNCs have the ability to obtain funds outside the local operating environments either by

          borrowing in the US market or transferring capital internally When competing against firms in

          shallow capital markets with high costs of capital MNCs may have a competitive advantage

          over local foreign companies due to these alternative sources of capital However investors and

          lenders are likely to expect higher rates of return from the additional risk associated with

          operating in these environments making it unclear whether a multinational network will enhance

          value in countries with a high cost of capital In addition foreign firms have some ability to

          access international capital markets which mitigates the advantages to US firms To examine

          whether the cost of capital plays a role in our finding of a premium we include a proxy for the

          extent of operations in countries with higher costs of capital Our results are unaffected by the

          inclusion of the proxy

          Finally we control for several corporate governance proxies which Hoechle et al (2012)

          find to be correlated with excess values (and industrial diversification) While magnitude of the

          premium is virtually unaffected by including these proxies the significance level does decline

          due to the reduced sample size

          Our study contributes to the literature on multinational firms Our new method of estimating

          excess values for multinational firms provides strong evidence of a statistically and economically

          significant premium associated with increased international operations The premium is robust to

          a variety of specifications and controls designed to evaluate alternative explanations In addition

          7

          this result easily reconciles with the international trade literature that establishes a link between

          greater productivity and international operations though we do not find results supporting this as

          the only source of the premium As segment disclosures improve and as new data sources

          become available on multinational activity (eg Bureau Van Dijk) our empirical approach can

          be used to investigate the extent to which the home country of the parent might influence the

          extent with which foreign operations affect firm value (ie by examining non-US based

          MNCs)7 Future studies could also examine the underlying forces affecting the excess value

          premiums across countries

          We also contribute to the understanding of international accounting standards and their

          comparability Many studies seek to compare firms using different accounting standards These

          comparisons generally rely on information generated by a particular accounting regime By

          comparing commonly used metrics (total assets net income and sales) reported for the same

          firm and year across different regimes we provide insights as to the relative comparability across

          standards In particular we find that sales is reported significantly more consistently across

          accounting regimes than the other metrics examined This finding should aid researchers in

          reducing measurement error when comparing accounting information in multinational settings

          The paper proceeds as follows Section 2 discusses the motivation for finding a premium or

          discount to multinational operations Section 3 describes our data and how the excess value of a

          firm is measured A discussion of our independent variables and primary findings is presented in

          Section 4 with additional robustness tests provided in Section 5 Finally Section 6 concludes

          7 As MNCs are ultimately bound by the tax regulatory and legal frameworks of their home country the valuation effect of foreign operations that we document for US-based MNCs may be different in a sample of non-US based MNCs with the same country-industry footprint Theorists refer to these as lsquolocational advantagesrsquo enjoyed by all multinational firms of a given nationality and obtained irrespective of skills or capabilities unique to a particular firm (Yamin 1991) There is also evidence of locational advantages in the market for corporate control (Huizinga and Voget 2009)

          8

          2 Premium versus discount

          In a frictionless world where managers maximize firm value and markets are efficient there

          should be no discount or premium to operating in foreign countries However there are a number

          of forces that may cause actual firm value to deviate from the implied firm value

          On one hand MNCs may have comparative advantages that generate premiums (ie positive

          excess values) relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Having operations in a variety

          of locations that access different supplies of inputs and customers allows the firm to take

          advantage of changing market conditions by shifting operations or products to maximize firm

          value more so than a firm operating in a single country Similarly having access to a variety of

          institutional settings such as different tax codes legal regimes and financial markets can provide

          MNCs with options beyond those available to firms located in a single country

          Another possible factor associated with a premium to multinational operations is the cost of

          capital For operations located in countries with shallow capital markets or weaker creditor

          rights operating within a conglomerate can provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for

          investments and expansion for at least two reasons First as our MNCs are domiciled in the US

          their foreign segments have greater access to US capital markets relative to local competitors in

          the foreign jurisdiction Second cash rich segments with few investment opportunities can

          finance investments in cash poor segments with positive net present value projects (eg Myers

          and Majluf 1984) Consequently diversified firms should be less liquidity constrained and better

          able to shift resources to the most valuable investment opportunities Research has found that

          internal financing is used more often when diversified firms have operations in countries with

          more costly external financing (Desai Foley and Hines 2004) Multinational firms may also be

          relatively more protected than single-country firms when negative shocks hit external capital

          9

          markets (Foley Desai and Forbes 2008) In a recent study Matvos and Seru (2011) find that

          industrially diversified firms perform better than non-diversified firms when external capital

          markets are impaired

          While these arguments suggest that MNCs enjoy certain advantages when the foreign cost of

          capital is high these benefits should be reduced by the additional risk associated with operating a

          business in a high cost of capital environment For example Verizon is a multinational firm

          operating in a number of countries One of the higher cost of capital locations in which they

          operated was Venezuela While the multinational structure of Verizon may have mitigated some

          of the risks associated with operating in a higher cost of capital location the firms was unable to

          eliminate all of these risks In fact in 2007 Verizonrsquos operations in that country were

          nationalized resulting in a net extraordinary loss of $131 million that year8 In other words

          MNC investors are likely to expect higher rates of return to compensate for higher risk which

          likely offsets some (if not all) of the potential excess value premium

          On the other hand multinational firms may incur a discount (ie negative excess values)

          relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Potential reasons for a discount largely rely on

          the existence of agency costs Multinational firms tend to be larger more complex and less

          transparent The combination of complexity and opacity inherent in MNCs reduces a firmrsquos

          reliance on external capital as the cost of such capital increases due to agency costs (Desai et al

          2004) As a result of the reduced reliance on external funds MNCs face a reduced level of

          monitoring As noted by Jensen (1986) managers have incentives to increase firm size beyond

          that which is optimal with overinvestment or misallocation of funds to pet projects If this lack of

          monitoring is in combination with available internal capital empire building becomes easier

          (Hope and Thomas 2008) Furthermore the current segment reporting standards under US 8 See the 10-K of Verizon Communications Inc dated December 31 2007 (footnote 2)

          10

          GAAP only require highly aggregated disclosures of foreign operations and allow for

          considerable managerial discretion As a result operating in multiple countries makes it easier

          for management to hide poor performance ndash either their own or that of a division ndash such that low

          quality managers are more likely to be retained and overcompensated and poorly performing

          divisions retained longer than optimal Other reasons one might expect a discount to be applied

          to multinational firms include higher coordination costs (eg coordinating across different

          cultures and languages) as well as additional risks These risks include exposure to multiple

          political regimes legal regimes economic regulations and currency fluctuations

          Past studies investigate whether foreign operations of US firms enhance or reduce firm

          value However all of these studies benchmark the value of the foreign operations of an MNC to

          US domestic firms For instance Denis et al (2002) determine the implied value of a US

          MNC using domestic (US) single-segment firms in the same industry as a benchmark Studies

          using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs also rely on domestic benchmarks

          (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

          However using a US domestic firm as a benchmark for the value of foreign operations

          implicitly makes two assumptions First this method assumes that the risks and expected growth

          rates of foreign operations are equivalent to those of domestic operations This assumption is

          inconsistent with the findings of Hail and Leuz (2009) which provides evidence that the cost of

          capital varies substantially across countries Second this method assumes that there is excess

          domestic capacity to allow for expansion with profitability similar to current domestic

          operations We relax these assumptions by measuring the imputed value of a foreign component

          of a US firm as if that component operated autonomously within that foreign country (rather

          than in the US) Specifically our multiples allow the cost of capital and expected growth rates

          11

          to vary across not just industry but also country Furthermore our counterfactual does not

          require the assumption that operations be relocated mitigating the production and sales capacity

          concerns

          3 Measuring excess value

          31 Description of excess value

          Figure 1 shows the average percent of foreign sales (based on segment disclosures under US

          GAAP) across firms through time and illustrates that firms are continuing to expand

          internationally9 This expansion highlights the importance of understanding whether the decision

          to operate internationally is on average a value enhancing corporate strategy We contribute to

          this understanding by evaluating whether the firm as a whole is worth more or less than its

          imputed value (ie the firm is valued in excess of the sum of its individual components)

          We measure the excess value of a firm as the logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to

          imputed value based on the method used in Berger and Ofek (1995) The imputed value is the

          hypothetical value of the MNC under the assumption that its country-industry components

          operate as independent entities A key innovation of our study is an alternative approach to

          imputing the value of the foreign operations of an MNC Components of MNCs operating in a

          given industry and country are imputed using the value of single-segment firms operating in the

          same industry and country Thus we ensure the discount rates and expected growth rates are

          applicable to each given industry and location in estimating the implied values of the MNC

          segments

          9 The discontinuity in industrial diversification (the percent of sales outside the primary industry) between 1997 and 1998 is the result of a change in segment reporting rules

          12

          The actual firm values are observable for all firms in our sample The hypothetical firm

          values for multi-segment firms are imputed using market value to sales ratios herein referred to

          as lsquomultiplesrsquo of the median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry Thus

          these single country-industry firms serve as benchmarks for an MNCrsquos operations within that

          same country-industry The imputed value of the country-industry component can be viewed as

          an estimate of what that component would be worth if it operated independently The sum of the

          imputed values across all country-industry components represents the hypothetical value that the

          multi-segment firm would be worth if it were broken apart

          32 Data

          Four primary data sources play a distinct role in carrying out our analysis i) Bureau of

          Economic Analysis (BEA) data ii) Compustat Segment data iii) Worldscope data and iv)

          Compustat Fundamentals Annual data Broadly speaking BEA data provide information about

          the diversified nature of MNCs Compustat Segment data provide information about the

          industrial diversification of US domiciled firms Worldscope data are used to compute

          multiples for single-segment foreign firms that serve as benchmarks for the foreign operations of

          MNCs (ie foreign benchmarks) and Compustat Fundamentals Annual data are used to

          compute multiples for single-segment domestic firms that serve as benchmarks for the domestic

          operations of multinational firms We also use the latter data source to construct our primary

          control variables

          13

          Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

          domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

          observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

          important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

          the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

          identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

          limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

          An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

          not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

          consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

          and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

          Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

          The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

          and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

          due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

          Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

          affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

          interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

          10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

          14

          accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

          we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

          affiliate13

          The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

          (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

          and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

          exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

          utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

          sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

          year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

          ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

          US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

          accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

          data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

          have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

          firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

          our data requirements

          33 Measuring excess value

          The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

          logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

          13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

          15

          Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

          observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

          (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

          Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

          operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

          components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

          by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

          value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

          multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

          obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

          annually

          Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

          multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

          ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

          multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

          for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

          need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

          sales data are measured most consistently

          To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

          accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

          14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

          16

          GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

          prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

          changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

          are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

          A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

          under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

          standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

          though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

          non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

          assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

          standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

          that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

          The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

          estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

          the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

          measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

          Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

          includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

          segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

          higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

          benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

          15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

          17

          means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

          multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

          To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

          firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

          only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

          those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

          We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

          of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

          benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

          the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

          and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

          multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

          To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

          we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

          the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

          represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

          five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

          France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

          firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

          16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

          18

          the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

          representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

          4 Empirical results

          41 Independent variables

          Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

          multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

          of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

          multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

          approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

          analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

          control variables (discussed below)

          We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

          value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

          Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

          and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

          firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

          we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

          for firms that operate in a single business segment

          Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

          long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

          sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

          the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

          19

          advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

          control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

          use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

          firm level

          42 Primary regression analysis

          In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

          activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

          Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

          foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

          (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

          indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

          remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

          column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

          Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

          effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

          46 in column (2)20

          Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

          firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

          2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

          measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

          20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

          20

          countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

          result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

          whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

          abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

          productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

          ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

          To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

          firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

          their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

          productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

          effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

          (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

          on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

          and Denis et al 2002)

          The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

          on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

          methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

          different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

          diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

          a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

          extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

          benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

          21

          more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

          value implications of a multinational network

          5 Robustness

          51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

          Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

          value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

          Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

          their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

          likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

          Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

          robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

          control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

          the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

          and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

          previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

          values

          Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

          lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

          lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

          channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

          Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

          periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

          22

          present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

          dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

          the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

          estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

          We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

          industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

          Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

          treated as endogenous

          Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

          model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

          model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

          explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

          with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

          variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

          (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

          this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

          variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

          The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

          the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

          excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

          diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

          Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

          model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

          23

          serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

          correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

          model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

          test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

          indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

          known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

          the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

          52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

          Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

          value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

          fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

          sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

          expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

          and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

          coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

          operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

          21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

          24

          typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

          these reasons we do not implement an event study

          53 Control premium

          A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

          source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

          enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

          prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

          ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

          firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

          the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

          such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

          MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

          Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

          weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

          included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

          Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

          when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

          value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

          extract large control premiums

          23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

          25

          54 Cost of capital

          As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

          network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

          capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

          establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

          and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

          is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

          between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

          markets in which it operates

          We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

          rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

          imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

          of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

          significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

          (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

          we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

          A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

          do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

          capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

          24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

          26

          55 Corporate governance

          In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

          we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

          governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

          discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

          governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

          are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

          of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

          ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

          (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

          (Governance Index)

          As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

          almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

          None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

          on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

          conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

          sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

          2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

          virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

          the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

          governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

          27

          6 Conclusion

          Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

          domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

          degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

          examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

          incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

          important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

          Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

          increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

          value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

          This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

          firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

          firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

          The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

          whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

          panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

          account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

          we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

          control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

          premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

          in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

          multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

          corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

          28

          industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

          explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

          remains significant

          Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

          evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

          international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

          to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

          premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

          what factors influence the premium

          29

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          Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

          Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

          evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

          Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

          components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

          reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

          Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

          Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

          data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

          Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

          and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

          choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

          destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

          Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

          Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

          wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

          International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

          30

          Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

          Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

          Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

          Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

          Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

          Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

          diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

          Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

          Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

          Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

          US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

          firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

          44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

          American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

          discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

          of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

          border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

          Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

          31

          Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

          Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

          of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

          Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

          market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

          Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

          comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

          Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

          165-186

          Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

          Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

          Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

          Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

          365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

          Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

          Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

          Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

          corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

          32

          Appendix A Variable Definitions

          We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

          Dependent variable

          Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

          Independent variables

          Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

          Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

          Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

          Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

          CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

          EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

          RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

          Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

          Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

          Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

          33

          CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

          Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

          Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

          Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

          34

          Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

          35

          Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

          2003

          4 6

          2004

          25 38

          2005

          8 12

          2006

          6 9

          2007

          7 11

          2008

          5 8

          2009

          5 8

          2010

          5 8

          2011

          1 2

          66

          Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

          IFRS

          47 71

          Canadian GAAP

          12 18

          Israeli GAAP

          2 3

          Dutch GAAP

          1 2

          Indian GAAP

          1 2

          Japanese GAAP

          1 2

          Norwegian GAAP

          1 2

          Swiss GAAP

          1 2

          66

          36

          (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

          Percent different from US GAAP

          Comparison to sales (p-values)

          N Mean Median

          Mean Median

          Full Sample (2001-2011)

          Sales

          66 236 000

          Net Income

          66 10653 647

          005 lt001

          Assets

          66 1162 126

          lt001 lt001

          Study Sample (2001-2008)

          Sales

          55 257 000

          Net Income

          55 10303 589

          011 lt001

          Assets

          55 1047 099

          003 lt001

          37

          Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

          Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

          Test of Diff (p-value) Value

          Test of Diff (p-value)

          Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

          38

          Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

          This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

          Country

          N (1)

          Sales (millions)

          (2)

          Total Sales (3)

          N (4)

          Sales (million)

          (5)

          Total Sales (6)

          Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

          39

          Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

          40

          Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

          41

          Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

          42

          Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

          43

          Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

          Governance

          No Governance (same sample)

          Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

          CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

          Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

          • Cover for paperpdf
          • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

            4

            country-industry in which US-based MNCs operate These data provide a substantial advantage

            over the Compustat database used by prior research While Compustat provides some

            information about the countries and industries in which these firms operate it is not as detailed

            about either of these dimensions (or their interaction) and heavily relies on managerial disclosure

            choices which could induce measurement bias (Villalonga 2004a) In addition to the new

            method of estimating the value effects of foreign operations we provide evidence that MNCs

            trade at a premium which stands in contrast to the discount documented in Denis et al (2002)

            This difference is primarily attributed to our use of foreign benchmarks to construct the imputed

            values of foreign operations6

            Our finding of a premium better reconciles with the findings in the international trade

            literature By focusing on nonpublic establishment level (eg factory store or office) data the

            trade literature is able to generate relatively precise proxies for total factor productivity (TFP)

            and provides robust evidence that firms engaging in international trade are more productive than

            those that do not (see Helpman 2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Furthermore

            productivity differences tend to be highly persistent even within narrowly defined industries

            (Syverson 2011) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately measure TFP at the firm

            level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor countries Nevertheless

            Helpman Melitz and Yeaple (2004) provide some evidence that US firms engaging in FDI

            have labor productivity advantages over firms that do not Reconciling the discount to

            multinational operations found by Denis et al (2002) to the trade literature requires that the

            persistent productivity advantages of firms engaged in international trade must be more than

            offset by some other cost (eg agency costs) While this relation is possible it is difficult to

            6 We repeat the analysis of Denis et al (2002) for our sample and confirm that differences in value effects of foreign operations are driven by the different methods for measuring the imputed value of foreign operations

            5

            conjecture why the most productive firms would have the largest agency costs In contrast the

            finding of a premium easily reconciles with the trade literature

            Given our result we investigate whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate

            characteristics of firms that choose to invest abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present

            a simple model with heterogeneous productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest

            productivity endowments are the ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign

            subsidiary To the extent productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type

            of firms that choose to invest abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of their

            foreign investments After including firm fixed effects to control for time invariant firm

            characteristics (eg innate productivity advantages) we continue to find economically and

            statistically significant evidence of a premium to foreign operations

            To further account for the endogenous nature of FDI we estimate a dynamic panel data

            model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator developed by Arellano and

            Bond (1991) Arellano and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) This estimator allows

            us to simultaneously account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and

            firm value This method also yields a significant premium which is of similar magnitude and

            significance to that estimated using fixed effects

            We also perform a series of additional robustness tests First we examine whether the

            measured excess value premium is driven by operations in countries with large control premiums

            (Dyck and Zingales 2004) In countries with large control premiums using stock price in the

            calculation of total firm value could underestimate the true value of the benchmark firms and

            thereby induce an excess value premium We fail to find evidence that the excess value premium

            is driven by such countries

            6

            Second we examine whether access to a low cost of capital is a meaningful source of the

            US MNC advantage We incorporate foreign benchmarks in our method of estimating firm

            excess value as it allows us to incorporate attributes of operating in those foreign countries ndash a

            key attribute being the cost of capital Relative to the local benchmarks in foreign countries US

            MNCs have the ability to obtain funds outside the local operating environments either by

            borrowing in the US market or transferring capital internally When competing against firms in

            shallow capital markets with high costs of capital MNCs may have a competitive advantage

            over local foreign companies due to these alternative sources of capital However investors and

            lenders are likely to expect higher rates of return from the additional risk associated with

            operating in these environments making it unclear whether a multinational network will enhance

            value in countries with a high cost of capital In addition foreign firms have some ability to

            access international capital markets which mitigates the advantages to US firms To examine

            whether the cost of capital plays a role in our finding of a premium we include a proxy for the

            extent of operations in countries with higher costs of capital Our results are unaffected by the

            inclusion of the proxy

            Finally we control for several corporate governance proxies which Hoechle et al (2012)

            find to be correlated with excess values (and industrial diversification) While magnitude of the

            premium is virtually unaffected by including these proxies the significance level does decline

            due to the reduced sample size

            Our study contributes to the literature on multinational firms Our new method of estimating

            excess values for multinational firms provides strong evidence of a statistically and economically

            significant premium associated with increased international operations The premium is robust to

            a variety of specifications and controls designed to evaluate alternative explanations In addition

            7

            this result easily reconciles with the international trade literature that establishes a link between

            greater productivity and international operations though we do not find results supporting this as

            the only source of the premium As segment disclosures improve and as new data sources

            become available on multinational activity (eg Bureau Van Dijk) our empirical approach can

            be used to investigate the extent to which the home country of the parent might influence the

            extent with which foreign operations affect firm value (ie by examining non-US based

            MNCs)7 Future studies could also examine the underlying forces affecting the excess value

            premiums across countries

            We also contribute to the understanding of international accounting standards and their

            comparability Many studies seek to compare firms using different accounting standards These

            comparisons generally rely on information generated by a particular accounting regime By

            comparing commonly used metrics (total assets net income and sales) reported for the same

            firm and year across different regimes we provide insights as to the relative comparability across

            standards In particular we find that sales is reported significantly more consistently across

            accounting regimes than the other metrics examined This finding should aid researchers in

            reducing measurement error when comparing accounting information in multinational settings

            The paper proceeds as follows Section 2 discusses the motivation for finding a premium or

            discount to multinational operations Section 3 describes our data and how the excess value of a

            firm is measured A discussion of our independent variables and primary findings is presented in

            Section 4 with additional robustness tests provided in Section 5 Finally Section 6 concludes

            7 As MNCs are ultimately bound by the tax regulatory and legal frameworks of their home country the valuation effect of foreign operations that we document for US-based MNCs may be different in a sample of non-US based MNCs with the same country-industry footprint Theorists refer to these as lsquolocational advantagesrsquo enjoyed by all multinational firms of a given nationality and obtained irrespective of skills or capabilities unique to a particular firm (Yamin 1991) There is also evidence of locational advantages in the market for corporate control (Huizinga and Voget 2009)

            8

            2 Premium versus discount

            In a frictionless world where managers maximize firm value and markets are efficient there

            should be no discount or premium to operating in foreign countries However there are a number

            of forces that may cause actual firm value to deviate from the implied firm value

            On one hand MNCs may have comparative advantages that generate premiums (ie positive

            excess values) relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Having operations in a variety

            of locations that access different supplies of inputs and customers allows the firm to take

            advantage of changing market conditions by shifting operations or products to maximize firm

            value more so than a firm operating in a single country Similarly having access to a variety of

            institutional settings such as different tax codes legal regimes and financial markets can provide

            MNCs with options beyond those available to firms located in a single country

            Another possible factor associated with a premium to multinational operations is the cost of

            capital For operations located in countries with shallow capital markets or weaker creditor

            rights operating within a conglomerate can provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for

            investments and expansion for at least two reasons First as our MNCs are domiciled in the US

            their foreign segments have greater access to US capital markets relative to local competitors in

            the foreign jurisdiction Second cash rich segments with few investment opportunities can

            finance investments in cash poor segments with positive net present value projects (eg Myers

            and Majluf 1984) Consequently diversified firms should be less liquidity constrained and better

            able to shift resources to the most valuable investment opportunities Research has found that

            internal financing is used more often when diversified firms have operations in countries with

            more costly external financing (Desai Foley and Hines 2004) Multinational firms may also be

            relatively more protected than single-country firms when negative shocks hit external capital

            9

            markets (Foley Desai and Forbes 2008) In a recent study Matvos and Seru (2011) find that

            industrially diversified firms perform better than non-diversified firms when external capital

            markets are impaired

            While these arguments suggest that MNCs enjoy certain advantages when the foreign cost of

            capital is high these benefits should be reduced by the additional risk associated with operating a

            business in a high cost of capital environment For example Verizon is a multinational firm

            operating in a number of countries One of the higher cost of capital locations in which they

            operated was Venezuela While the multinational structure of Verizon may have mitigated some

            of the risks associated with operating in a higher cost of capital location the firms was unable to

            eliminate all of these risks In fact in 2007 Verizonrsquos operations in that country were

            nationalized resulting in a net extraordinary loss of $131 million that year8 In other words

            MNC investors are likely to expect higher rates of return to compensate for higher risk which

            likely offsets some (if not all) of the potential excess value premium

            On the other hand multinational firms may incur a discount (ie negative excess values)

            relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Potential reasons for a discount largely rely on

            the existence of agency costs Multinational firms tend to be larger more complex and less

            transparent The combination of complexity and opacity inherent in MNCs reduces a firmrsquos

            reliance on external capital as the cost of such capital increases due to agency costs (Desai et al

            2004) As a result of the reduced reliance on external funds MNCs face a reduced level of

            monitoring As noted by Jensen (1986) managers have incentives to increase firm size beyond

            that which is optimal with overinvestment or misallocation of funds to pet projects If this lack of

            monitoring is in combination with available internal capital empire building becomes easier

            (Hope and Thomas 2008) Furthermore the current segment reporting standards under US 8 See the 10-K of Verizon Communications Inc dated December 31 2007 (footnote 2)

            10

            GAAP only require highly aggregated disclosures of foreign operations and allow for

            considerable managerial discretion As a result operating in multiple countries makes it easier

            for management to hide poor performance ndash either their own or that of a division ndash such that low

            quality managers are more likely to be retained and overcompensated and poorly performing

            divisions retained longer than optimal Other reasons one might expect a discount to be applied

            to multinational firms include higher coordination costs (eg coordinating across different

            cultures and languages) as well as additional risks These risks include exposure to multiple

            political regimes legal regimes economic regulations and currency fluctuations

            Past studies investigate whether foreign operations of US firms enhance or reduce firm

            value However all of these studies benchmark the value of the foreign operations of an MNC to

            US domestic firms For instance Denis et al (2002) determine the implied value of a US

            MNC using domestic (US) single-segment firms in the same industry as a benchmark Studies

            using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs also rely on domestic benchmarks

            (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

            However using a US domestic firm as a benchmark for the value of foreign operations

            implicitly makes two assumptions First this method assumes that the risks and expected growth

            rates of foreign operations are equivalent to those of domestic operations This assumption is

            inconsistent with the findings of Hail and Leuz (2009) which provides evidence that the cost of

            capital varies substantially across countries Second this method assumes that there is excess

            domestic capacity to allow for expansion with profitability similar to current domestic

            operations We relax these assumptions by measuring the imputed value of a foreign component

            of a US firm as if that component operated autonomously within that foreign country (rather

            than in the US) Specifically our multiples allow the cost of capital and expected growth rates

            11

            to vary across not just industry but also country Furthermore our counterfactual does not

            require the assumption that operations be relocated mitigating the production and sales capacity

            concerns

            3 Measuring excess value

            31 Description of excess value

            Figure 1 shows the average percent of foreign sales (based on segment disclosures under US

            GAAP) across firms through time and illustrates that firms are continuing to expand

            internationally9 This expansion highlights the importance of understanding whether the decision

            to operate internationally is on average a value enhancing corporate strategy We contribute to

            this understanding by evaluating whether the firm as a whole is worth more or less than its

            imputed value (ie the firm is valued in excess of the sum of its individual components)

            We measure the excess value of a firm as the logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to

            imputed value based on the method used in Berger and Ofek (1995) The imputed value is the

            hypothetical value of the MNC under the assumption that its country-industry components

            operate as independent entities A key innovation of our study is an alternative approach to

            imputing the value of the foreign operations of an MNC Components of MNCs operating in a

            given industry and country are imputed using the value of single-segment firms operating in the

            same industry and country Thus we ensure the discount rates and expected growth rates are

            applicable to each given industry and location in estimating the implied values of the MNC

            segments

            9 The discontinuity in industrial diversification (the percent of sales outside the primary industry) between 1997 and 1998 is the result of a change in segment reporting rules

            12

            The actual firm values are observable for all firms in our sample The hypothetical firm

            values for multi-segment firms are imputed using market value to sales ratios herein referred to

            as lsquomultiplesrsquo of the median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry Thus

            these single country-industry firms serve as benchmarks for an MNCrsquos operations within that

            same country-industry The imputed value of the country-industry component can be viewed as

            an estimate of what that component would be worth if it operated independently The sum of the

            imputed values across all country-industry components represents the hypothetical value that the

            multi-segment firm would be worth if it were broken apart

            32 Data

            Four primary data sources play a distinct role in carrying out our analysis i) Bureau of

            Economic Analysis (BEA) data ii) Compustat Segment data iii) Worldscope data and iv)

            Compustat Fundamentals Annual data Broadly speaking BEA data provide information about

            the diversified nature of MNCs Compustat Segment data provide information about the

            industrial diversification of US domiciled firms Worldscope data are used to compute

            multiples for single-segment foreign firms that serve as benchmarks for the foreign operations of

            MNCs (ie foreign benchmarks) and Compustat Fundamentals Annual data are used to

            compute multiples for single-segment domestic firms that serve as benchmarks for the domestic

            operations of multinational firms We also use the latter data source to construct our primary

            control variables

            13

            Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

            domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

            observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

            important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

            the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

            identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

            limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

            An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

            not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

            consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

            and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

            Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

            The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

            and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

            due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

            Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

            affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

            interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

            10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

            14

            accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

            we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

            affiliate13

            The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

            (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

            and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

            exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

            utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

            sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

            year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

            ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

            US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

            accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

            data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

            have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

            firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

            our data requirements

            33 Measuring excess value

            The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

            logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

            13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

            15

            Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

            observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

            (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

            Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

            operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

            components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

            by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

            value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

            multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

            obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

            annually

            Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

            multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

            ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

            multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

            for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

            need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

            sales data are measured most consistently

            To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

            accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

            14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

            16

            GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

            prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

            changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

            are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

            A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

            under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

            standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

            though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

            non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

            assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

            standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

            that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

            The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

            estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

            the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

            measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

            Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

            includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

            segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

            higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

            benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

            15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

            17

            means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

            multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

            To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

            firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

            only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

            those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

            We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

            of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

            benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

            the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

            and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

            multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

            To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

            we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

            the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

            represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

            five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

            France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

            firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

            16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

            18

            the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

            representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

            4 Empirical results

            41 Independent variables

            Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

            multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

            of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

            multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

            approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

            analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

            control variables (discussed below)

            We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

            value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

            Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

            and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

            firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

            we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

            for firms that operate in a single business segment

            Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

            long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

            sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

            the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

            19

            advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

            control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

            use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

            firm level

            42 Primary regression analysis

            In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

            activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

            Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

            foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

            (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

            indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

            remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

            column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

            Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

            effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

            46 in column (2)20

            Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

            firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

            2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

            measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

            20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

            20

            countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

            result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

            whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

            abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

            productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

            ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

            To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

            firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

            their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

            productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

            effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

            (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

            on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

            and Denis et al 2002)

            The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

            on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

            methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

            different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

            diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

            a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

            extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

            benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

            21

            more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

            value implications of a multinational network

            5 Robustness

            51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

            Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

            value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

            Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

            their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

            likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

            Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

            robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

            control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

            the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

            and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

            previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

            values

            Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

            lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

            lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

            channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

            Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

            periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

            22

            present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

            dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

            the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

            estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

            We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

            industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

            Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

            treated as endogenous

            Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

            model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

            model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

            explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

            with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

            variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

            (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

            this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

            variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

            The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

            the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

            excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

            diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

            Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

            model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

            23

            serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

            correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

            model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

            test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

            indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

            known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

            the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

            52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

            Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

            value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

            fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

            sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

            expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

            and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

            coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

            operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

            21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

            24

            typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

            these reasons we do not implement an event study

            53 Control premium

            A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

            source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

            enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

            prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

            ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

            firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

            the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

            such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

            MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

            Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

            weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

            included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

            Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

            when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

            value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

            extract large control premiums

            23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

            25

            54 Cost of capital

            As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

            network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

            capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

            establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

            and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

            is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

            between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

            markets in which it operates

            We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

            rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

            imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

            of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

            significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

            (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

            we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

            A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

            do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

            capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

            24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

            26

            55 Corporate governance

            In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

            we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

            governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

            discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

            governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

            are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

            of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

            ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

            (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

            (Governance Index)

            As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

            almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

            None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

            on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

            conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

            sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

            2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

            virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

            the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

            governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

            27

            6 Conclusion

            Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

            domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

            degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

            examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

            incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

            important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

            Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

            increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

            value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

            This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

            firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

            firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

            The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

            whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

            panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

            account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

            we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

            control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

            premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

            in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

            multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

            corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

            28

            industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

            explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

            remains significant

            Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

            evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

            international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

            to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

            premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

            what factors influence the premium

            29

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            Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

            Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

            evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

            Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

            components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

            reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

            Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

            Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

            data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

            Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

            and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

            choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

            destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

            Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

            Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

            wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

            International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

            30

            Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

            Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

            Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

            Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

            Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

            Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

            diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

            Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

            Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

            Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

            US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

            firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

            44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

            American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

            discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

            of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

            border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

            Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

            31

            Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

            Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

            of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

            Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

            market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

            Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

            comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

            Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

            165-186

            Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

            Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

            Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

            Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

            365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

            Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

            Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

            Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

            corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

            32

            Appendix A Variable Definitions

            We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

            Dependent variable

            Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

            Independent variables

            Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

            Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

            Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

            Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

            CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

            EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

            RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

            Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

            Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

            Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

            33

            CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

            Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

            Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

            Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

            34

            Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

            35

            Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

            2003

            4 6

            2004

            25 38

            2005

            8 12

            2006

            6 9

            2007

            7 11

            2008

            5 8

            2009

            5 8

            2010

            5 8

            2011

            1 2

            66

            Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

            IFRS

            47 71

            Canadian GAAP

            12 18

            Israeli GAAP

            2 3

            Dutch GAAP

            1 2

            Indian GAAP

            1 2

            Japanese GAAP

            1 2

            Norwegian GAAP

            1 2

            Swiss GAAP

            1 2

            66

            36

            (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

            Percent different from US GAAP

            Comparison to sales (p-values)

            N Mean Median

            Mean Median

            Full Sample (2001-2011)

            Sales

            66 236 000

            Net Income

            66 10653 647

            005 lt001

            Assets

            66 1162 126

            lt001 lt001

            Study Sample (2001-2008)

            Sales

            55 257 000

            Net Income

            55 10303 589

            011 lt001

            Assets

            55 1047 099

            003 lt001

            37

            Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

            Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

            Test of Diff (p-value) Value

            Test of Diff (p-value)

            Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

            38

            Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

            This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

            Country

            N (1)

            Sales (millions)

            (2)

            Total Sales (3)

            N (4)

            Sales (million)

            (5)

            Total Sales (6)

            Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

            39

            Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

            40

            Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

            41

            Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

            42

            Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

            43

            Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

            Governance

            No Governance (same sample)

            Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

            CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

            Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

            • Cover for paperpdf
            • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

              5

              conjecture why the most productive firms would have the largest agency costs In contrast the

              finding of a premium easily reconciles with the trade literature

              Given our result we investigate whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate

              characteristics of firms that choose to invest abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present

              a simple model with heterogeneous productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest

              productivity endowments are the ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign

              subsidiary To the extent productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type

              of firms that choose to invest abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of their

              foreign investments After including firm fixed effects to control for time invariant firm

              characteristics (eg innate productivity advantages) we continue to find economically and

              statistically significant evidence of a premium to foreign operations

              To further account for the endogenous nature of FDI we estimate a dynamic panel data

              model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator developed by Arellano and

              Bond (1991) Arellano and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) This estimator allows

              us to simultaneously account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and

              firm value This method also yields a significant premium which is of similar magnitude and

              significance to that estimated using fixed effects

              We also perform a series of additional robustness tests First we examine whether the

              measured excess value premium is driven by operations in countries with large control premiums

              (Dyck and Zingales 2004) In countries with large control premiums using stock price in the

              calculation of total firm value could underestimate the true value of the benchmark firms and

              thereby induce an excess value premium We fail to find evidence that the excess value premium

              is driven by such countries

              6

              Second we examine whether access to a low cost of capital is a meaningful source of the

              US MNC advantage We incorporate foreign benchmarks in our method of estimating firm

              excess value as it allows us to incorporate attributes of operating in those foreign countries ndash a

              key attribute being the cost of capital Relative to the local benchmarks in foreign countries US

              MNCs have the ability to obtain funds outside the local operating environments either by

              borrowing in the US market or transferring capital internally When competing against firms in

              shallow capital markets with high costs of capital MNCs may have a competitive advantage

              over local foreign companies due to these alternative sources of capital However investors and

              lenders are likely to expect higher rates of return from the additional risk associated with

              operating in these environments making it unclear whether a multinational network will enhance

              value in countries with a high cost of capital In addition foreign firms have some ability to

              access international capital markets which mitigates the advantages to US firms To examine

              whether the cost of capital plays a role in our finding of a premium we include a proxy for the

              extent of operations in countries with higher costs of capital Our results are unaffected by the

              inclusion of the proxy

              Finally we control for several corporate governance proxies which Hoechle et al (2012)

              find to be correlated with excess values (and industrial diversification) While magnitude of the

              premium is virtually unaffected by including these proxies the significance level does decline

              due to the reduced sample size

              Our study contributes to the literature on multinational firms Our new method of estimating

              excess values for multinational firms provides strong evidence of a statistically and economically

              significant premium associated with increased international operations The premium is robust to

              a variety of specifications and controls designed to evaluate alternative explanations In addition

              7

              this result easily reconciles with the international trade literature that establishes a link between

              greater productivity and international operations though we do not find results supporting this as

              the only source of the premium As segment disclosures improve and as new data sources

              become available on multinational activity (eg Bureau Van Dijk) our empirical approach can

              be used to investigate the extent to which the home country of the parent might influence the

              extent with which foreign operations affect firm value (ie by examining non-US based

              MNCs)7 Future studies could also examine the underlying forces affecting the excess value

              premiums across countries

              We also contribute to the understanding of international accounting standards and their

              comparability Many studies seek to compare firms using different accounting standards These

              comparisons generally rely on information generated by a particular accounting regime By

              comparing commonly used metrics (total assets net income and sales) reported for the same

              firm and year across different regimes we provide insights as to the relative comparability across

              standards In particular we find that sales is reported significantly more consistently across

              accounting regimes than the other metrics examined This finding should aid researchers in

              reducing measurement error when comparing accounting information in multinational settings

              The paper proceeds as follows Section 2 discusses the motivation for finding a premium or

              discount to multinational operations Section 3 describes our data and how the excess value of a

              firm is measured A discussion of our independent variables and primary findings is presented in

              Section 4 with additional robustness tests provided in Section 5 Finally Section 6 concludes

              7 As MNCs are ultimately bound by the tax regulatory and legal frameworks of their home country the valuation effect of foreign operations that we document for US-based MNCs may be different in a sample of non-US based MNCs with the same country-industry footprint Theorists refer to these as lsquolocational advantagesrsquo enjoyed by all multinational firms of a given nationality and obtained irrespective of skills or capabilities unique to a particular firm (Yamin 1991) There is also evidence of locational advantages in the market for corporate control (Huizinga and Voget 2009)

              8

              2 Premium versus discount

              In a frictionless world where managers maximize firm value and markets are efficient there

              should be no discount or premium to operating in foreign countries However there are a number

              of forces that may cause actual firm value to deviate from the implied firm value

              On one hand MNCs may have comparative advantages that generate premiums (ie positive

              excess values) relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Having operations in a variety

              of locations that access different supplies of inputs and customers allows the firm to take

              advantage of changing market conditions by shifting operations or products to maximize firm

              value more so than a firm operating in a single country Similarly having access to a variety of

              institutional settings such as different tax codes legal regimes and financial markets can provide

              MNCs with options beyond those available to firms located in a single country

              Another possible factor associated with a premium to multinational operations is the cost of

              capital For operations located in countries with shallow capital markets or weaker creditor

              rights operating within a conglomerate can provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for

              investments and expansion for at least two reasons First as our MNCs are domiciled in the US

              their foreign segments have greater access to US capital markets relative to local competitors in

              the foreign jurisdiction Second cash rich segments with few investment opportunities can

              finance investments in cash poor segments with positive net present value projects (eg Myers

              and Majluf 1984) Consequently diversified firms should be less liquidity constrained and better

              able to shift resources to the most valuable investment opportunities Research has found that

              internal financing is used more often when diversified firms have operations in countries with

              more costly external financing (Desai Foley and Hines 2004) Multinational firms may also be

              relatively more protected than single-country firms when negative shocks hit external capital

              9

              markets (Foley Desai and Forbes 2008) In a recent study Matvos and Seru (2011) find that

              industrially diversified firms perform better than non-diversified firms when external capital

              markets are impaired

              While these arguments suggest that MNCs enjoy certain advantages when the foreign cost of

              capital is high these benefits should be reduced by the additional risk associated with operating a

              business in a high cost of capital environment For example Verizon is a multinational firm

              operating in a number of countries One of the higher cost of capital locations in which they

              operated was Venezuela While the multinational structure of Verizon may have mitigated some

              of the risks associated with operating in a higher cost of capital location the firms was unable to

              eliminate all of these risks In fact in 2007 Verizonrsquos operations in that country were

              nationalized resulting in a net extraordinary loss of $131 million that year8 In other words

              MNC investors are likely to expect higher rates of return to compensate for higher risk which

              likely offsets some (if not all) of the potential excess value premium

              On the other hand multinational firms may incur a discount (ie negative excess values)

              relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Potential reasons for a discount largely rely on

              the existence of agency costs Multinational firms tend to be larger more complex and less

              transparent The combination of complexity and opacity inherent in MNCs reduces a firmrsquos

              reliance on external capital as the cost of such capital increases due to agency costs (Desai et al

              2004) As a result of the reduced reliance on external funds MNCs face a reduced level of

              monitoring As noted by Jensen (1986) managers have incentives to increase firm size beyond

              that which is optimal with overinvestment or misallocation of funds to pet projects If this lack of

              monitoring is in combination with available internal capital empire building becomes easier

              (Hope and Thomas 2008) Furthermore the current segment reporting standards under US 8 See the 10-K of Verizon Communications Inc dated December 31 2007 (footnote 2)

              10

              GAAP only require highly aggregated disclosures of foreign operations and allow for

              considerable managerial discretion As a result operating in multiple countries makes it easier

              for management to hide poor performance ndash either their own or that of a division ndash such that low

              quality managers are more likely to be retained and overcompensated and poorly performing

              divisions retained longer than optimal Other reasons one might expect a discount to be applied

              to multinational firms include higher coordination costs (eg coordinating across different

              cultures and languages) as well as additional risks These risks include exposure to multiple

              political regimes legal regimes economic regulations and currency fluctuations

              Past studies investigate whether foreign operations of US firms enhance or reduce firm

              value However all of these studies benchmark the value of the foreign operations of an MNC to

              US domestic firms For instance Denis et al (2002) determine the implied value of a US

              MNC using domestic (US) single-segment firms in the same industry as a benchmark Studies

              using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs also rely on domestic benchmarks

              (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

              However using a US domestic firm as a benchmark for the value of foreign operations

              implicitly makes two assumptions First this method assumes that the risks and expected growth

              rates of foreign operations are equivalent to those of domestic operations This assumption is

              inconsistent with the findings of Hail and Leuz (2009) which provides evidence that the cost of

              capital varies substantially across countries Second this method assumes that there is excess

              domestic capacity to allow for expansion with profitability similar to current domestic

              operations We relax these assumptions by measuring the imputed value of a foreign component

              of a US firm as if that component operated autonomously within that foreign country (rather

              than in the US) Specifically our multiples allow the cost of capital and expected growth rates

              11

              to vary across not just industry but also country Furthermore our counterfactual does not

              require the assumption that operations be relocated mitigating the production and sales capacity

              concerns

              3 Measuring excess value

              31 Description of excess value

              Figure 1 shows the average percent of foreign sales (based on segment disclosures under US

              GAAP) across firms through time and illustrates that firms are continuing to expand

              internationally9 This expansion highlights the importance of understanding whether the decision

              to operate internationally is on average a value enhancing corporate strategy We contribute to

              this understanding by evaluating whether the firm as a whole is worth more or less than its

              imputed value (ie the firm is valued in excess of the sum of its individual components)

              We measure the excess value of a firm as the logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to

              imputed value based on the method used in Berger and Ofek (1995) The imputed value is the

              hypothetical value of the MNC under the assumption that its country-industry components

              operate as independent entities A key innovation of our study is an alternative approach to

              imputing the value of the foreign operations of an MNC Components of MNCs operating in a

              given industry and country are imputed using the value of single-segment firms operating in the

              same industry and country Thus we ensure the discount rates and expected growth rates are

              applicable to each given industry and location in estimating the implied values of the MNC

              segments

              9 The discontinuity in industrial diversification (the percent of sales outside the primary industry) between 1997 and 1998 is the result of a change in segment reporting rules

              12

              The actual firm values are observable for all firms in our sample The hypothetical firm

              values for multi-segment firms are imputed using market value to sales ratios herein referred to

              as lsquomultiplesrsquo of the median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry Thus

              these single country-industry firms serve as benchmarks for an MNCrsquos operations within that

              same country-industry The imputed value of the country-industry component can be viewed as

              an estimate of what that component would be worth if it operated independently The sum of the

              imputed values across all country-industry components represents the hypothetical value that the

              multi-segment firm would be worth if it were broken apart

              32 Data

              Four primary data sources play a distinct role in carrying out our analysis i) Bureau of

              Economic Analysis (BEA) data ii) Compustat Segment data iii) Worldscope data and iv)

              Compustat Fundamentals Annual data Broadly speaking BEA data provide information about

              the diversified nature of MNCs Compustat Segment data provide information about the

              industrial diversification of US domiciled firms Worldscope data are used to compute

              multiples for single-segment foreign firms that serve as benchmarks for the foreign operations of

              MNCs (ie foreign benchmarks) and Compustat Fundamentals Annual data are used to

              compute multiples for single-segment domestic firms that serve as benchmarks for the domestic

              operations of multinational firms We also use the latter data source to construct our primary

              control variables

              13

              Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

              domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

              observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

              important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

              the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

              identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

              limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

              An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

              not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

              consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

              and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

              Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

              The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

              and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

              due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

              Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

              affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

              interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

              10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

              14

              accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

              we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

              affiliate13

              The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

              (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

              and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

              exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

              utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

              sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

              year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

              ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

              US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

              accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

              data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

              have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

              firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

              our data requirements

              33 Measuring excess value

              The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

              logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

              13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

              15

              Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

              observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

              (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

              Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

              operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

              components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

              by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

              value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

              multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

              obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

              annually

              Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

              multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

              ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

              multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

              for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

              need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

              sales data are measured most consistently

              To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

              accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

              14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

              16

              GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

              prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

              changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

              are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

              A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

              under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

              standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

              though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

              non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

              assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

              standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

              that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

              The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

              estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

              the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

              measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

              Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

              includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

              segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

              higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

              benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

              15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

              17

              means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

              multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

              To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

              firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

              only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

              those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

              We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

              of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

              benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

              the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

              and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

              multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

              To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

              we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

              the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

              represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

              five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

              France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

              firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

              16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

              18

              the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

              representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

              4 Empirical results

              41 Independent variables

              Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

              multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

              of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

              multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

              approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

              analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

              control variables (discussed below)

              We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

              value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

              Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

              and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

              firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

              we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

              for firms that operate in a single business segment

              Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

              long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

              sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

              the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

              19

              advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

              control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

              use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

              firm level

              42 Primary regression analysis

              In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

              activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

              Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

              foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

              (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

              indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

              remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

              column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

              Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

              effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

              46 in column (2)20

              Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

              firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

              2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

              measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

              20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

              20

              countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

              result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

              whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

              abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

              productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

              ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

              To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

              firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

              their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

              productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

              effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

              (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

              on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

              and Denis et al 2002)

              The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

              on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

              methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

              different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

              diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

              a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

              extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

              benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

              21

              more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

              value implications of a multinational network

              5 Robustness

              51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

              Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

              value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

              Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

              their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

              likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

              Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

              robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

              control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

              the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

              and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

              previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

              values

              Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

              lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

              lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

              channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

              Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

              periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

              22

              present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

              dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

              the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

              estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

              We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

              industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

              Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

              treated as endogenous

              Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

              model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

              model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

              explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

              with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

              variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

              (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

              this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

              variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

              The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

              the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

              excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

              diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

              Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

              model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

              23

              serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

              correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

              model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

              test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

              indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

              known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

              the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

              52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

              Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

              value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

              fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

              sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

              expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

              and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

              coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

              operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

              21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

              24

              typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

              these reasons we do not implement an event study

              53 Control premium

              A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

              source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

              enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

              prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

              ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

              firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

              the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

              such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

              MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

              Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

              weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

              included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

              Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

              when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

              value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

              extract large control premiums

              23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

              25

              54 Cost of capital

              As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

              network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

              capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

              establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

              and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

              is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

              between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

              markets in which it operates

              We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

              rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

              imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

              of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

              significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

              (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

              we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

              A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

              do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

              capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

              24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

              26

              55 Corporate governance

              In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

              we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

              governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

              discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

              governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

              are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

              of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

              ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

              (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

              (Governance Index)

              As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

              almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

              None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

              on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

              conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

              sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

              2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

              virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

              the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

              governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

              27

              6 Conclusion

              Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

              domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

              degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

              examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

              incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

              important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

              Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

              increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

              value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

              This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

              firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

              firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

              The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

              whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

              panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

              account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

              we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

              control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

              premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

              in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

              multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

              corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

              28

              industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

              explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

              remains significant

              Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

              evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

              international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

              to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

              premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

              what factors influence the premium

              29

              References

              Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

              Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

              evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

              Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

              components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

              reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

              Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

              Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

              data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

              Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

              and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

              choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

              destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

              Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

              Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

              wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

              International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

              30

              Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

              Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

              Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

              Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

              Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

              Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

              diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

              Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

              Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

              Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

              US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

              firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

              44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

              American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

              discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

              of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

              border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

              Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

              31

              Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

              Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

              of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

              Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

              market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

              Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

              comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

              Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

              165-186

              Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

              Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

              Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

              Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

              365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

              Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

              Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

              Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

              corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

              32

              Appendix A Variable Definitions

              We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

              Dependent variable

              Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

              Independent variables

              Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

              Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

              Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

              Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

              CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

              EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

              RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

              Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

              Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

              Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

              33

              CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

              Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

              Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

              Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

              34

              Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

              35

              Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

              2003

              4 6

              2004

              25 38

              2005

              8 12

              2006

              6 9

              2007

              7 11

              2008

              5 8

              2009

              5 8

              2010

              5 8

              2011

              1 2

              66

              Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

              IFRS

              47 71

              Canadian GAAP

              12 18

              Israeli GAAP

              2 3

              Dutch GAAP

              1 2

              Indian GAAP

              1 2

              Japanese GAAP

              1 2

              Norwegian GAAP

              1 2

              Swiss GAAP

              1 2

              66

              36

              (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

              Percent different from US GAAP

              Comparison to sales (p-values)

              N Mean Median

              Mean Median

              Full Sample (2001-2011)

              Sales

              66 236 000

              Net Income

              66 10653 647

              005 lt001

              Assets

              66 1162 126

              lt001 lt001

              Study Sample (2001-2008)

              Sales

              55 257 000

              Net Income

              55 10303 589

              011 lt001

              Assets

              55 1047 099

              003 lt001

              37

              Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

              Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

              Test of Diff (p-value) Value

              Test of Diff (p-value)

              Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

              38

              Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

              This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

              Country

              N (1)

              Sales (millions)

              (2)

              Total Sales (3)

              N (4)

              Sales (million)

              (5)

              Total Sales (6)

              Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

              39

              Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

              40

              Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

              41

              Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

              42

              Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

              43

              Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

              Governance

              No Governance (same sample)

              Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

              CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

              Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

              • Cover for paperpdf
              • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                6

                Second we examine whether access to a low cost of capital is a meaningful source of the

                US MNC advantage We incorporate foreign benchmarks in our method of estimating firm

                excess value as it allows us to incorporate attributes of operating in those foreign countries ndash a

                key attribute being the cost of capital Relative to the local benchmarks in foreign countries US

                MNCs have the ability to obtain funds outside the local operating environments either by

                borrowing in the US market or transferring capital internally When competing against firms in

                shallow capital markets with high costs of capital MNCs may have a competitive advantage

                over local foreign companies due to these alternative sources of capital However investors and

                lenders are likely to expect higher rates of return from the additional risk associated with

                operating in these environments making it unclear whether a multinational network will enhance

                value in countries with a high cost of capital In addition foreign firms have some ability to

                access international capital markets which mitigates the advantages to US firms To examine

                whether the cost of capital plays a role in our finding of a premium we include a proxy for the

                extent of operations in countries with higher costs of capital Our results are unaffected by the

                inclusion of the proxy

                Finally we control for several corporate governance proxies which Hoechle et al (2012)

                find to be correlated with excess values (and industrial diversification) While magnitude of the

                premium is virtually unaffected by including these proxies the significance level does decline

                due to the reduced sample size

                Our study contributes to the literature on multinational firms Our new method of estimating

                excess values for multinational firms provides strong evidence of a statistically and economically

                significant premium associated with increased international operations The premium is robust to

                a variety of specifications and controls designed to evaluate alternative explanations In addition

                7

                this result easily reconciles with the international trade literature that establishes a link between

                greater productivity and international operations though we do not find results supporting this as

                the only source of the premium As segment disclosures improve and as new data sources

                become available on multinational activity (eg Bureau Van Dijk) our empirical approach can

                be used to investigate the extent to which the home country of the parent might influence the

                extent with which foreign operations affect firm value (ie by examining non-US based

                MNCs)7 Future studies could also examine the underlying forces affecting the excess value

                premiums across countries

                We also contribute to the understanding of international accounting standards and their

                comparability Many studies seek to compare firms using different accounting standards These

                comparisons generally rely on information generated by a particular accounting regime By

                comparing commonly used metrics (total assets net income and sales) reported for the same

                firm and year across different regimes we provide insights as to the relative comparability across

                standards In particular we find that sales is reported significantly more consistently across

                accounting regimes than the other metrics examined This finding should aid researchers in

                reducing measurement error when comparing accounting information in multinational settings

                The paper proceeds as follows Section 2 discusses the motivation for finding a premium or

                discount to multinational operations Section 3 describes our data and how the excess value of a

                firm is measured A discussion of our independent variables and primary findings is presented in

                Section 4 with additional robustness tests provided in Section 5 Finally Section 6 concludes

                7 As MNCs are ultimately bound by the tax regulatory and legal frameworks of their home country the valuation effect of foreign operations that we document for US-based MNCs may be different in a sample of non-US based MNCs with the same country-industry footprint Theorists refer to these as lsquolocational advantagesrsquo enjoyed by all multinational firms of a given nationality and obtained irrespective of skills or capabilities unique to a particular firm (Yamin 1991) There is also evidence of locational advantages in the market for corporate control (Huizinga and Voget 2009)

                8

                2 Premium versus discount

                In a frictionless world where managers maximize firm value and markets are efficient there

                should be no discount or premium to operating in foreign countries However there are a number

                of forces that may cause actual firm value to deviate from the implied firm value

                On one hand MNCs may have comparative advantages that generate premiums (ie positive

                excess values) relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Having operations in a variety

                of locations that access different supplies of inputs and customers allows the firm to take

                advantage of changing market conditions by shifting operations or products to maximize firm

                value more so than a firm operating in a single country Similarly having access to a variety of

                institutional settings such as different tax codes legal regimes and financial markets can provide

                MNCs with options beyond those available to firms located in a single country

                Another possible factor associated with a premium to multinational operations is the cost of

                capital For operations located in countries with shallow capital markets or weaker creditor

                rights operating within a conglomerate can provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for

                investments and expansion for at least two reasons First as our MNCs are domiciled in the US

                their foreign segments have greater access to US capital markets relative to local competitors in

                the foreign jurisdiction Second cash rich segments with few investment opportunities can

                finance investments in cash poor segments with positive net present value projects (eg Myers

                and Majluf 1984) Consequently diversified firms should be less liquidity constrained and better

                able to shift resources to the most valuable investment opportunities Research has found that

                internal financing is used more often when diversified firms have operations in countries with

                more costly external financing (Desai Foley and Hines 2004) Multinational firms may also be

                relatively more protected than single-country firms when negative shocks hit external capital

                9

                markets (Foley Desai and Forbes 2008) In a recent study Matvos and Seru (2011) find that

                industrially diversified firms perform better than non-diversified firms when external capital

                markets are impaired

                While these arguments suggest that MNCs enjoy certain advantages when the foreign cost of

                capital is high these benefits should be reduced by the additional risk associated with operating a

                business in a high cost of capital environment For example Verizon is a multinational firm

                operating in a number of countries One of the higher cost of capital locations in which they

                operated was Venezuela While the multinational structure of Verizon may have mitigated some

                of the risks associated with operating in a higher cost of capital location the firms was unable to

                eliminate all of these risks In fact in 2007 Verizonrsquos operations in that country were

                nationalized resulting in a net extraordinary loss of $131 million that year8 In other words

                MNC investors are likely to expect higher rates of return to compensate for higher risk which

                likely offsets some (if not all) of the potential excess value premium

                On the other hand multinational firms may incur a discount (ie negative excess values)

                relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Potential reasons for a discount largely rely on

                the existence of agency costs Multinational firms tend to be larger more complex and less

                transparent The combination of complexity and opacity inherent in MNCs reduces a firmrsquos

                reliance on external capital as the cost of such capital increases due to agency costs (Desai et al

                2004) As a result of the reduced reliance on external funds MNCs face a reduced level of

                monitoring As noted by Jensen (1986) managers have incentives to increase firm size beyond

                that which is optimal with overinvestment or misallocation of funds to pet projects If this lack of

                monitoring is in combination with available internal capital empire building becomes easier

                (Hope and Thomas 2008) Furthermore the current segment reporting standards under US 8 See the 10-K of Verizon Communications Inc dated December 31 2007 (footnote 2)

                10

                GAAP only require highly aggregated disclosures of foreign operations and allow for

                considerable managerial discretion As a result operating in multiple countries makes it easier

                for management to hide poor performance ndash either their own or that of a division ndash such that low

                quality managers are more likely to be retained and overcompensated and poorly performing

                divisions retained longer than optimal Other reasons one might expect a discount to be applied

                to multinational firms include higher coordination costs (eg coordinating across different

                cultures and languages) as well as additional risks These risks include exposure to multiple

                political regimes legal regimes economic regulations and currency fluctuations

                Past studies investigate whether foreign operations of US firms enhance or reduce firm

                value However all of these studies benchmark the value of the foreign operations of an MNC to

                US domestic firms For instance Denis et al (2002) determine the implied value of a US

                MNC using domestic (US) single-segment firms in the same industry as a benchmark Studies

                using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs also rely on domestic benchmarks

                (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

                However using a US domestic firm as a benchmark for the value of foreign operations

                implicitly makes two assumptions First this method assumes that the risks and expected growth

                rates of foreign operations are equivalent to those of domestic operations This assumption is

                inconsistent with the findings of Hail and Leuz (2009) which provides evidence that the cost of

                capital varies substantially across countries Second this method assumes that there is excess

                domestic capacity to allow for expansion with profitability similar to current domestic

                operations We relax these assumptions by measuring the imputed value of a foreign component

                of a US firm as if that component operated autonomously within that foreign country (rather

                than in the US) Specifically our multiples allow the cost of capital and expected growth rates

                11

                to vary across not just industry but also country Furthermore our counterfactual does not

                require the assumption that operations be relocated mitigating the production and sales capacity

                concerns

                3 Measuring excess value

                31 Description of excess value

                Figure 1 shows the average percent of foreign sales (based on segment disclosures under US

                GAAP) across firms through time and illustrates that firms are continuing to expand

                internationally9 This expansion highlights the importance of understanding whether the decision

                to operate internationally is on average a value enhancing corporate strategy We contribute to

                this understanding by evaluating whether the firm as a whole is worth more or less than its

                imputed value (ie the firm is valued in excess of the sum of its individual components)

                We measure the excess value of a firm as the logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to

                imputed value based on the method used in Berger and Ofek (1995) The imputed value is the

                hypothetical value of the MNC under the assumption that its country-industry components

                operate as independent entities A key innovation of our study is an alternative approach to

                imputing the value of the foreign operations of an MNC Components of MNCs operating in a

                given industry and country are imputed using the value of single-segment firms operating in the

                same industry and country Thus we ensure the discount rates and expected growth rates are

                applicable to each given industry and location in estimating the implied values of the MNC

                segments

                9 The discontinuity in industrial diversification (the percent of sales outside the primary industry) between 1997 and 1998 is the result of a change in segment reporting rules

                12

                The actual firm values are observable for all firms in our sample The hypothetical firm

                values for multi-segment firms are imputed using market value to sales ratios herein referred to

                as lsquomultiplesrsquo of the median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry Thus

                these single country-industry firms serve as benchmarks for an MNCrsquos operations within that

                same country-industry The imputed value of the country-industry component can be viewed as

                an estimate of what that component would be worth if it operated independently The sum of the

                imputed values across all country-industry components represents the hypothetical value that the

                multi-segment firm would be worth if it were broken apart

                32 Data

                Four primary data sources play a distinct role in carrying out our analysis i) Bureau of

                Economic Analysis (BEA) data ii) Compustat Segment data iii) Worldscope data and iv)

                Compustat Fundamentals Annual data Broadly speaking BEA data provide information about

                the diversified nature of MNCs Compustat Segment data provide information about the

                industrial diversification of US domiciled firms Worldscope data are used to compute

                multiples for single-segment foreign firms that serve as benchmarks for the foreign operations of

                MNCs (ie foreign benchmarks) and Compustat Fundamentals Annual data are used to

                compute multiples for single-segment domestic firms that serve as benchmarks for the domestic

                operations of multinational firms We also use the latter data source to construct our primary

                control variables

                13

                Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

                domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

                observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

                important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

                the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

                identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

                limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

                An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

                not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

                consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

                and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

                Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

                The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

                and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

                due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

                Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

                affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

                interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

                10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

                14

                accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

                we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

                affiliate13

                The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

                (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

                and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

                exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

                utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

                sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

                year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

                ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

                US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

                accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

                data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

                have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

                firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

                our data requirements

                33 Measuring excess value

                The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

                logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

                13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

                15

                Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

                observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

                (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

                Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

                operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

                components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

                by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

                value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

                multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

                obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

                annually

                Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

                multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

                ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

                multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

                for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

                need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

                sales data are measured most consistently

                To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

                accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

                14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

                16

                GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

                prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

                changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

                are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

                A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

                under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

                standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

                though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

                non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

                assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

                standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

                that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

                The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

                estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

                the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

                measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

                Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

                includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

                segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

                higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

                benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

                15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

                17

                means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

                multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

                To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

                firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

                only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

                those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

                We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

                of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

                benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

                the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

                and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

                multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

                To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

                we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

                the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

                represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

                five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

                France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

                firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

                16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

                18

                the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

                representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

                4 Empirical results

                41 Independent variables

                Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

                multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

                of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

                multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

                approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

                analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

                control variables (discussed below)

                We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

                value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

                Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

                and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

                firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

                we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

                for firms that operate in a single business segment

                Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

                long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

                sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

                the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

                19

                advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

                control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

                use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

                firm level

                42 Primary regression analysis

                In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

                activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

                Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

                foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

                (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

                indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

                remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

                column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

                Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

                effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

                46 in column (2)20

                Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

                firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

                2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

                measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

                20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

                20

                countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                and Denis et al 2002)

                The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                21

                more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                value implications of a multinational network

                5 Robustness

                51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                values

                Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                22

                present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                treated as endogenous

                Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                23

                serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                24

                typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                these reasons we do not implement an event study

                53 Control premium

                A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                extract large control premiums

                23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                25

                54 Cost of capital

                As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                markets in which it operates

                We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                26

                55 Corporate governance

                In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                (Governance Index)

                As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                27

                6 Conclusion

                Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                28

                industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                remains significant

                Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                what factors influence the premium

                29

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                Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

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                reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

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                Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                31

                Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                165-186

                Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                32

                Appendix A Variable Definitions

                We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                Dependent variable

                Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                Independent variables

                Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                33

                CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                34

                Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                35

                Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                2003

                4 6

                2004

                25 38

                2005

                8 12

                2006

                6 9

                2007

                7 11

                2008

                5 8

                2009

                5 8

                2010

                5 8

                2011

                1 2

                66

                Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                IFRS

                47 71

                Canadian GAAP

                12 18

                Israeli GAAP

                2 3

                Dutch GAAP

                1 2

                Indian GAAP

                1 2

                Japanese GAAP

                1 2

                Norwegian GAAP

                1 2

                Swiss GAAP

                1 2

                66

                36

                (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                Percent different from US GAAP

                Comparison to sales (p-values)

                N Mean Median

                Mean Median

                Full Sample (2001-2011)

                Sales

                66 236 000

                Net Income

                66 10653 647

                005 lt001

                Assets

                66 1162 126

                lt001 lt001

                Study Sample (2001-2008)

                Sales

                55 257 000

                Net Income

                55 10303 589

                011 lt001

                Assets

                55 1047 099

                003 lt001

                37

                Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                Test of Diff (p-value)

                Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                38

                Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                Country

                N (1)

                Sales (millions)

                (2)

                Total Sales (3)

                N (4)

                Sales (million)

                (5)

                Total Sales (6)

                Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                39

                Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                40

                Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                41

                Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                42

                Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                43

                Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                Governance

                No Governance (same sample)

                Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                • Cover for paperpdf
                • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                  7

                  this result easily reconciles with the international trade literature that establishes a link between

                  greater productivity and international operations though we do not find results supporting this as

                  the only source of the premium As segment disclosures improve and as new data sources

                  become available on multinational activity (eg Bureau Van Dijk) our empirical approach can

                  be used to investigate the extent to which the home country of the parent might influence the

                  extent with which foreign operations affect firm value (ie by examining non-US based

                  MNCs)7 Future studies could also examine the underlying forces affecting the excess value

                  premiums across countries

                  We also contribute to the understanding of international accounting standards and their

                  comparability Many studies seek to compare firms using different accounting standards These

                  comparisons generally rely on information generated by a particular accounting regime By

                  comparing commonly used metrics (total assets net income and sales) reported for the same

                  firm and year across different regimes we provide insights as to the relative comparability across

                  standards In particular we find that sales is reported significantly more consistently across

                  accounting regimes than the other metrics examined This finding should aid researchers in

                  reducing measurement error when comparing accounting information in multinational settings

                  The paper proceeds as follows Section 2 discusses the motivation for finding a premium or

                  discount to multinational operations Section 3 describes our data and how the excess value of a

                  firm is measured A discussion of our independent variables and primary findings is presented in

                  Section 4 with additional robustness tests provided in Section 5 Finally Section 6 concludes

                  7 As MNCs are ultimately bound by the tax regulatory and legal frameworks of their home country the valuation effect of foreign operations that we document for US-based MNCs may be different in a sample of non-US based MNCs with the same country-industry footprint Theorists refer to these as lsquolocational advantagesrsquo enjoyed by all multinational firms of a given nationality and obtained irrespective of skills or capabilities unique to a particular firm (Yamin 1991) There is also evidence of locational advantages in the market for corporate control (Huizinga and Voget 2009)

                  8

                  2 Premium versus discount

                  In a frictionless world where managers maximize firm value and markets are efficient there

                  should be no discount or premium to operating in foreign countries However there are a number

                  of forces that may cause actual firm value to deviate from the implied firm value

                  On one hand MNCs may have comparative advantages that generate premiums (ie positive

                  excess values) relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Having operations in a variety

                  of locations that access different supplies of inputs and customers allows the firm to take

                  advantage of changing market conditions by shifting operations or products to maximize firm

                  value more so than a firm operating in a single country Similarly having access to a variety of

                  institutional settings such as different tax codes legal regimes and financial markets can provide

                  MNCs with options beyond those available to firms located in a single country

                  Another possible factor associated with a premium to multinational operations is the cost of

                  capital For operations located in countries with shallow capital markets or weaker creditor

                  rights operating within a conglomerate can provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for

                  investments and expansion for at least two reasons First as our MNCs are domiciled in the US

                  their foreign segments have greater access to US capital markets relative to local competitors in

                  the foreign jurisdiction Second cash rich segments with few investment opportunities can

                  finance investments in cash poor segments with positive net present value projects (eg Myers

                  and Majluf 1984) Consequently diversified firms should be less liquidity constrained and better

                  able to shift resources to the most valuable investment opportunities Research has found that

                  internal financing is used more often when diversified firms have operations in countries with

                  more costly external financing (Desai Foley and Hines 2004) Multinational firms may also be

                  relatively more protected than single-country firms when negative shocks hit external capital

                  9

                  markets (Foley Desai and Forbes 2008) In a recent study Matvos and Seru (2011) find that

                  industrially diversified firms perform better than non-diversified firms when external capital

                  markets are impaired

                  While these arguments suggest that MNCs enjoy certain advantages when the foreign cost of

                  capital is high these benefits should be reduced by the additional risk associated with operating a

                  business in a high cost of capital environment For example Verizon is a multinational firm

                  operating in a number of countries One of the higher cost of capital locations in which they

                  operated was Venezuela While the multinational structure of Verizon may have mitigated some

                  of the risks associated with operating in a higher cost of capital location the firms was unable to

                  eliminate all of these risks In fact in 2007 Verizonrsquos operations in that country were

                  nationalized resulting in a net extraordinary loss of $131 million that year8 In other words

                  MNC investors are likely to expect higher rates of return to compensate for higher risk which

                  likely offsets some (if not all) of the potential excess value premium

                  On the other hand multinational firms may incur a discount (ie negative excess values)

                  relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Potential reasons for a discount largely rely on

                  the existence of agency costs Multinational firms tend to be larger more complex and less

                  transparent The combination of complexity and opacity inherent in MNCs reduces a firmrsquos

                  reliance on external capital as the cost of such capital increases due to agency costs (Desai et al

                  2004) As a result of the reduced reliance on external funds MNCs face a reduced level of

                  monitoring As noted by Jensen (1986) managers have incentives to increase firm size beyond

                  that which is optimal with overinvestment or misallocation of funds to pet projects If this lack of

                  monitoring is in combination with available internal capital empire building becomes easier

                  (Hope and Thomas 2008) Furthermore the current segment reporting standards under US 8 See the 10-K of Verizon Communications Inc dated December 31 2007 (footnote 2)

                  10

                  GAAP only require highly aggregated disclosures of foreign operations and allow for

                  considerable managerial discretion As a result operating in multiple countries makes it easier

                  for management to hide poor performance ndash either their own or that of a division ndash such that low

                  quality managers are more likely to be retained and overcompensated and poorly performing

                  divisions retained longer than optimal Other reasons one might expect a discount to be applied

                  to multinational firms include higher coordination costs (eg coordinating across different

                  cultures and languages) as well as additional risks These risks include exposure to multiple

                  political regimes legal regimes economic regulations and currency fluctuations

                  Past studies investigate whether foreign operations of US firms enhance or reduce firm

                  value However all of these studies benchmark the value of the foreign operations of an MNC to

                  US domestic firms For instance Denis et al (2002) determine the implied value of a US

                  MNC using domestic (US) single-segment firms in the same industry as a benchmark Studies

                  using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs also rely on domestic benchmarks

                  (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

                  However using a US domestic firm as a benchmark for the value of foreign operations

                  implicitly makes two assumptions First this method assumes that the risks and expected growth

                  rates of foreign operations are equivalent to those of domestic operations This assumption is

                  inconsistent with the findings of Hail and Leuz (2009) which provides evidence that the cost of

                  capital varies substantially across countries Second this method assumes that there is excess

                  domestic capacity to allow for expansion with profitability similar to current domestic

                  operations We relax these assumptions by measuring the imputed value of a foreign component

                  of a US firm as if that component operated autonomously within that foreign country (rather

                  than in the US) Specifically our multiples allow the cost of capital and expected growth rates

                  11

                  to vary across not just industry but also country Furthermore our counterfactual does not

                  require the assumption that operations be relocated mitigating the production and sales capacity

                  concerns

                  3 Measuring excess value

                  31 Description of excess value

                  Figure 1 shows the average percent of foreign sales (based on segment disclosures under US

                  GAAP) across firms through time and illustrates that firms are continuing to expand

                  internationally9 This expansion highlights the importance of understanding whether the decision

                  to operate internationally is on average a value enhancing corporate strategy We contribute to

                  this understanding by evaluating whether the firm as a whole is worth more or less than its

                  imputed value (ie the firm is valued in excess of the sum of its individual components)

                  We measure the excess value of a firm as the logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to

                  imputed value based on the method used in Berger and Ofek (1995) The imputed value is the

                  hypothetical value of the MNC under the assumption that its country-industry components

                  operate as independent entities A key innovation of our study is an alternative approach to

                  imputing the value of the foreign operations of an MNC Components of MNCs operating in a

                  given industry and country are imputed using the value of single-segment firms operating in the

                  same industry and country Thus we ensure the discount rates and expected growth rates are

                  applicable to each given industry and location in estimating the implied values of the MNC

                  segments

                  9 The discontinuity in industrial diversification (the percent of sales outside the primary industry) between 1997 and 1998 is the result of a change in segment reporting rules

                  12

                  The actual firm values are observable for all firms in our sample The hypothetical firm

                  values for multi-segment firms are imputed using market value to sales ratios herein referred to

                  as lsquomultiplesrsquo of the median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry Thus

                  these single country-industry firms serve as benchmarks for an MNCrsquos operations within that

                  same country-industry The imputed value of the country-industry component can be viewed as

                  an estimate of what that component would be worth if it operated independently The sum of the

                  imputed values across all country-industry components represents the hypothetical value that the

                  multi-segment firm would be worth if it were broken apart

                  32 Data

                  Four primary data sources play a distinct role in carrying out our analysis i) Bureau of

                  Economic Analysis (BEA) data ii) Compustat Segment data iii) Worldscope data and iv)

                  Compustat Fundamentals Annual data Broadly speaking BEA data provide information about

                  the diversified nature of MNCs Compustat Segment data provide information about the

                  industrial diversification of US domiciled firms Worldscope data are used to compute

                  multiples for single-segment foreign firms that serve as benchmarks for the foreign operations of

                  MNCs (ie foreign benchmarks) and Compustat Fundamentals Annual data are used to

                  compute multiples for single-segment domestic firms that serve as benchmarks for the domestic

                  operations of multinational firms We also use the latter data source to construct our primary

                  control variables

                  13

                  Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

                  domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

                  observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

                  important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

                  the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

                  identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

                  limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

                  An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

                  not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

                  consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

                  and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

                  Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

                  The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

                  and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

                  due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

                  Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

                  affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

                  interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

                  10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

                  14

                  accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

                  we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

                  affiliate13

                  The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

                  (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

                  and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

                  exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

                  utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

                  sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

                  year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

                  ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

                  US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

                  accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

                  data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

                  have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

                  firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

                  our data requirements

                  33 Measuring excess value

                  The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

                  logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

                  13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

                  15

                  Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

                  observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

                  (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

                  Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

                  operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

                  components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

                  by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

                  value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

                  multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

                  obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

                  annually

                  Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

                  multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

                  ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

                  multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

                  for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

                  need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

                  sales data are measured most consistently

                  To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

                  accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

                  14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

                  16

                  GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

                  prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

                  changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

                  are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

                  A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

                  under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

                  standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

                  though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

                  non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

                  assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

                  standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

                  that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

                  The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

                  estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

                  the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

                  measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

                  Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

                  includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

                  segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

                  higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

                  benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

                  15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

                  17

                  means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

                  multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

                  To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

                  firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

                  only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

                  those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

                  We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

                  of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

                  benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

                  the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

                  and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

                  multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

                  To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

                  we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

                  the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

                  represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

                  five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

                  France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

                  firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

                  16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

                  18

                  the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

                  representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

                  4 Empirical results

                  41 Independent variables

                  Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

                  multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

                  of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

                  multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

                  approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

                  analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

                  control variables (discussed below)

                  We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

                  value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

                  Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

                  and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

                  firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

                  we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

                  for firms that operate in a single business segment

                  Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

                  long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

                  sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

                  the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

                  19

                  advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

                  control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

                  use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

                  firm level

                  42 Primary regression analysis

                  In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

                  activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

                  Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

                  foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

                  (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

                  indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

                  remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

                  column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

                  Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

                  effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

                  46 in column (2)20

                  Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

                  firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

                  2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

                  measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

                  20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

                  20

                  countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                  result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                  whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                  abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                  productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                  ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                  To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                  firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                  their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                  productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                  effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                  (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                  on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                  and Denis et al 2002)

                  The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                  on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                  methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                  different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                  diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                  a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                  extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                  benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                  21

                  more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                  value implications of a multinational network

                  5 Robustness

                  51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                  Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                  value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                  Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                  their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                  likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                  Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                  robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                  control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                  the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                  and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                  previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                  values

                  Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                  lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                  lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                  channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                  Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                  periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                  22

                  present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                  dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                  the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                  estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                  We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                  industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                  Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                  treated as endogenous

                  Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                  model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                  model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                  explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                  with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                  variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                  (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                  this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                  variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                  The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                  the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                  excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                  diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                  Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                  model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                  23

                  serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                  correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                  model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                  test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                  indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                  known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                  the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                  52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                  Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                  value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                  fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                  sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                  expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                  and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                  coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                  operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                  21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                  24

                  typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                  these reasons we do not implement an event study

                  53 Control premium

                  A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                  source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                  enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                  prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                  ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                  firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                  the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                  such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                  MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                  Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                  weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                  included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                  Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                  when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                  value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                  extract large control premiums

                  23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                  25

                  54 Cost of capital

                  As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                  network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                  capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                  establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                  and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                  is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                  between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                  markets in which it operates

                  We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                  rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                  imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                  of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                  significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                  (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                  we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                  A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                  do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                  capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                  24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                  26

                  55 Corporate governance

                  In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                  we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                  governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                  discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                  governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                  are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                  of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                  ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                  (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                  (Governance Index)

                  As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                  almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                  None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                  on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                  conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                  sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                  2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                  virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                  the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                  governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                  27

                  6 Conclusion

                  Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                  domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                  degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                  examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                  incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                  important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                  Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                  increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                  value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                  This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                  firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                  firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                  The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                  whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                  panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                  account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                  we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                  control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                  premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                  in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                  multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                  corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                  28

                  industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                  explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                  remains significant

                  Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                  evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                  international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                  to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                  premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                  what factors influence the premium

                  29

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                  Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

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                  Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                  wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

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                  30

                  Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                  Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                  Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                  Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                  Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                  Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                  diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                  Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                  Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                  Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                  US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                  firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                  44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                  American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                  discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                  of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                  border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                  Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                  31

                  Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                  Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                  of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                  Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                  market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                  Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                  comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                  Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                  165-186

                  Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                  Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                  Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                  Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                  365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                  Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                  Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                  Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                  corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                  32

                  Appendix A Variable Definitions

                  We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                  Dependent variable

                  Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                  Independent variables

                  Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                  Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                  Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                  Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                  CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                  EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                  RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                  Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                  Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                  Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                  33

                  CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                  Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                  Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                  Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                  34

                  Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                  35

                  Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                  2003

                  4 6

                  2004

                  25 38

                  2005

                  8 12

                  2006

                  6 9

                  2007

                  7 11

                  2008

                  5 8

                  2009

                  5 8

                  2010

                  5 8

                  2011

                  1 2

                  66

                  Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                  IFRS

                  47 71

                  Canadian GAAP

                  12 18

                  Israeli GAAP

                  2 3

                  Dutch GAAP

                  1 2

                  Indian GAAP

                  1 2

                  Japanese GAAP

                  1 2

                  Norwegian GAAP

                  1 2

                  Swiss GAAP

                  1 2

                  66

                  36

                  (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                  Percent different from US GAAP

                  Comparison to sales (p-values)

                  N Mean Median

                  Mean Median

                  Full Sample (2001-2011)

                  Sales

                  66 236 000

                  Net Income

                  66 10653 647

                  005 lt001

                  Assets

                  66 1162 126

                  lt001 lt001

                  Study Sample (2001-2008)

                  Sales

                  55 257 000

                  Net Income

                  55 10303 589

                  011 lt001

                  Assets

                  55 1047 099

                  003 lt001

                  37

                  Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                  Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                  Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                  Test of Diff (p-value)

                  Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                  38

                  Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                  This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                  Country

                  N (1)

                  Sales (millions)

                  (2)

                  Total Sales (3)

                  N (4)

                  Sales (million)

                  (5)

                  Total Sales (6)

                  Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                  39

                  Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                  40

                  Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                  41

                  Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                  42

                  Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                  43

                  Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                  Governance

                  No Governance (same sample)

                  Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                  CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                  Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                  • Cover for paperpdf
                  • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                    8

                    2 Premium versus discount

                    In a frictionless world where managers maximize firm value and markets are efficient there

                    should be no discount or premium to operating in foreign countries However there are a number

                    of forces that may cause actual firm value to deviate from the implied firm value

                    On one hand MNCs may have comparative advantages that generate premiums (ie positive

                    excess values) relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Having operations in a variety

                    of locations that access different supplies of inputs and customers allows the firm to take

                    advantage of changing market conditions by shifting operations or products to maximize firm

                    value more so than a firm operating in a single country Similarly having access to a variety of

                    institutional settings such as different tax codes legal regimes and financial markets can provide

                    MNCs with options beyond those available to firms located in a single country

                    Another possible factor associated with a premium to multinational operations is the cost of

                    capital For operations located in countries with shallow capital markets or weaker creditor

                    rights operating within a conglomerate can provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for

                    investments and expansion for at least two reasons First as our MNCs are domiciled in the US

                    their foreign segments have greater access to US capital markets relative to local competitors in

                    the foreign jurisdiction Second cash rich segments with few investment opportunities can

                    finance investments in cash poor segments with positive net present value projects (eg Myers

                    and Majluf 1984) Consequently diversified firms should be less liquidity constrained and better

                    able to shift resources to the most valuable investment opportunities Research has found that

                    internal financing is used more often when diversified firms have operations in countries with

                    more costly external financing (Desai Foley and Hines 2004) Multinational firms may also be

                    relatively more protected than single-country firms when negative shocks hit external capital

                    9

                    markets (Foley Desai and Forbes 2008) In a recent study Matvos and Seru (2011) find that

                    industrially diversified firms perform better than non-diversified firms when external capital

                    markets are impaired

                    While these arguments suggest that MNCs enjoy certain advantages when the foreign cost of

                    capital is high these benefits should be reduced by the additional risk associated with operating a

                    business in a high cost of capital environment For example Verizon is a multinational firm

                    operating in a number of countries One of the higher cost of capital locations in which they

                    operated was Venezuela While the multinational structure of Verizon may have mitigated some

                    of the risks associated with operating in a higher cost of capital location the firms was unable to

                    eliminate all of these risks In fact in 2007 Verizonrsquos operations in that country were

                    nationalized resulting in a net extraordinary loss of $131 million that year8 In other words

                    MNC investors are likely to expect higher rates of return to compensate for higher risk which

                    likely offsets some (if not all) of the potential excess value premium

                    On the other hand multinational firms may incur a discount (ie negative excess values)

                    relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Potential reasons for a discount largely rely on

                    the existence of agency costs Multinational firms tend to be larger more complex and less

                    transparent The combination of complexity and opacity inherent in MNCs reduces a firmrsquos

                    reliance on external capital as the cost of such capital increases due to agency costs (Desai et al

                    2004) As a result of the reduced reliance on external funds MNCs face a reduced level of

                    monitoring As noted by Jensen (1986) managers have incentives to increase firm size beyond

                    that which is optimal with overinvestment or misallocation of funds to pet projects If this lack of

                    monitoring is in combination with available internal capital empire building becomes easier

                    (Hope and Thomas 2008) Furthermore the current segment reporting standards under US 8 See the 10-K of Verizon Communications Inc dated December 31 2007 (footnote 2)

                    10

                    GAAP only require highly aggregated disclosures of foreign operations and allow for

                    considerable managerial discretion As a result operating in multiple countries makes it easier

                    for management to hide poor performance ndash either their own or that of a division ndash such that low

                    quality managers are more likely to be retained and overcompensated and poorly performing

                    divisions retained longer than optimal Other reasons one might expect a discount to be applied

                    to multinational firms include higher coordination costs (eg coordinating across different

                    cultures and languages) as well as additional risks These risks include exposure to multiple

                    political regimes legal regimes economic regulations and currency fluctuations

                    Past studies investigate whether foreign operations of US firms enhance or reduce firm

                    value However all of these studies benchmark the value of the foreign operations of an MNC to

                    US domestic firms For instance Denis et al (2002) determine the implied value of a US

                    MNC using domestic (US) single-segment firms in the same industry as a benchmark Studies

                    using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs also rely on domestic benchmarks

                    (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

                    However using a US domestic firm as a benchmark for the value of foreign operations

                    implicitly makes two assumptions First this method assumes that the risks and expected growth

                    rates of foreign operations are equivalent to those of domestic operations This assumption is

                    inconsistent with the findings of Hail and Leuz (2009) which provides evidence that the cost of

                    capital varies substantially across countries Second this method assumes that there is excess

                    domestic capacity to allow for expansion with profitability similar to current domestic

                    operations We relax these assumptions by measuring the imputed value of a foreign component

                    of a US firm as if that component operated autonomously within that foreign country (rather

                    than in the US) Specifically our multiples allow the cost of capital and expected growth rates

                    11

                    to vary across not just industry but also country Furthermore our counterfactual does not

                    require the assumption that operations be relocated mitigating the production and sales capacity

                    concerns

                    3 Measuring excess value

                    31 Description of excess value

                    Figure 1 shows the average percent of foreign sales (based on segment disclosures under US

                    GAAP) across firms through time and illustrates that firms are continuing to expand

                    internationally9 This expansion highlights the importance of understanding whether the decision

                    to operate internationally is on average a value enhancing corporate strategy We contribute to

                    this understanding by evaluating whether the firm as a whole is worth more or less than its

                    imputed value (ie the firm is valued in excess of the sum of its individual components)

                    We measure the excess value of a firm as the logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to

                    imputed value based on the method used in Berger and Ofek (1995) The imputed value is the

                    hypothetical value of the MNC under the assumption that its country-industry components

                    operate as independent entities A key innovation of our study is an alternative approach to

                    imputing the value of the foreign operations of an MNC Components of MNCs operating in a

                    given industry and country are imputed using the value of single-segment firms operating in the

                    same industry and country Thus we ensure the discount rates and expected growth rates are

                    applicable to each given industry and location in estimating the implied values of the MNC

                    segments

                    9 The discontinuity in industrial diversification (the percent of sales outside the primary industry) between 1997 and 1998 is the result of a change in segment reporting rules

                    12

                    The actual firm values are observable for all firms in our sample The hypothetical firm

                    values for multi-segment firms are imputed using market value to sales ratios herein referred to

                    as lsquomultiplesrsquo of the median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry Thus

                    these single country-industry firms serve as benchmarks for an MNCrsquos operations within that

                    same country-industry The imputed value of the country-industry component can be viewed as

                    an estimate of what that component would be worth if it operated independently The sum of the

                    imputed values across all country-industry components represents the hypothetical value that the

                    multi-segment firm would be worth if it were broken apart

                    32 Data

                    Four primary data sources play a distinct role in carrying out our analysis i) Bureau of

                    Economic Analysis (BEA) data ii) Compustat Segment data iii) Worldscope data and iv)

                    Compustat Fundamentals Annual data Broadly speaking BEA data provide information about

                    the diversified nature of MNCs Compustat Segment data provide information about the

                    industrial diversification of US domiciled firms Worldscope data are used to compute

                    multiples for single-segment foreign firms that serve as benchmarks for the foreign operations of

                    MNCs (ie foreign benchmarks) and Compustat Fundamentals Annual data are used to

                    compute multiples for single-segment domestic firms that serve as benchmarks for the domestic

                    operations of multinational firms We also use the latter data source to construct our primary

                    control variables

                    13

                    Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

                    domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

                    observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

                    important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

                    the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

                    identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

                    limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

                    An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

                    not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

                    consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

                    and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

                    Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

                    The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

                    and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

                    due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

                    Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

                    affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

                    interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

                    10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

                    14

                    accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

                    we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

                    affiliate13

                    The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

                    (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

                    and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

                    exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

                    utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

                    sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

                    year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

                    ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

                    US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

                    accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

                    data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

                    have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

                    firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

                    our data requirements

                    33 Measuring excess value

                    The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

                    logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

                    13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

                    15

                    Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

                    observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

                    (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

                    Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

                    operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

                    components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

                    by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

                    value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

                    multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

                    obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

                    annually

                    Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

                    multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

                    ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

                    multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

                    for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

                    need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

                    sales data are measured most consistently

                    To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

                    accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

                    14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

                    16

                    GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

                    prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

                    changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

                    are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

                    A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

                    under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

                    standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

                    though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

                    non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

                    assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

                    standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

                    that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

                    The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

                    estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

                    the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

                    measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

                    Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

                    includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

                    segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

                    higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

                    benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

                    15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

                    17

                    means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

                    multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

                    To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

                    firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

                    only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

                    those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

                    We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

                    of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

                    benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

                    the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

                    and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

                    multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

                    To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

                    we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

                    the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

                    represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

                    five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

                    France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

                    firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

                    16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

                    18

                    the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

                    representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

                    4 Empirical results

                    41 Independent variables

                    Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

                    multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

                    of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

                    multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

                    approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

                    analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

                    control variables (discussed below)

                    We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

                    value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

                    Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

                    and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

                    firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

                    we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

                    for firms that operate in a single business segment

                    Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

                    long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

                    sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

                    the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

                    19

                    advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

                    control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

                    use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

                    firm level

                    42 Primary regression analysis

                    In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

                    activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

                    Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

                    foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

                    (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

                    indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

                    remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

                    column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

                    Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

                    effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

                    46 in column (2)20

                    Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

                    firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

                    2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

                    measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

                    20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

                    20

                    countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                    result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                    whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                    abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                    productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                    ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                    To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                    firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                    their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                    productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                    effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                    (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                    on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                    and Denis et al 2002)

                    The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                    on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                    methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                    different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                    diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                    a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                    extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                    benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                    21

                    more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                    value implications of a multinational network

                    5 Robustness

                    51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                    Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                    value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                    Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                    their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                    likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                    Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                    robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                    control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                    the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                    and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                    previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                    values

                    Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                    lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                    lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                    channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                    Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                    periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                    22

                    present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                    dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                    the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                    estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                    We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                    industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                    Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                    treated as endogenous

                    Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                    model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                    model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                    explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                    with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                    variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                    (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                    this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                    variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                    The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                    the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                    excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                    diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                    Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                    model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                    23

                    serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                    correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                    model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                    test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                    indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                    known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                    the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                    52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                    Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                    value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                    fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                    sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                    expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                    and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                    coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                    operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                    21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                    24

                    typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                    these reasons we do not implement an event study

                    53 Control premium

                    A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                    source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                    enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                    prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                    ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                    firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                    the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                    such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                    MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                    Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                    weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                    included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                    Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                    when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                    value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                    extract large control premiums

                    23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                    25

                    54 Cost of capital

                    As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                    network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                    capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                    establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                    and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                    is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                    between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                    markets in which it operates

                    We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                    rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                    imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                    of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                    significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                    (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                    we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                    A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                    do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                    capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                    24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                    26

                    55 Corporate governance

                    In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                    we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                    governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                    discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                    governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                    are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                    of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                    ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                    (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                    (Governance Index)

                    As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                    almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                    None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                    on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                    conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                    sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                    2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                    virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                    the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                    governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                    27

                    6 Conclusion

                    Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                    domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                    degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                    examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                    incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                    important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                    Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                    increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                    value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                    This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                    firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                    firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                    The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                    whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                    panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                    account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                    we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                    control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                    premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                    in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                    multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                    corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                    28

                    industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                    explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                    remains significant

                    Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                    evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                    international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                    to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                    premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                    what factors influence the premium

                    29

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                    US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

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                    of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

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                    32

                    Appendix A Variable Definitions

                    We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                    Dependent variable

                    Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                    Independent variables

                    Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                    Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                    Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                    Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                    CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                    EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                    RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                    Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                    Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                    Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                    33

                    CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                    Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                    Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                    Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                    34

                    Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                    35

                    Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                    2003

                    4 6

                    2004

                    25 38

                    2005

                    8 12

                    2006

                    6 9

                    2007

                    7 11

                    2008

                    5 8

                    2009

                    5 8

                    2010

                    5 8

                    2011

                    1 2

                    66

                    Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                    IFRS

                    47 71

                    Canadian GAAP

                    12 18

                    Israeli GAAP

                    2 3

                    Dutch GAAP

                    1 2

                    Indian GAAP

                    1 2

                    Japanese GAAP

                    1 2

                    Norwegian GAAP

                    1 2

                    Swiss GAAP

                    1 2

                    66

                    36

                    (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                    Percent different from US GAAP

                    Comparison to sales (p-values)

                    N Mean Median

                    Mean Median

                    Full Sample (2001-2011)

                    Sales

                    66 236 000

                    Net Income

                    66 10653 647

                    005 lt001

                    Assets

                    66 1162 126

                    lt001 lt001

                    Study Sample (2001-2008)

                    Sales

                    55 257 000

                    Net Income

                    55 10303 589

                    011 lt001

                    Assets

                    55 1047 099

                    003 lt001

                    37

                    Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                    Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                    Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                    Test of Diff (p-value)

                    Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                    38

                    Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                    This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                    Country

                    N (1)

                    Sales (millions)

                    (2)

                    Total Sales (3)

                    N (4)

                    Sales (million)

                    (5)

                    Total Sales (6)

                    Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                    39

                    Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                    40

                    Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                    41

                    Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                    42

                    Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                    43

                    Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                    Governance

                    No Governance (same sample)

                    Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                    CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                    Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                    • Cover for paperpdf
                    • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                      9

                      markets (Foley Desai and Forbes 2008) In a recent study Matvos and Seru (2011) find that

                      industrially diversified firms perform better than non-diversified firms when external capital

                      markets are impaired

                      While these arguments suggest that MNCs enjoy certain advantages when the foreign cost of

                      capital is high these benefits should be reduced by the additional risk associated with operating a

                      business in a high cost of capital environment For example Verizon is a multinational firm

                      operating in a number of countries One of the higher cost of capital locations in which they

                      operated was Venezuela While the multinational structure of Verizon may have mitigated some

                      of the risks associated with operating in a higher cost of capital location the firms was unable to

                      eliminate all of these risks In fact in 2007 Verizonrsquos operations in that country were

                      nationalized resulting in a net extraordinary loss of $131 million that year8 In other words

                      MNC investors are likely to expect higher rates of return to compensate for higher risk which

                      likely offsets some (if not all) of the potential excess value premium

                      On the other hand multinational firms may incur a discount (ie negative excess values)

                      relative to a similar footprint of stand-alone firms Potential reasons for a discount largely rely on

                      the existence of agency costs Multinational firms tend to be larger more complex and less

                      transparent The combination of complexity and opacity inherent in MNCs reduces a firmrsquos

                      reliance on external capital as the cost of such capital increases due to agency costs (Desai et al

                      2004) As a result of the reduced reliance on external funds MNCs face a reduced level of

                      monitoring As noted by Jensen (1986) managers have incentives to increase firm size beyond

                      that which is optimal with overinvestment or misallocation of funds to pet projects If this lack of

                      monitoring is in combination with available internal capital empire building becomes easier

                      (Hope and Thomas 2008) Furthermore the current segment reporting standards under US 8 See the 10-K of Verizon Communications Inc dated December 31 2007 (footnote 2)

                      10

                      GAAP only require highly aggregated disclosures of foreign operations and allow for

                      considerable managerial discretion As a result operating in multiple countries makes it easier

                      for management to hide poor performance ndash either their own or that of a division ndash such that low

                      quality managers are more likely to be retained and overcompensated and poorly performing

                      divisions retained longer than optimal Other reasons one might expect a discount to be applied

                      to multinational firms include higher coordination costs (eg coordinating across different

                      cultures and languages) as well as additional risks These risks include exposure to multiple

                      political regimes legal regimes economic regulations and currency fluctuations

                      Past studies investigate whether foreign operations of US firms enhance or reduce firm

                      value However all of these studies benchmark the value of the foreign operations of an MNC to

                      US domestic firms For instance Denis et al (2002) determine the implied value of a US

                      MNC using domestic (US) single-segment firms in the same industry as a benchmark Studies

                      using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs also rely on domestic benchmarks

                      (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

                      However using a US domestic firm as a benchmark for the value of foreign operations

                      implicitly makes two assumptions First this method assumes that the risks and expected growth

                      rates of foreign operations are equivalent to those of domestic operations This assumption is

                      inconsistent with the findings of Hail and Leuz (2009) which provides evidence that the cost of

                      capital varies substantially across countries Second this method assumes that there is excess

                      domestic capacity to allow for expansion with profitability similar to current domestic

                      operations We relax these assumptions by measuring the imputed value of a foreign component

                      of a US firm as if that component operated autonomously within that foreign country (rather

                      than in the US) Specifically our multiples allow the cost of capital and expected growth rates

                      11

                      to vary across not just industry but also country Furthermore our counterfactual does not

                      require the assumption that operations be relocated mitigating the production and sales capacity

                      concerns

                      3 Measuring excess value

                      31 Description of excess value

                      Figure 1 shows the average percent of foreign sales (based on segment disclosures under US

                      GAAP) across firms through time and illustrates that firms are continuing to expand

                      internationally9 This expansion highlights the importance of understanding whether the decision

                      to operate internationally is on average a value enhancing corporate strategy We contribute to

                      this understanding by evaluating whether the firm as a whole is worth more or less than its

                      imputed value (ie the firm is valued in excess of the sum of its individual components)

                      We measure the excess value of a firm as the logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to

                      imputed value based on the method used in Berger and Ofek (1995) The imputed value is the

                      hypothetical value of the MNC under the assumption that its country-industry components

                      operate as independent entities A key innovation of our study is an alternative approach to

                      imputing the value of the foreign operations of an MNC Components of MNCs operating in a

                      given industry and country are imputed using the value of single-segment firms operating in the

                      same industry and country Thus we ensure the discount rates and expected growth rates are

                      applicable to each given industry and location in estimating the implied values of the MNC

                      segments

                      9 The discontinuity in industrial diversification (the percent of sales outside the primary industry) between 1997 and 1998 is the result of a change in segment reporting rules

                      12

                      The actual firm values are observable for all firms in our sample The hypothetical firm

                      values for multi-segment firms are imputed using market value to sales ratios herein referred to

                      as lsquomultiplesrsquo of the median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry Thus

                      these single country-industry firms serve as benchmarks for an MNCrsquos operations within that

                      same country-industry The imputed value of the country-industry component can be viewed as

                      an estimate of what that component would be worth if it operated independently The sum of the

                      imputed values across all country-industry components represents the hypothetical value that the

                      multi-segment firm would be worth if it were broken apart

                      32 Data

                      Four primary data sources play a distinct role in carrying out our analysis i) Bureau of

                      Economic Analysis (BEA) data ii) Compustat Segment data iii) Worldscope data and iv)

                      Compustat Fundamentals Annual data Broadly speaking BEA data provide information about

                      the diversified nature of MNCs Compustat Segment data provide information about the

                      industrial diversification of US domiciled firms Worldscope data are used to compute

                      multiples for single-segment foreign firms that serve as benchmarks for the foreign operations of

                      MNCs (ie foreign benchmarks) and Compustat Fundamentals Annual data are used to

                      compute multiples for single-segment domestic firms that serve as benchmarks for the domestic

                      operations of multinational firms We also use the latter data source to construct our primary

                      control variables

                      13

                      Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

                      domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

                      observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

                      important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

                      the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

                      identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

                      limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

                      An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

                      not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

                      consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

                      and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

                      Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

                      The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

                      and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

                      due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

                      Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

                      affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

                      interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

                      10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

                      14

                      accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

                      we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

                      affiliate13

                      The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

                      (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

                      and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

                      exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

                      utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

                      sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

                      year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

                      ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

                      US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

                      accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

                      data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

                      have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

                      firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

                      our data requirements

                      33 Measuring excess value

                      The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

                      logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

                      13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

                      15

                      Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

                      observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

                      (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

                      Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

                      operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

                      components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

                      by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

                      value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

                      multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

                      obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

                      annually

                      Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

                      multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

                      ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

                      multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

                      for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

                      need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

                      sales data are measured most consistently

                      To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

                      accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

                      14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

                      16

                      GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

                      prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

                      changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

                      are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

                      A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

                      under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

                      standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

                      though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

                      non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

                      assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

                      standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

                      that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

                      The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

                      estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

                      the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

                      measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

                      Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

                      includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

                      segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

                      higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

                      benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

                      15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

                      17

                      means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

                      multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

                      To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

                      firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

                      only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

                      those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

                      We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

                      of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

                      benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

                      the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

                      and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

                      multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

                      To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

                      we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

                      the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

                      represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

                      five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

                      France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

                      firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

                      16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

                      18

                      the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

                      representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

                      4 Empirical results

                      41 Independent variables

                      Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

                      multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

                      of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

                      multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

                      approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

                      analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

                      control variables (discussed below)

                      We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

                      value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

                      Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

                      and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

                      firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

                      we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

                      for firms that operate in a single business segment

                      Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

                      long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

                      sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

                      the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

                      19

                      advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

                      control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

                      use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

                      firm level

                      42 Primary regression analysis

                      In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

                      activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

                      Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

                      foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

                      (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

                      indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

                      remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

                      column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

                      Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

                      effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

                      46 in column (2)20

                      Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

                      firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

                      2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

                      measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

                      20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

                      20

                      countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                      result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                      whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                      abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                      productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                      ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                      To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                      firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                      their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                      productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                      effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                      (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                      on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                      and Denis et al 2002)

                      The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                      on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                      methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                      different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                      diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                      a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                      extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                      benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                      21

                      more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                      value implications of a multinational network

                      5 Robustness

                      51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                      Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                      value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                      Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                      their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                      likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                      Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                      robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                      control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                      the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                      and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                      previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                      values

                      Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                      lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                      lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                      channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                      Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                      periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                      22

                      present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                      dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                      the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                      estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                      We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                      industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                      Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                      treated as endogenous

                      Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                      model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                      model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                      explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                      with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                      variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                      (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                      this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                      variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                      The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                      the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                      excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                      diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                      Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                      model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                      23

                      serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                      correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                      model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                      test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                      indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                      known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                      the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                      52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                      Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                      value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                      fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                      sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                      expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                      and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                      coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                      operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                      21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                      24

                      typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                      these reasons we do not implement an event study

                      53 Control premium

                      A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                      source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                      enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                      prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                      ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                      firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                      the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                      such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                      MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                      Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                      weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                      included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                      Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                      when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                      value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                      extract large control premiums

                      23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                      25

                      54 Cost of capital

                      As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                      network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                      capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                      establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                      and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                      is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                      between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                      markets in which it operates

                      We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                      rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                      imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                      of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                      significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                      (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                      we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                      A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                      do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                      capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                      24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                      26

                      55 Corporate governance

                      In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                      we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                      governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                      discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                      governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                      are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                      of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                      ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                      (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                      (Governance Index)

                      As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                      almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                      None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                      on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                      conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                      sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                      2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                      virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                      the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                      governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                      27

                      6 Conclusion

                      Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                      domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                      degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                      examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                      incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                      important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                      Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                      increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                      value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                      This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                      firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                      firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                      The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                      whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                      panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                      account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                      we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                      control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                      premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                      in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                      multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                      corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                      28

                      industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                      explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                      remains significant

                      Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                      evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                      international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                      to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                      premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                      what factors influence the premium

                      29

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                      Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                      evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                      Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                      components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                      reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                      Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                      Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                      data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                      Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                      and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                      choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                      destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                      Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                      Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                      wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                      International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                      30

                      Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                      Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                      Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                      Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                      Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                      Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                      diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                      Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                      Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                      Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                      US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                      firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                      44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                      American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                      discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                      of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                      border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                      Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                      31

                      Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                      Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                      of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                      Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                      market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                      Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                      comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                      Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                      165-186

                      Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                      Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                      Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                      Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                      365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                      Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                      Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                      Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                      corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                      32

                      Appendix A Variable Definitions

                      We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                      Dependent variable

                      Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                      Independent variables

                      Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                      Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                      Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                      Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                      CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                      EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                      RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                      Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                      Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                      Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                      33

                      CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                      Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                      Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                      Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                      34

                      Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                      35

                      Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                      2003

                      4 6

                      2004

                      25 38

                      2005

                      8 12

                      2006

                      6 9

                      2007

                      7 11

                      2008

                      5 8

                      2009

                      5 8

                      2010

                      5 8

                      2011

                      1 2

                      66

                      Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                      IFRS

                      47 71

                      Canadian GAAP

                      12 18

                      Israeli GAAP

                      2 3

                      Dutch GAAP

                      1 2

                      Indian GAAP

                      1 2

                      Japanese GAAP

                      1 2

                      Norwegian GAAP

                      1 2

                      Swiss GAAP

                      1 2

                      66

                      36

                      (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                      Percent different from US GAAP

                      Comparison to sales (p-values)

                      N Mean Median

                      Mean Median

                      Full Sample (2001-2011)

                      Sales

                      66 236 000

                      Net Income

                      66 10653 647

                      005 lt001

                      Assets

                      66 1162 126

                      lt001 lt001

                      Study Sample (2001-2008)

                      Sales

                      55 257 000

                      Net Income

                      55 10303 589

                      011 lt001

                      Assets

                      55 1047 099

                      003 lt001

                      37

                      Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                      Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                      Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                      Test of Diff (p-value)

                      Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                      38

                      Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                      This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                      Country

                      N (1)

                      Sales (millions)

                      (2)

                      Total Sales (3)

                      N (4)

                      Sales (million)

                      (5)

                      Total Sales (6)

                      Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                      39

                      Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                      40

                      Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                      41

                      Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                      42

                      Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                      43

                      Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                      Governance

                      No Governance (same sample)

                      Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                      CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                      Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                      • Cover for paperpdf
                      • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                        10

                        GAAP only require highly aggregated disclosures of foreign operations and allow for

                        considerable managerial discretion As a result operating in multiple countries makes it easier

                        for management to hide poor performance ndash either their own or that of a division ndash such that low

                        quality managers are more likely to be retained and overcompensated and poorly performing

                        divisions retained longer than optimal Other reasons one might expect a discount to be applied

                        to multinational firms include higher coordination costs (eg coordinating across different

                        cultures and languages) as well as additional risks These risks include exposure to multiple

                        political regimes legal regimes economic regulations and currency fluctuations

                        Past studies investigate whether foreign operations of US firms enhance or reduce firm

                        value However all of these studies benchmark the value of the foreign operations of an MNC to

                        US domestic firms For instance Denis et al (2002) determine the implied value of a US

                        MNC using domestic (US) single-segment firms in the same industry as a benchmark Studies

                        using Tobinrsquos Q to investigate valuation effects of MNCs also rely on domestic benchmarks

                        (eg Morck and Yeung 1991 Morck and Yeung 2001 Gande Schenzler and Senbet 2009)

                        However using a US domestic firm as a benchmark for the value of foreign operations

                        implicitly makes two assumptions First this method assumes that the risks and expected growth

                        rates of foreign operations are equivalent to those of domestic operations This assumption is

                        inconsistent with the findings of Hail and Leuz (2009) which provides evidence that the cost of

                        capital varies substantially across countries Second this method assumes that there is excess

                        domestic capacity to allow for expansion with profitability similar to current domestic

                        operations We relax these assumptions by measuring the imputed value of a foreign component

                        of a US firm as if that component operated autonomously within that foreign country (rather

                        than in the US) Specifically our multiples allow the cost of capital and expected growth rates

                        11

                        to vary across not just industry but also country Furthermore our counterfactual does not

                        require the assumption that operations be relocated mitigating the production and sales capacity

                        concerns

                        3 Measuring excess value

                        31 Description of excess value

                        Figure 1 shows the average percent of foreign sales (based on segment disclosures under US

                        GAAP) across firms through time and illustrates that firms are continuing to expand

                        internationally9 This expansion highlights the importance of understanding whether the decision

                        to operate internationally is on average a value enhancing corporate strategy We contribute to

                        this understanding by evaluating whether the firm as a whole is worth more or less than its

                        imputed value (ie the firm is valued in excess of the sum of its individual components)

                        We measure the excess value of a firm as the logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to

                        imputed value based on the method used in Berger and Ofek (1995) The imputed value is the

                        hypothetical value of the MNC under the assumption that its country-industry components

                        operate as independent entities A key innovation of our study is an alternative approach to

                        imputing the value of the foreign operations of an MNC Components of MNCs operating in a

                        given industry and country are imputed using the value of single-segment firms operating in the

                        same industry and country Thus we ensure the discount rates and expected growth rates are

                        applicable to each given industry and location in estimating the implied values of the MNC

                        segments

                        9 The discontinuity in industrial diversification (the percent of sales outside the primary industry) between 1997 and 1998 is the result of a change in segment reporting rules

                        12

                        The actual firm values are observable for all firms in our sample The hypothetical firm

                        values for multi-segment firms are imputed using market value to sales ratios herein referred to

                        as lsquomultiplesrsquo of the median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry Thus

                        these single country-industry firms serve as benchmarks for an MNCrsquos operations within that

                        same country-industry The imputed value of the country-industry component can be viewed as

                        an estimate of what that component would be worth if it operated independently The sum of the

                        imputed values across all country-industry components represents the hypothetical value that the

                        multi-segment firm would be worth if it were broken apart

                        32 Data

                        Four primary data sources play a distinct role in carrying out our analysis i) Bureau of

                        Economic Analysis (BEA) data ii) Compustat Segment data iii) Worldscope data and iv)

                        Compustat Fundamentals Annual data Broadly speaking BEA data provide information about

                        the diversified nature of MNCs Compustat Segment data provide information about the

                        industrial diversification of US domiciled firms Worldscope data are used to compute

                        multiples for single-segment foreign firms that serve as benchmarks for the foreign operations of

                        MNCs (ie foreign benchmarks) and Compustat Fundamentals Annual data are used to

                        compute multiples for single-segment domestic firms that serve as benchmarks for the domestic

                        operations of multinational firms We also use the latter data source to construct our primary

                        control variables

                        13

                        Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

                        domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

                        observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

                        important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

                        the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

                        identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

                        limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

                        An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

                        not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

                        consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

                        and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

                        Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

                        The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

                        and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

                        due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

                        Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

                        affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

                        interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

                        10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

                        14

                        accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

                        we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

                        affiliate13

                        The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

                        (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

                        and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

                        exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

                        utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

                        sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

                        year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

                        ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

                        US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

                        accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

                        data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

                        have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

                        firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

                        our data requirements

                        33 Measuring excess value

                        The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

                        logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

                        13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

                        15

                        Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

                        observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

                        (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

                        Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

                        operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

                        components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

                        by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

                        value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

                        multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

                        obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

                        annually

                        Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

                        multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

                        ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

                        multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

                        for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

                        need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

                        sales data are measured most consistently

                        To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

                        accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

                        14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

                        16

                        GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

                        prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

                        changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

                        are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

                        A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

                        under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

                        standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

                        though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

                        non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

                        assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

                        standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

                        that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

                        The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

                        estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

                        the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

                        measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

                        Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

                        includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

                        segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

                        higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

                        benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

                        15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

                        17

                        means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

                        multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

                        To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

                        firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

                        only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

                        those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

                        We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

                        of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

                        benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

                        the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

                        and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

                        multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

                        To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

                        we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

                        the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

                        represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

                        five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

                        France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

                        firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

                        16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

                        18

                        the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

                        representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

                        4 Empirical results

                        41 Independent variables

                        Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

                        multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

                        of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

                        multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

                        approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

                        analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

                        control variables (discussed below)

                        We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

                        value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

                        Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

                        and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

                        firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

                        we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

                        for firms that operate in a single business segment

                        Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

                        long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

                        sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

                        the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

                        19

                        advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

                        control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

                        use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

                        firm level

                        42 Primary regression analysis

                        In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

                        activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

                        Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

                        foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

                        (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

                        indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

                        remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

                        column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

                        Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

                        effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

                        46 in column (2)20

                        Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

                        firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

                        2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

                        measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

                        20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

                        20

                        countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                        result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                        whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                        abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                        productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                        ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                        To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                        firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                        their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                        productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                        effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                        (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                        on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                        and Denis et al 2002)

                        The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                        on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                        methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                        different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                        diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                        a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                        extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                        benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                        21

                        more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                        value implications of a multinational network

                        5 Robustness

                        51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                        Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                        value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                        Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                        their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                        likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                        Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                        robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                        control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                        the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                        and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                        previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                        values

                        Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                        lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                        lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                        channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                        Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                        periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                        22

                        present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                        dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                        the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                        estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                        We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                        industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                        Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                        treated as endogenous

                        Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                        model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                        model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                        explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                        with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                        variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                        (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                        this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                        variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                        The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                        the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                        excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                        diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                        Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                        model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                        23

                        serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                        correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                        model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                        test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                        indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                        known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                        the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                        52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                        Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                        value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                        fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                        sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                        expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                        and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                        coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                        operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                        21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                        24

                        typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                        these reasons we do not implement an event study

                        53 Control premium

                        A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                        source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                        enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                        prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                        ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                        firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                        the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                        such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                        MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                        Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                        weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                        included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                        Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                        when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                        value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                        extract large control premiums

                        23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                        25

                        54 Cost of capital

                        As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                        network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                        capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                        establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                        and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                        is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                        between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                        markets in which it operates

                        We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                        rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                        imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                        of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                        significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                        (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                        we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                        A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                        do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                        capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                        24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                        26

                        55 Corporate governance

                        In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                        we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                        governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                        discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                        governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                        are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                        of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                        ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                        (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                        (Governance Index)

                        As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                        almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                        None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                        on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                        conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                        sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                        2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                        virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                        the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                        governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                        27

                        6 Conclusion

                        Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                        domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                        degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                        examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                        incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                        important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                        Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                        increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                        value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                        This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                        firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                        firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                        The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                        whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                        panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                        account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                        we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                        control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                        premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                        in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                        multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                        corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                        28

                        industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                        explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                        remains significant

                        Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                        evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                        international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                        to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                        premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                        what factors influence the premium

                        29

                        References

                        Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

                        Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                        evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                        Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                        components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                        reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                        Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                        Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                        data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                        Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                        and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                        choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                        destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                        Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                        Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                        wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                        International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                        30

                        Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                        Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                        Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                        Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                        Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                        Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                        diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                        Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                        Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                        Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                        US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                        firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                        44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                        American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                        discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                        of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                        border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                        Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                        31

                        Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                        Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                        of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                        Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                        market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                        Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                        comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                        Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                        165-186

                        Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                        Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                        Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                        Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                        365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                        Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                        Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                        Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                        corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                        32

                        Appendix A Variable Definitions

                        We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                        Dependent variable

                        Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                        Independent variables

                        Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                        Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                        Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                        Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                        CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                        EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                        RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                        Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                        Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                        Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                        33

                        CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                        Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                        Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                        Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                        34

                        Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                        35

                        Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                        2003

                        4 6

                        2004

                        25 38

                        2005

                        8 12

                        2006

                        6 9

                        2007

                        7 11

                        2008

                        5 8

                        2009

                        5 8

                        2010

                        5 8

                        2011

                        1 2

                        66

                        Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                        IFRS

                        47 71

                        Canadian GAAP

                        12 18

                        Israeli GAAP

                        2 3

                        Dutch GAAP

                        1 2

                        Indian GAAP

                        1 2

                        Japanese GAAP

                        1 2

                        Norwegian GAAP

                        1 2

                        Swiss GAAP

                        1 2

                        66

                        36

                        (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                        Percent different from US GAAP

                        Comparison to sales (p-values)

                        N Mean Median

                        Mean Median

                        Full Sample (2001-2011)

                        Sales

                        66 236 000

                        Net Income

                        66 10653 647

                        005 lt001

                        Assets

                        66 1162 126

                        lt001 lt001

                        Study Sample (2001-2008)

                        Sales

                        55 257 000

                        Net Income

                        55 10303 589

                        011 lt001

                        Assets

                        55 1047 099

                        003 lt001

                        37

                        Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                        Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                        Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                        Test of Diff (p-value)

                        Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                        38

                        Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                        This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                        Country

                        N (1)

                        Sales (millions)

                        (2)

                        Total Sales (3)

                        N (4)

                        Sales (million)

                        (5)

                        Total Sales (6)

                        Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                        39

                        Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                        40

                        Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                        41

                        Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                        42

                        Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                        43

                        Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                        Governance

                        No Governance (same sample)

                        Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                        CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                        Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                        • Cover for paperpdf
                        • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                          11

                          to vary across not just industry but also country Furthermore our counterfactual does not

                          require the assumption that operations be relocated mitigating the production and sales capacity

                          concerns

                          3 Measuring excess value

                          31 Description of excess value

                          Figure 1 shows the average percent of foreign sales (based on segment disclosures under US

                          GAAP) across firms through time and illustrates that firms are continuing to expand

                          internationally9 This expansion highlights the importance of understanding whether the decision

                          to operate internationally is on average a value enhancing corporate strategy We contribute to

                          this understanding by evaluating whether the firm as a whole is worth more or less than its

                          imputed value (ie the firm is valued in excess of the sum of its individual components)

                          We measure the excess value of a firm as the logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to

                          imputed value based on the method used in Berger and Ofek (1995) The imputed value is the

                          hypothetical value of the MNC under the assumption that its country-industry components

                          operate as independent entities A key innovation of our study is an alternative approach to

                          imputing the value of the foreign operations of an MNC Components of MNCs operating in a

                          given industry and country are imputed using the value of single-segment firms operating in the

                          same industry and country Thus we ensure the discount rates and expected growth rates are

                          applicable to each given industry and location in estimating the implied values of the MNC

                          segments

                          9 The discontinuity in industrial diversification (the percent of sales outside the primary industry) between 1997 and 1998 is the result of a change in segment reporting rules

                          12

                          The actual firm values are observable for all firms in our sample The hypothetical firm

                          values for multi-segment firms are imputed using market value to sales ratios herein referred to

                          as lsquomultiplesrsquo of the median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry Thus

                          these single country-industry firms serve as benchmarks for an MNCrsquos operations within that

                          same country-industry The imputed value of the country-industry component can be viewed as

                          an estimate of what that component would be worth if it operated independently The sum of the

                          imputed values across all country-industry components represents the hypothetical value that the

                          multi-segment firm would be worth if it were broken apart

                          32 Data

                          Four primary data sources play a distinct role in carrying out our analysis i) Bureau of

                          Economic Analysis (BEA) data ii) Compustat Segment data iii) Worldscope data and iv)

                          Compustat Fundamentals Annual data Broadly speaking BEA data provide information about

                          the diversified nature of MNCs Compustat Segment data provide information about the

                          industrial diversification of US domiciled firms Worldscope data are used to compute

                          multiples for single-segment foreign firms that serve as benchmarks for the foreign operations of

                          MNCs (ie foreign benchmarks) and Compustat Fundamentals Annual data are used to

                          compute multiples for single-segment domestic firms that serve as benchmarks for the domestic

                          operations of multinational firms We also use the latter data source to construct our primary

                          control variables

                          13

                          Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

                          domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

                          observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

                          important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

                          the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

                          identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

                          limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

                          An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

                          not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

                          consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

                          and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

                          Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

                          The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

                          and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

                          due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

                          Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

                          affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

                          interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

                          10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

                          14

                          accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

                          we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

                          affiliate13

                          The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

                          (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

                          and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

                          exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

                          utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

                          sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

                          year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

                          ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

                          US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

                          accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

                          data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

                          have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

                          firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

                          our data requirements

                          33 Measuring excess value

                          The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

                          logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

                          13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

                          15

                          Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

                          observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

                          (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

                          Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

                          operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

                          components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

                          by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

                          value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

                          multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

                          obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

                          annually

                          Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

                          multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

                          ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

                          multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

                          for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

                          need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

                          sales data are measured most consistently

                          To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

                          accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

                          14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

                          16

                          GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

                          prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

                          changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

                          are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

                          A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

                          under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

                          standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

                          though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

                          non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

                          assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

                          standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

                          that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

                          The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

                          estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

                          the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

                          measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

                          Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

                          includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

                          segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

                          higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

                          benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

                          15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

                          17

                          means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

                          multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

                          To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

                          firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

                          only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

                          those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

                          We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

                          of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

                          benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

                          the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

                          and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

                          multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

                          To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

                          we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

                          the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

                          represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

                          five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

                          France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

                          firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

                          16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

                          18

                          the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

                          representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

                          4 Empirical results

                          41 Independent variables

                          Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

                          multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

                          of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

                          multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

                          approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

                          analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

                          control variables (discussed below)

                          We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

                          value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

                          Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

                          and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

                          firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

                          we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

                          for firms that operate in a single business segment

                          Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

                          long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

                          sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

                          the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

                          19

                          advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

                          control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

                          use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

                          firm level

                          42 Primary regression analysis

                          In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

                          activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

                          Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

                          foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

                          (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

                          indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

                          remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

                          column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

                          Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

                          effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

                          46 in column (2)20

                          Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

                          firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

                          2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

                          measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

                          20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

                          20

                          countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                          result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                          whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                          abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                          productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                          ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                          To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                          firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                          their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                          productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                          effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                          (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                          on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                          and Denis et al 2002)

                          The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                          on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                          methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                          different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                          diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                          a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                          extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                          benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                          21

                          more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                          value implications of a multinational network

                          5 Robustness

                          51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                          Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                          value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                          Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                          their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                          likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                          Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                          robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                          control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                          the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                          and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                          previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                          values

                          Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                          lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                          lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                          channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                          Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                          periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                          22

                          present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                          dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                          the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                          estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                          We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                          industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                          Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                          treated as endogenous

                          Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                          model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                          model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                          explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                          with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                          variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                          (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                          this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                          variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                          The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                          the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                          excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                          diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                          Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                          model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                          23

                          serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                          correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                          model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                          test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                          indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                          known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                          the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                          52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                          Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                          value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                          fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                          sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                          expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                          and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                          coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                          operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                          21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                          24

                          typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                          these reasons we do not implement an event study

                          53 Control premium

                          A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                          source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                          enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                          prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                          ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                          firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                          the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                          such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                          MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                          Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                          weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                          included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                          Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                          when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                          value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                          extract large control premiums

                          23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                          25

                          54 Cost of capital

                          As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                          network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                          capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                          establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                          and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                          is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                          between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                          markets in which it operates

                          We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                          rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                          imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                          of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                          significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                          (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                          we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                          A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                          do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                          capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                          24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                          26

                          55 Corporate governance

                          In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                          we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                          governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                          discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                          governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                          are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                          of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                          ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                          (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                          (Governance Index)

                          As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                          almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                          None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                          on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                          conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                          sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                          2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                          virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                          the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                          governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                          27

                          6 Conclusion

                          Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                          domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                          degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                          examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                          incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                          important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                          Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                          increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                          value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                          This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                          firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                          firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                          The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                          whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                          panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                          account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                          we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                          control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                          premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                          in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                          multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                          corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                          28

                          industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                          explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                          remains significant

                          Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                          evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                          international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                          to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                          premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                          what factors influence the premium

                          29

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                          Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

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                          Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

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                          American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                          discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                          of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

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                          Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                          31

                          Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                          Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                          of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                          Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                          market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                          Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                          comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                          Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                          165-186

                          Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                          Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                          Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                          Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                          365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                          Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                          Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                          Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                          corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                          32

                          Appendix A Variable Definitions

                          We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                          Dependent variable

                          Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                          Independent variables

                          Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                          Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                          Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                          Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                          CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                          EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                          RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                          Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                          Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                          Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                          33

                          CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                          Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                          Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                          Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                          34

                          Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                          35

                          Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                          2003

                          4 6

                          2004

                          25 38

                          2005

                          8 12

                          2006

                          6 9

                          2007

                          7 11

                          2008

                          5 8

                          2009

                          5 8

                          2010

                          5 8

                          2011

                          1 2

                          66

                          Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                          IFRS

                          47 71

                          Canadian GAAP

                          12 18

                          Israeli GAAP

                          2 3

                          Dutch GAAP

                          1 2

                          Indian GAAP

                          1 2

                          Japanese GAAP

                          1 2

                          Norwegian GAAP

                          1 2

                          Swiss GAAP

                          1 2

                          66

                          36

                          (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                          Percent different from US GAAP

                          Comparison to sales (p-values)

                          N Mean Median

                          Mean Median

                          Full Sample (2001-2011)

                          Sales

                          66 236 000

                          Net Income

                          66 10653 647

                          005 lt001

                          Assets

                          66 1162 126

                          lt001 lt001

                          Study Sample (2001-2008)

                          Sales

                          55 257 000

                          Net Income

                          55 10303 589

                          011 lt001

                          Assets

                          55 1047 099

                          003 lt001

                          37

                          Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                          Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                          Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                          Test of Diff (p-value)

                          Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                          38

                          Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                          This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                          Country

                          N (1)

                          Sales (millions)

                          (2)

                          Total Sales (3)

                          N (4)

                          Sales (million)

                          (5)

                          Total Sales (6)

                          Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                          39

                          Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                          40

                          Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                          41

                          Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                          42

                          Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                          43

                          Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                          Governance

                          No Governance (same sample)

                          Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                          CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                          Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                          • Cover for paperpdf
                          • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                            12

                            The actual firm values are observable for all firms in our sample The hypothetical firm

                            values for multi-segment firms are imputed using market value to sales ratios herein referred to

                            as lsquomultiplesrsquo of the median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry Thus

                            these single country-industry firms serve as benchmarks for an MNCrsquos operations within that

                            same country-industry The imputed value of the country-industry component can be viewed as

                            an estimate of what that component would be worth if it operated independently The sum of the

                            imputed values across all country-industry components represents the hypothetical value that the

                            multi-segment firm would be worth if it were broken apart

                            32 Data

                            Four primary data sources play a distinct role in carrying out our analysis i) Bureau of

                            Economic Analysis (BEA) data ii) Compustat Segment data iii) Worldscope data and iv)

                            Compustat Fundamentals Annual data Broadly speaking BEA data provide information about

                            the diversified nature of MNCs Compustat Segment data provide information about the

                            industrial diversification of US domiciled firms Worldscope data are used to compute

                            multiples for single-segment foreign firms that serve as benchmarks for the foreign operations of

                            MNCs (ie foreign benchmarks) and Compustat Fundamentals Annual data are used to

                            compute multiples for single-segment domestic firms that serve as benchmarks for the domestic

                            operations of multinational firms We also use the latter data source to construct our primary

                            control variables

                            13

                            Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

                            domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

                            observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

                            important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

                            the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

                            identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

                            limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

                            An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

                            not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

                            consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

                            and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

                            Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

                            The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

                            and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

                            due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

                            Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

                            affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

                            interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

                            10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

                            14

                            accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

                            we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

                            affiliate13

                            The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

                            (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

                            and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

                            exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

                            utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

                            sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

                            year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

                            ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

                            US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

                            accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

                            data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

                            have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

                            firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

                            our data requirements

                            33 Measuring excess value

                            The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

                            logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

                            13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

                            15

                            Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

                            observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

                            (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

                            Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

                            operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

                            components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

                            by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

                            value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

                            multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

                            obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

                            annually

                            Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

                            multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

                            ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

                            multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

                            for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

                            need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

                            sales data are measured most consistently

                            To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

                            accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

                            14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

                            16

                            GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

                            prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

                            changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

                            are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

                            A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

                            under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

                            standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

                            though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

                            non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

                            assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

                            standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

                            that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

                            The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

                            estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

                            the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

                            measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

                            Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

                            includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

                            segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

                            higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

                            benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

                            15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

                            17

                            means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

                            multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

                            To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

                            firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

                            only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

                            those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

                            We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

                            of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

                            benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

                            the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

                            and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

                            multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

                            To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

                            we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

                            the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

                            represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

                            five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

                            France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

                            firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

                            16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

                            18

                            the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

                            representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

                            4 Empirical results

                            41 Independent variables

                            Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

                            multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

                            of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

                            multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

                            approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

                            analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

                            control variables (discussed below)

                            We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

                            value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

                            Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

                            and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

                            firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

                            we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

                            for firms that operate in a single business segment

                            Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

                            long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

                            sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

                            the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

                            19

                            advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

                            control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

                            use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

                            firm level

                            42 Primary regression analysis

                            In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

                            activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

                            Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

                            foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

                            (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

                            indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

                            remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

                            column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

                            Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

                            effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

                            46 in column (2)20

                            Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

                            firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

                            2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

                            measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

                            20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

                            20

                            countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                            result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                            whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                            abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                            productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                            ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                            To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                            firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                            their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                            productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                            effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                            (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                            on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                            and Denis et al 2002)

                            The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                            on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                            methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                            different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                            diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                            a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                            extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                            benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                            21

                            more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                            value implications of a multinational network

                            5 Robustness

                            51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                            Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                            value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                            Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                            their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                            likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                            Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                            robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                            control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                            the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                            and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                            previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                            values

                            Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                            lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                            lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                            channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                            Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                            periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                            22

                            present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                            dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                            the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                            estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                            We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                            industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                            Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                            treated as endogenous

                            Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                            model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                            model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                            explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                            with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                            variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                            (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                            this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                            variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                            The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                            the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                            excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                            diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                            Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                            model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                            23

                            serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                            correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                            model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                            test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                            indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                            known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                            the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                            52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                            Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                            value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                            fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                            sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                            expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                            and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                            coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                            operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                            21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                            24

                            typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                            these reasons we do not implement an event study

                            53 Control premium

                            A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                            source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                            enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                            prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                            ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                            firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                            the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                            such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                            MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                            Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                            weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                            included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                            Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                            when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                            value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                            extract large control premiums

                            23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                            25

                            54 Cost of capital

                            As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                            network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                            capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                            establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                            and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                            is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                            between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                            markets in which it operates

                            We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                            rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                            imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                            of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                            significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                            (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                            we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                            A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                            do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                            capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                            24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                            26

                            55 Corporate governance

                            In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                            we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                            governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                            discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                            governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                            are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                            of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                            ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                            (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                            (Governance Index)

                            As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                            almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                            None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                            on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                            conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                            sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                            2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                            virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                            the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                            governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                            27

                            6 Conclusion

                            Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                            domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                            degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                            examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                            incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                            important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                            Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                            increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                            value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                            This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                            firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                            firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                            The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                            whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                            panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                            account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                            we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                            control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                            premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                            in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                            multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                            corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                            28

                            industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                            explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                            remains significant

                            Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                            evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                            international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                            to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                            premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                            what factors influence the premium

                            29

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                            Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

                            Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                            evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                            Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                            components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                            reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                            Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                            Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                            data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                            Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                            and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                            choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                            destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                            Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                            Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                            wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                            International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                            30

                            Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                            Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                            Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                            Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                            Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                            Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                            diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                            Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                            Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                            Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                            US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                            firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                            44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                            American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                            discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                            of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                            border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                            Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                            31

                            Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                            Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                            of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                            Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                            market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                            Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                            comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                            Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                            165-186

                            Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                            Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                            Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                            Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                            365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                            Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                            Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                            Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                            corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                            32

                            Appendix A Variable Definitions

                            We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                            Dependent variable

                            Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                            Independent variables

                            Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                            Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                            Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                            Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                            CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                            EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                            RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                            Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                            Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                            Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                            33

                            CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                            Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                            Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                            Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                            34

                            Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                            35

                            Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                            2003

                            4 6

                            2004

                            25 38

                            2005

                            8 12

                            2006

                            6 9

                            2007

                            7 11

                            2008

                            5 8

                            2009

                            5 8

                            2010

                            5 8

                            2011

                            1 2

                            66

                            Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                            IFRS

                            47 71

                            Canadian GAAP

                            12 18

                            Israeli GAAP

                            2 3

                            Dutch GAAP

                            1 2

                            Indian GAAP

                            1 2

                            Japanese GAAP

                            1 2

                            Norwegian GAAP

                            1 2

                            Swiss GAAP

                            1 2

                            66

                            36

                            (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                            Percent different from US GAAP

                            Comparison to sales (p-values)

                            N Mean Median

                            Mean Median

                            Full Sample (2001-2011)

                            Sales

                            66 236 000

                            Net Income

                            66 10653 647

                            005 lt001

                            Assets

                            66 1162 126

                            lt001 lt001

                            Study Sample (2001-2008)

                            Sales

                            55 257 000

                            Net Income

                            55 10303 589

                            011 lt001

                            Assets

                            55 1047 099

                            003 lt001

                            37

                            Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                            Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                            Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                            Test of Diff (p-value)

                            Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                            38

                            Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                            This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                            Country

                            N (1)

                            Sales (millions)

                            (2)

                            Total Sales (3)

                            N (4)

                            Sales (million)

                            (5)

                            Total Sales (6)

                            Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                            39

                            Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                            40

                            Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                            41

                            Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                            42

                            Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                            43

                            Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                            Governance

                            No Governance (same sample)

                            Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                            CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                            Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                            • Cover for paperpdf
                            • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                              13

                              Key to the execution of our study is our access to BEA data Federal law requires US-

                              domiciled MNCs to report certain financial and operating data to the BEA10 With regard to

                              observing the country-industry operations of MNCs use of the BEA data overcomes two

                              important limitations of Compustat Segment data First Compustat does not consistently identify

                              the specific location or scale of MNCsrsquo foreign operations11 Second Compustat does not

                              identify the industry activities in each country of operation This latter point is particularly

                              limiting for MNCs because domestic industry activity need not mirror foreign industry activity

                              An MNC generating an equal proportion of sales in two industries in the domestic market need

                              not generate industry sales in equal proportions in every foreign market12 The lack of detail and

                              consistency in Compustat Segment data arises because segment reporting is highly aggregated

                              and firms exercise substantial discretion in defining segments under Accounting Standards

                              Codification 280 (ASC 280) (eg Villalonga 2004a and Bens Berger and Monahan 2011)

                              The BEA defines an MNC as the combination of a single US entity called the US parent

                              and at least one foreign affiliate ndash that is these firms have a physical presence outside the US

                              due to FDI Since 1982 MNCs have completed a mandatory and confidential lsquoSurvey of US

                              Direct Investment Abroadrsquo for the domestic operation and the operations of each foreign

                              affiliate defined as a foreign entity in which the US parent holds at least a 10 percent equity

                              interest (directly or indirectly) The data are reported in US dollars on a fiscal year basis and in

                              10 BEA surveys are conducted pursuant to the International Investment and Trade in Services Survey Act (PL 94-472 90 Stat 2059 22 USC 3101-3108) See httpwwwbeagovsurveysdiasurvhtm and Mataloni (2003) for more detailed information on the BEA data 11 Exhibit 21 disclosures of material subsidiaries and their locations in SEC 10-K filings could potentially help overcome the inability to observe the location of the firmrsquos foreign operations from segment disclosures However at least three limitations remain (1) for industrially diversified multinational firms the researcher would be required to make an assumption about the proportion of industrial diversification in each country (2) Exhibit 21 provides no information about the scale of activity in each jurisdiction and (3) managerial discretion is used to determine a lsquomaterialrsquo subsidiary under Section 601 of SEC Regulation S-K 12 In fact the expectation that a multinational firm would exhibit different industry membership in different countries is consistent with the theory of vertical foreign direct investment where firms separate their various value chain activities and locate them in the most favorable country (see eg Hanson Mataloni and Slaughter 2005)

                              14

                              accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

                              we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

                              affiliate13

                              The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

                              (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

                              and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

                              exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

                              utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

                              sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

                              year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

                              ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

                              US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

                              accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

                              data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

                              have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

                              firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

                              our data requirements

                              33 Measuring excess value

                              The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

                              logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

                              13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

                              15

                              Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

                              observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

                              (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

                              Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

                              operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

                              components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

                              by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

                              value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

                              multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

                              obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

                              annually

                              Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

                              multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

                              ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

                              multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

                              for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

                              need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

                              sales data are measured most consistently

                              To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

                              accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

                              14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

                              16

                              GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

                              prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

                              changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

                              are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

                              A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

                              under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

                              standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

                              though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

                              non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

                              assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

                              standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

                              that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

                              The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

                              estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

                              the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

                              measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

                              Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

                              includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

                              segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

                              higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

                              benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

                              15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

                              17

                              means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

                              multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

                              To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

                              firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

                              only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

                              those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

                              We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

                              of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

                              benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

                              the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

                              and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

                              multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

                              To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

                              we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

                              the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

                              represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

                              five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

                              France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

                              firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

                              16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

                              18

                              the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

                              representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

                              4 Empirical results

                              41 Independent variables

                              Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

                              multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

                              of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

                              multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

                              approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

                              analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

                              control variables (discussed below)

                              We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

                              value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

                              Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

                              and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

                              firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

                              we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

                              for firms that operate in a single business segment

                              Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

                              long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

                              sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

                              the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

                              19

                              advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

                              control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

                              use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

                              firm level

                              42 Primary regression analysis

                              In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

                              activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

                              Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

                              foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

                              (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

                              indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

                              remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

                              column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

                              Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

                              effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

                              46 in column (2)20

                              Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

                              firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

                              2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

                              measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

                              20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

                              20

                              countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                              result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                              whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                              abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                              productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                              ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                              To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                              firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                              their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                              productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                              effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                              (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                              on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                              and Denis et al 2002)

                              The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                              on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                              methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                              different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                              diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                              a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                              extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                              benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                              21

                              more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                              value implications of a multinational network

                              5 Robustness

                              51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                              Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                              value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                              Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                              their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                              likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                              Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                              robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                              control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                              the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                              and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                              previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                              values

                              Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                              lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                              lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                              channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                              Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                              periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                              22

                              present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                              dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                              the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                              estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                              We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                              industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                              Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                              treated as endogenous

                              Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                              model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                              model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                              explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                              with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                              variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                              (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                              this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                              variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                              The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                              the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                              excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                              diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                              Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                              model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                              23

                              serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                              correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                              model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                              test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                              indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                              known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                              the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                              52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                              Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                              value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                              fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                              sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                              expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                              and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                              coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                              operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                              21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                              24

                              typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                              these reasons we do not implement an event study

                              53 Control premium

                              A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                              source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                              enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                              prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                              ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                              firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                              the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                              such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                              MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                              Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                              weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                              included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                              Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                              when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                              value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                              extract large control premiums

                              23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                              25

                              54 Cost of capital

                              As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                              network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                              capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                              establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                              and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                              is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                              between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                              markets in which it operates

                              We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                              rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                              imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                              of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                              significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                              (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                              we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                              A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                              do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                              capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                              24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                              26

                              55 Corporate governance

                              In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                              we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                              governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                              discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                              governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                              are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                              of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                              ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                              (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                              (Governance Index)

                              As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                              almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                              None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                              on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                              conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                              sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                              2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                              virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                              the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                              governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                              27

                              6 Conclusion

                              Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                              domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                              degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                              examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                              incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                              important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                              Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                              increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                              value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                              This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                              firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                              firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                              The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                              whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                              panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                              account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                              we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                              control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                              premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                              in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                              multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                              corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                              28

                              industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                              explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                              remains significant

                              Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                              evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                              international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                              to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                              premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                              what factors influence the premium

                              29

                              References

                              Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

                              Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                              evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                              Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                              components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                              reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                              Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                              Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                              data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                              Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                              and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                              choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                              destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                              Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                              Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                              wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                              International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                              30

                              Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                              Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                              Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                              Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                              Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                              Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                              diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                              Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                              Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                              Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                              US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                              firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                              44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                              American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                              discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                              of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                              border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                              Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                              31

                              Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                              Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                              of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                              Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                              market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                              Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                              comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                              Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                              165-186

                              Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                              Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                              Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                              Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                              365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                              Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                              Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                              Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                              corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                              32

                              Appendix A Variable Definitions

                              We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                              Dependent variable

                              Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                              Independent variables

                              Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                              Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                              Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                              Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                              CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                              EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                              RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                              Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                              Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                              Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                              33

                              CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                              Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                              Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                              Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                              34

                              Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                              35

                              Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                              2003

                              4 6

                              2004

                              25 38

                              2005

                              8 12

                              2006

                              6 9

                              2007

                              7 11

                              2008

                              5 8

                              2009

                              5 8

                              2010

                              5 8

                              2011

                              1 2

                              66

                              Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                              IFRS

                              47 71

                              Canadian GAAP

                              12 18

                              Israeli GAAP

                              2 3

                              Dutch GAAP

                              1 2

                              Indian GAAP

                              1 2

                              Japanese GAAP

                              1 2

                              Norwegian GAAP

                              1 2

                              Swiss GAAP

                              1 2

                              66

                              36

                              (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                              Percent different from US GAAP

                              Comparison to sales (p-values)

                              N Mean Median

                              Mean Median

                              Full Sample (2001-2011)

                              Sales

                              66 236 000

                              Net Income

                              66 10653 647

                              005 lt001

                              Assets

                              66 1162 126

                              lt001 lt001

                              Study Sample (2001-2008)

                              Sales

                              55 257 000

                              Net Income

                              55 10303 589

                              011 lt001

                              Assets

                              55 1047 099

                              003 lt001

                              37

                              Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                              Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                              Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                              Test of Diff (p-value)

                              Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                              38

                              Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                              This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                              Country

                              N (1)

                              Sales (millions)

                              (2)

                              Total Sales (3)

                              N (4)

                              Sales (million)

                              (5)

                              Total Sales (6)

                              Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                              39

                              Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                              40

                              Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                              41

                              Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                              42

                              Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                              43

                              Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                              Governance

                              No Governance (same sample)

                              Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                              CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                              Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                              • Cover for paperpdf
                              • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                14

                                accordance with US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) For each year

                                we observe the sales industry composition and location of not only the parent but also each

                                affiliate13

                                The procedures we use to construct our sample are similar to those used by Berger and Ofek

                                (1995) and Denis et al (2002) Using firm-years appearing in Compustat Fundamentals Annual

                                and Compustat Segment data we obtain a sample of firms domiciled in the US with total sales

                                exceeding $20 million We exclude firms in the financial service (SIC codes 6000 to 6999) and

                                utility (SIC codes 4000 to 4999) industries and eliminate firm-years when the sum of segment

                                sales (Compustat geographic or Compustat business) is not within 1 of total firm sales for that

                                year We restrict our sample period to include fiscal years beginning after December 15 1997 as

                                ASC 280 Segment Reporting substantially altered the definition of a reporting segment under

                                US GAAP This restriction ensures that Compustat Segment data reflects the use of a consistent

                                accounting standard Finally we require that our MNCs appear in both Compustat and BEA

                                data The requirement that our sample firms appear in the BEA database ensures that the firms

                                have observable international operations In sum these procedures result in 1166 multinational

                                firms incorporated in the US with 4950 observations between 1998 and 2008 that meet all of

                                our data requirements

                                33 Measuring excess value

                                The dependent variable in our study is excess firm value (Excess Value) defined as the

                                logarithm of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value (Berger and Ofek 1995)

                                13 We obtain sales industry membership and country location for affiliates from one of two sources When affiliates exceed the BEA-determined reporting thresholds (ie if their assets sales or net income (loss) exceed $7 million in 1999 $30 million in 2000 through 2003 $10 million in 2004 and $40 million in 2005 through 2008) they must file their own detailed survey When affiliates fall below the thresholds we obtain our data from an attachment to the parent survey

                                15

                                Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

                                observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

                                (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

                                Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

                                operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

                                components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

                                by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

                                value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

                                multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

                                obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

                                annually

                                Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

                                multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

                                ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

                                multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

                                for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

                                need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

                                sales data are measured most consistently

                                To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

                                accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

                                14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

                                16

                                GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

                                prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

                                changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

                                are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

                                A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

                                under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

                                standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

                                though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

                                non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

                                assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

                                standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

                                that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

                                The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

                                estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

                                the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

                                measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

                                Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

                                includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

                                segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

                                higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

                                benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

                                15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

                                17

                                means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

                                multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

                                To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

                                firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

                                only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

                                those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

                                We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

                                of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

                                benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

                                the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

                                and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

                                multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

                                To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

                                we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

                                the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

                                represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

                                five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

                                France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

                                firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

                                16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

                                18

                                the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

                                representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

                                4 Empirical results

                                41 Independent variables

                                Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

                                multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

                                of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

                                multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

                                approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

                                analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

                                control variables (discussed below)

                                We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

                                value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

                                Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

                                and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

                                firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

                                we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

                                for firms that operate in a single business segment

                                Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

                                long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

                                sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

                                the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

                                19

                                advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

                                control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

                                use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

                                firm level

                                42 Primary regression analysis

                                In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

                                activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

                                Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

                                foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

                                (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

                                indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

                                remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

                                column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

                                Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

                                effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

                                46 in column (2)20

                                Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

                                firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

                                2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

                                measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

                                20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

                                20

                                countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                                result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                                whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                                abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                                productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                                ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                                To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                                firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                                their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                                productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                                effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                                (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                                on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                                and Denis et al 2002)

                                The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                                on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                                methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                                different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                                diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                                a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                                extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                                benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                                21

                                more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                                value implications of a multinational network

                                5 Robustness

                                51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                                Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                                value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                                Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                                their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                                likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                                Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                                robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                                control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                                the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                                and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                                previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                                values

                                Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                                lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                                lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                                channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                                Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                                periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                                22

                                present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                                dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                                the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                                estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                                We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                                industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                                Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                                treated as endogenous

                                Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                                model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                                model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                                explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                                with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                                variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                                (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                                this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                                variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                                The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                                the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                                excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                                diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                                Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                                model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                                23

                                serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                                correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                                model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                                test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                                indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                                known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                                the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                                52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                                Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                                value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                                fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                                sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                                expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                                and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                                coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                                operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                                21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                                24

                                typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                                these reasons we do not implement an event study

                                53 Control premium

                                A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                                source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                                enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                                prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                                ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                                firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                                the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                                such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                                MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                                Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                                weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                                included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                                Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                                when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                                value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                                extract large control premiums

                                23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                                25

                                54 Cost of capital

                                As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                                network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                                capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                                establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                                and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                                is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                                between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                                markets in which it operates

                                We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                                rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                                imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                                of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                                significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                                (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                                we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                                A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                                do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                                capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                                24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                                26

                                55 Corporate governance

                                In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                                we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                                governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                                discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                                governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                                are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                                of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                                ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                                (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                                (Governance Index)

                                As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                                almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                                None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                                on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                                conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                                sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                                2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                                virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                                the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                                governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                                27

                                6 Conclusion

                                Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                                domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                                degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                                examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                                incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                                important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                                Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                                increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                                value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                                This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                                firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                                firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                                The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                                whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                                panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                                account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                                we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                                control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                                premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                                in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                                multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                                corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                                28

                                industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                remains significant

                                Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                what factors influence the premium

                                29

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                                Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

                                Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                                reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                                Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                                30

                                Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                31

                                Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                165-186

                                Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                32

                                Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                Dependent variable

                                Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                Independent variables

                                Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                33

                                CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                34

                                Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                35

                                Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                2003

                                4 6

                                2004

                                25 38

                                2005

                                8 12

                                2006

                                6 9

                                2007

                                7 11

                                2008

                                5 8

                                2009

                                5 8

                                2010

                                5 8

                                2011

                                1 2

                                66

                                Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                IFRS

                                47 71

                                Canadian GAAP

                                12 18

                                Israeli GAAP

                                2 3

                                Dutch GAAP

                                1 2

                                Indian GAAP

                                1 2

                                Japanese GAAP

                                1 2

                                Norwegian GAAP

                                1 2

                                Swiss GAAP

                                1 2

                                66

                                36

                                (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                Percent different from US GAAP

                                Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                N Mean Median

                                Mean Median

                                Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                Sales

                                66 236 000

                                Net Income

                                66 10653 647

                                005 lt001

                                Assets

                                66 1162 126

                                lt001 lt001

                                Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                Sales

                                55 257 000

                                Net Income

                                55 10303 589

                                011 lt001

                                Assets

                                55 1047 099

                                003 lt001

                                37

                                Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                Test of Diff (p-value)

                                Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                38

                                Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                Country

                                N (1)

                                Sales (millions)

                                (2)

                                Total Sales (3)

                                N (4)

                                Sales (million)

                                (5)

                                Total Sales (6)

                                Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                39

                                Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                40

                                Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                41

                                Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                42

                                Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                43

                                Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                Governance

                                No Governance (same sample)

                                Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                • Cover for paperpdf
                                • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                  15

                                  Appendix A provides the definition of this and all other variables used in our analysis We

                                  observe actual firm value equal to a firmrsquos market value of equity plus book value of liabilities

                                  (ie book value of total assets minus book value of total equity) using Compustat Fundamentals

                                  Annual data We calculate imputed firm value as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos

                                  operations in each country-industry Our method for imputing the value of the separate

                                  components of a firm can best be described in three steps First we obtain total sales generated

                                  by a firm for each country-industry in which it operates14 Second we obtain multiples (market

                                  value to sales ratios) for benchmark firms operating in those same country-industries Third we

                                  multiply a firmrsquos country-industry sales by the applicable median country-industry multiple to

                                  obtain the imputed market value for each country-industry operation We perform each step

                                  annually

                                  Conceptually imputed values can be based on assets (ie Tobinrsquos Q) net income or sales

                                  multiples We restrict ourselves to sales multiples for two reasons First using value to sales

                                  ratios maintains consistency with the prior research on the excess value implications of

                                  multinational operations (eg Denis et al 2002) Second as our method uses accounting data

                                  for foreign companies to compute country-industry multiples the accounting numbers we use

                                  need to be consistently measured across firms using different accounting standards We find that

                                  sales data are measured most consistently

                                  To assess the comparability of sales relative to either net income or assets across various

                                  accounting standards we examine all firms listed on Worldscope as changing to or from US

                                  14 Specifically we allocate total sales from Compustat to each component based on the proportion of BEA sales (after eliminating intercompany sales) occurring in each country-industry This step ensures that our total firm sales do not deviate from a firmrsquos total sales as reported in the 10-K

                                  16

                                  GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

                                  prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

                                  changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

                                  are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

                                  A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

                                  under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

                                  standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

                                  though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

                                  non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

                                  assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

                                  standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

                                  that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

                                  The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

                                  estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

                                  the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

                                  measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

                                  Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

                                  includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

                                  segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

                                  higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

                                  benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

                                  15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

                                  17

                                  means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

                                  multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

                                  To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

                                  firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

                                  only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

                                  those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

                                  We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

                                  of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

                                  benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

                                  the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

                                  and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

                                  multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

                                  To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

                                  we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

                                  the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

                                  represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

                                  five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

                                  France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

                                  firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

                                  16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

                                  18

                                  the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

                                  representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

                                  4 Empirical results

                                  41 Independent variables

                                  Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

                                  multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

                                  of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

                                  multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

                                  approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

                                  analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

                                  control variables (discussed below)

                                  We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

                                  value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

                                  Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

                                  and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

                                  firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

                                  we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

                                  for firms that operate in a single business segment

                                  Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

                                  long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

                                  sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

                                  the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

                                  19

                                  advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

                                  control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

                                  use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

                                  firm level

                                  42 Primary regression analysis

                                  In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

                                  activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

                                  Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

                                  foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

                                  (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

                                  indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

                                  remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

                                  column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

                                  Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

                                  effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

                                  46 in column (2)20

                                  Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

                                  firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

                                  2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

                                  measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

                                  20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

                                  20

                                  countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                                  result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                                  whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                                  abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                                  productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                                  ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                                  To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                                  firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                                  their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                                  productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                                  effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                                  (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                                  on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                                  and Denis et al 2002)

                                  The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                                  on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                                  methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                                  different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                                  diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                                  a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                                  extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                                  benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                                  21

                                  more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                                  value implications of a multinational network

                                  5 Robustness

                                  51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                                  Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                                  value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                                  Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                                  their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                                  likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                                  Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                                  robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                                  control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                                  the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                                  and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                                  previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                                  values

                                  Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                                  lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                                  lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                                  channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                                  Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                                  periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                                  22

                                  present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                                  dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                                  the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                                  estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                                  We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                                  industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                                  Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                                  treated as endogenous

                                  Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                                  model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                                  model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                                  explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                                  with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                                  variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                                  (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                                  this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                                  variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                                  The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                                  the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                                  excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                                  diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                                  Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                                  model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                                  23

                                  serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                                  correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                                  model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                                  test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                                  indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                                  known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                                  the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                                  52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                                  Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                                  value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                                  fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                                  sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                                  expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                                  and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                                  coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                                  operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                                  21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                                  24

                                  typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                                  these reasons we do not implement an event study

                                  53 Control premium

                                  A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                                  source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                                  enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                                  prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                                  ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                                  firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                                  the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                                  such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                                  MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                                  Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                                  weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                                  included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                                  Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                                  when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                                  value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                                  extract large control premiums

                                  23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                                  25

                                  54 Cost of capital

                                  As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                                  network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                                  capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                                  establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                                  and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                                  is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                                  between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                                  markets in which it operates

                                  We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                                  rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                                  imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                                  of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                                  significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                                  (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                                  we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                                  A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                                  do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                                  capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                                  24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                                  26

                                  55 Corporate governance

                                  In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                                  we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                                  governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                                  discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                                  governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                                  are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                                  of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                                  ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                                  (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                                  (Governance Index)

                                  As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                                  almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                                  None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                                  on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                                  conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                                  sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                                  2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                                  virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                                  the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                                  governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                                  27

                                  6 Conclusion

                                  Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                                  domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                                  degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                                  examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                                  incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                                  important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                                  Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                                  increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                                  value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                                  This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                                  firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                                  firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                                  The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                                  whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                                  panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                                  account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                                  we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                                  control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                                  premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                                  in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                                  multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                                  corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                                  28

                                  industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                  explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                  remains significant

                                  Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                  evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                  international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                  to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                  premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                  what factors influence the premium

                                  29

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                                  Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

                                  Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                  evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                  Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                  components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                                  reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                                  Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                  Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                  data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                  Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                  and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                  choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                  destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                  Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                  Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                  wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                  International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

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                                  Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                  Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                  Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                  Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                  Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                  Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                  diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                  Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                  Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                  Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                  US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                  firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                  44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                  American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                  discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                  of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                  border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                  Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                  31

                                  Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                  Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                  of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                  Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                  market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                  Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                  comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                  Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                  165-186

                                  Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                  Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                  Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                  Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                  365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                  Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                  Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                  Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                  corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                  32

                                  Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                  We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                  Dependent variable

                                  Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                  Independent variables

                                  Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                  Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                  Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                  Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                  CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                  EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                  RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                  Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                  Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                  Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                  33

                                  CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                  Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                  Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                  Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                  34

                                  Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                  35

                                  Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                  2003

                                  4 6

                                  2004

                                  25 38

                                  2005

                                  8 12

                                  2006

                                  6 9

                                  2007

                                  7 11

                                  2008

                                  5 8

                                  2009

                                  5 8

                                  2010

                                  5 8

                                  2011

                                  1 2

                                  66

                                  Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                  IFRS

                                  47 71

                                  Canadian GAAP

                                  12 18

                                  Israeli GAAP

                                  2 3

                                  Dutch GAAP

                                  1 2

                                  Indian GAAP

                                  1 2

                                  Japanese GAAP

                                  1 2

                                  Norwegian GAAP

                                  1 2

                                  Swiss GAAP

                                  1 2

                                  66

                                  36

                                  (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                  Percent different from US GAAP

                                  Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                  N Mean Median

                                  Mean Median

                                  Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                  Sales

                                  66 236 000

                                  Net Income

                                  66 10653 647

                                  005 lt001

                                  Assets

                                  66 1162 126

                                  lt001 lt001

                                  Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                  Sales

                                  55 257 000

                                  Net Income

                                  55 10303 589

                                  011 lt001

                                  Assets

                                  55 1047 099

                                  003 lt001

                                  37

                                  Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                  Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                  Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                  Test of Diff (p-value)

                                  Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                  38

                                  Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                  This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                  Country

                                  N (1)

                                  Sales (millions)

                                  (2)

                                  Total Sales (3)

                                  N (4)

                                  Sales (million)

                                  (5)

                                  Total Sales (6)

                                  Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                  39

                                  Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                  40

                                  Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                  41

                                  Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                  42

                                  Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                  43

                                  Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                  Governance

                                  No Governance (same sample)

                                  Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                  CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                  Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                  • Cover for paperpdf
                                  • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                    16

                                    GAAP between 2005 and 201115 We obtain accounting data for the year of the change and the

                                    prior year where electronically available in English We are able to obtain data for 66 firms

                                    changing standards as detailed in Table 1 The distribution of years for which accounting data

                                    are available under two different accounting standards for the same fiscal year is shown in Panel

                                    A The years shown are the year prior to the change as these accounting numbers were provided

                                    under the original standard and then subsequently restated in the following year under the new

                                    standard for comparative purposes The majority of the shifts were to or from IFRS (71)

                                    though seven other accounting standards are noted (Panel B) We examine the percent that the

                                    non-US GAAP reported number differs from the US GAAP reported number in Panel C to

                                    assess the comparability of these three summary accounting numbers across various accounting

                                    standards Examining both the full sample as well as the subset that overlaps our study we find

                                    that sales are more consistently measured than net income or assets

                                    The sum of the imputed values across the country-industry components of an MNC is an

                                    estimate of the value of a portfolio of unrelated businesses that mirror the related businesses of

                                    the firm Consequently a comparison of the actual firm value with the imputed firm value is a

                                    measure of how a multinational network affects firm value We provide descriptive statistics for

                                    Excess Value for our sample of 4950 MNC firm-years in Table 2 Panel A This table also

                                    includes univariate comparisons of the values between the MNC firms and the domestic single-

                                    segment and foreign single-segment benchmark firms The Excess Value measure is significantly

                                    higher for MNCs suggesting a premium in firm value for multinational firms relative to the

                                    benchmark firms in total as well as the domestic and foreign subgroups (p-values for tests of

                                    15 Due to the hand collection efforts required and the limitation on electronic filings we began our search with changes documented in 2005 which generally require filings from 2004

                                    17

                                    means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

                                    multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

                                    To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

                                    firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

                                    only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

                                    those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

                                    We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

                                    of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

                                    benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

                                    the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

                                    and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

                                    multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

                                    To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

                                    we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

                                    the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

                                    represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

                                    five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

                                    France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

                                    firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

                                    16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

                                    18

                                    the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

                                    representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

                                    4 Empirical results

                                    41 Independent variables

                                    Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

                                    multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

                                    of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

                                    multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

                                    approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

                                    analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

                                    control variables (discussed below)

                                    We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

                                    value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

                                    Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

                                    and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

                                    firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

                                    we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

                                    for firms that operate in a single business segment

                                    Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

                                    long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

                                    sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

                                    the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

                                    19

                                    advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

                                    control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

                                    use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

                                    firm level

                                    42 Primary regression analysis

                                    In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

                                    activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

                                    Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

                                    foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

                                    (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

                                    indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

                                    remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

                                    column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

                                    Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

                                    effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

                                    46 in column (2)20

                                    Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

                                    firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

                                    2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

                                    measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

                                    20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

                                    20

                                    countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                                    result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                                    whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                                    abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                                    productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                                    ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                                    To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                                    firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                                    their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                                    productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                                    effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                                    (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                                    on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                                    and Denis et al 2002)

                                    The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                                    on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                                    methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                                    different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                                    diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                                    a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                                    extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                                    benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                                    21

                                    more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                                    value implications of a multinational network

                                    5 Robustness

                                    51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                                    Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                                    value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                                    Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                                    their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                                    likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                                    Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                                    robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                                    control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                                    the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                                    and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                                    previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                                    values

                                    Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                                    lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                                    lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                                    channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                                    Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                                    periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                                    22

                                    present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                                    dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                                    the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                                    estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                                    We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                                    industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                                    Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                                    treated as endogenous

                                    Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                                    model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                                    model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                                    explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                                    with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                                    variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                                    (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                                    this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                                    variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                                    The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                                    the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                                    excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                                    diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                                    Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                                    model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                                    23

                                    serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                                    correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                                    model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                                    test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                                    indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                                    known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                                    the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                                    52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                                    Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                                    value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                                    fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                                    sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                                    expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                                    and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                                    coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                                    operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                                    21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                                    24

                                    typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                                    these reasons we do not implement an event study

                                    53 Control premium

                                    A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                                    source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                                    enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                                    prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                                    ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                                    firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                                    the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                                    such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                                    MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                                    Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                                    weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                                    included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                                    Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                                    when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                                    value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                                    extract large control premiums

                                    23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                                    25

                                    54 Cost of capital

                                    As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                                    network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                                    capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                                    establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                                    and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                                    is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                                    between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                                    markets in which it operates

                                    We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                                    rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                                    imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                                    of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                                    significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                                    (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                                    we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                                    A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                                    do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                                    capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                                    24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                                    26

                                    55 Corporate governance

                                    In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                                    we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                                    governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                                    discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                                    governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                                    are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                                    of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                                    ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                                    (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                                    (Governance Index)

                                    As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                                    almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                                    None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                                    on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                                    conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                                    sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                                    2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                                    virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                                    the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                                    governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                                    27

                                    6 Conclusion

                                    Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                                    domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                                    degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                                    examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                                    incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                                    important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                                    Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                                    increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                                    value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                                    This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                                    firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                                    firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                                    The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                                    whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                                    panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                                    account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                                    we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                                    control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                                    premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                                    in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                                    multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                                    corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                                    28

                                    industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                    explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                    remains significant

                                    Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                    evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                    international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                    to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                    premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                    what factors influence the premium

                                    29

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                                    Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

                                    Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                    evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                    Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                    components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                                    reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                                    Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                    Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                    data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                    Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                    and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                    choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                    destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                    Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                    Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                    wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                    International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                                    30

                                    Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                    Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                    Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                    Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                    Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                    Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                    diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                    Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                    Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                    Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                    US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                    firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                    44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                    American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                    discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                    of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                    border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                    Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                    31

                                    Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                    Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                    of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                    Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                    market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                    Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                    comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                    Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                    165-186

                                    Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                    Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                    Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                    Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                    365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                    Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                    Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                    Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                    corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                    32

                                    Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                    We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                    Dependent variable

                                    Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                    Independent variables

                                    Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                    Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                    Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                    Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                    CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                    EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                    RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                    Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                    Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                    Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                    33

                                    CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                    Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                    Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                    Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                    34

                                    Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                    35

                                    Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                    2003

                                    4 6

                                    2004

                                    25 38

                                    2005

                                    8 12

                                    2006

                                    6 9

                                    2007

                                    7 11

                                    2008

                                    5 8

                                    2009

                                    5 8

                                    2010

                                    5 8

                                    2011

                                    1 2

                                    66

                                    Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                    IFRS

                                    47 71

                                    Canadian GAAP

                                    12 18

                                    Israeli GAAP

                                    2 3

                                    Dutch GAAP

                                    1 2

                                    Indian GAAP

                                    1 2

                                    Japanese GAAP

                                    1 2

                                    Norwegian GAAP

                                    1 2

                                    Swiss GAAP

                                    1 2

                                    66

                                    36

                                    (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                    Percent different from US GAAP

                                    Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                    N Mean Median

                                    Mean Median

                                    Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                    Sales

                                    66 236 000

                                    Net Income

                                    66 10653 647

                                    005 lt001

                                    Assets

                                    66 1162 126

                                    lt001 lt001

                                    Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                    Sales

                                    55 257 000

                                    Net Income

                                    55 10303 589

                                    011 lt001

                                    Assets

                                    55 1047 099

                                    003 lt001

                                    37

                                    Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                    Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                    Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                    Test of Diff (p-value)

                                    Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                    38

                                    Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                    This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                    Country

                                    N (1)

                                    Sales (millions)

                                    (2)

                                    Total Sales (3)

                                    N (4)

                                    Sales (million)

                                    (5)

                                    Total Sales (6)

                                    Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                    39

                                    Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                    40

                                    Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                    41

                                    Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                    42

                                    Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                    43

                                    Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                    Governance

                                    No Governance (same sample)

                                    Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                    CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                    Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                    • Cover for paperpdf
                                    • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                      17

                                      means and medians are lt 001)16 These results provide some initial evidence that operating in

                                      multiple countries is positively associated with firm value

                                      To estimate country-industry multiples we rely on Worldscope financial data on foreign

                                      firms and Compustat Fundamentals Annual for domestic firms We restrict the firms to include

                                      only those with at least 90 of sales income and assets inside the country of domicile (ie

                                      those that do not report significant multinational activity) and that operate in a single industry

                                      We refer to these firms as benchmark firms (either foreign or domestic depending on the country

                                      of domicile) these firms do not appear in any of our regressions We report the number of

                                      benchmark firms during our sample period in Table 2 Panel A The industry criterion is based on

                                      the two-digit SIC code17 For every country that has at least five firms in the respective industry

                                      and year we use the median ratio of market value to sales18 This ratio is the country-industry

                                      multiple ndash an input required to compute imputed values

                                      To determine the country-industry composition of MNCs we rely on BEA data In Table 3

                                      we report the aggregate number of foreign affiliates and total sales by country as provided by

                                      the BEA data for our sample of 4950 MNCs The specific countries tabulated are those that

                                      represent at least 02 percent of total firm sales (pooled across all years) in our sample The top

                                      five foreign countries in which MNCs generate sales are Canada United Kingdom Germany

                                      France and Japan Table 3 also provides a comparison of the number of foreign benchmark

                                      firms available in Worldscope in the specific countries in which our sample of MNCs generate

                                      16 Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) the median values differ slightly from zero for the benchmark single-segment firms due to the truncation of extreme excess values 17 BEA reporting constrains us to the two-digit SIC code level 18 When five firms are not available for a given country and industry we follow Berger and Ofek (1995) and move to a more general industry definition (eg one-digit SIC code) This procedure results in a mean (median) 630 (757) of MNC sales matched at the two-digit level

                                      18

                                      the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

                                      representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

                                      4 Empirical results

                                      41 Independent variables

                                      Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

                                      multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

                                      of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

                                      multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

                                      approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

                                      analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

                                      control variables (discussed below)

                                      We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

                                      value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

                                      Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

                                      and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

                                      firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

                                      we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

                                      for firms that operate in a single business segment

                                      Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

                                      long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

                                      sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

                                      the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

                                      19

                                      advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

                                      control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

                                      use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

                                      firm level

                                      42 Primary regression analysis

                                      In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

                                      activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

                                      Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

                                      foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

                                      (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

                                      indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

                                      remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

                                      column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

                                      Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

                                      effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

                                      46 in column (2)20

                                      Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

                                      firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

                                      2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

                                      measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

                                      20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

                                      20

                                      countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                                      result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                                      whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                                      abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                                      productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                                      ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                                      To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                                      firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                                      their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                                      productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                                      effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                                      (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                                      on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                                      and Denis et al 2002)

                                      The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                                      on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                                      methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                                      different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                                      diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                                      a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                                      extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                                      benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                                      21

                                      more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                                      value implications of a multinational network

                                      5 Robustness

                                      51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                                      Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                                      value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                                      Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                                      their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                                      likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                                      Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                                      robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                                      control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                                      the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                                      and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                                      previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                                      values

                                      Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                                      lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                                      lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                                      channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                                      Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                                      periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                                      22

                                      present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                                      dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                                      the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                                      estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                                      We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                                      industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                                      Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                                      treated as endogenous

                                      Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                                      model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                                      model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                                      explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                                      with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                                      variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                                      (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                                      this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                                      variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                                      The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                                      the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                                      excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                                      diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                                      Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                                      model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                                      23

                                      serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                                      correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                                      model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                                      test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                                      indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                                      known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                                      the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                                      52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                                      Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                                      value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                                      fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                                      sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                                      expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                                      and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                                      coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                                      operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                                      21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                                      24

                                      typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                                      these reasons we do not implement an event study

                                      53 Control premium

                                      A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                                      source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                                      enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                                      prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                                      ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                                      firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                                      the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                                      such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                                      MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                                      Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                                      weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                                      included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                                      Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                                      when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                                      value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                                      extract large control premiums

                                      23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                                      25

                                      54 Cost of capital

                                      As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                                      network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                                      capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                                      establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                                      and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                                      is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                                      between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                                      markets in which it operates

                                      We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                                      rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                                      imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                                      of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                                      significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                                      (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                                      we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                                      A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                                      do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                                      capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                                      24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                                      26

                                      55 Corporate governance

                                      In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                                      we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                                      governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                                      discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                                      governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                                      are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                                      of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                                      ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                                      (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                                      (Governance Index)

                                      As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                                      almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                                      None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                                      on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                                      conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                                      sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                                      2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                                      virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                                      the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                                      governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                                      27

                                      6 Conclusion

                                      Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                                      domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                                      degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                                      examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                                      incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                                      important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                                      Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                                      increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                                      value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                                      This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                                      firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                                      firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                                      The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                                      whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                                      panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                                      account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                                      we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                                      control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                                      premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                                      in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                                      multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                                      corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                                      28

                                      industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                      explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                      remains significant

                                      Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                      evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                      international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                      to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                      premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                      what factors influence the premium

                                      29

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                                      of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                      border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                      Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                      31

                                      Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                      Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                      of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                      Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                      market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                      Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                      comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                      Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                      165-186

                                      Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                      Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                      Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                      Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                      365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                      Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                      Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                      Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                      corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                      32

                                      Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                      We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                      Dependent variable

                                      Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                      Independent variables

                                      Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                      Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                      Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                      Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                      CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                      EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                      RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                      Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                      Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                      Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                      33

                                      CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                      Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                      Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                      Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                      34

                                      Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                      35

                                      Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                      2003

                                      4 6

                                      2004

                                      25 38

                                      2005

                                      8 12

                                      2006

                                      6 9

                                      2007

                                      7 11

                                      2008

                                      5 8

                                      2009

                                      5 8

                                      2010

                                      5 8

                                      2011

                                      1 2

                                      66

                                      Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                      IFRS

                                      47 71

                                      Canadian GAAP

                                      12 18

                                      Israeli GAAP

                                      2 3

                                      Dutch GAAP

                                      1 2

                                      Indian GAAP

                                      1 2

                                      Japanese GAAP

                                      1 2

                                      Norwegian GAAP

                                      1 2

                                      Swiss GAAP

                                      1 2

                                      66

                                      36

                                      (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                      Percent different from US GAAP

                                      Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                      N Mean Median

                                      Mean Median

                                      Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                      Sales

                                      66 236 000

                                      Net Income

                                      66 10653 647

                                      005 lt001

                                      Assets

                                      66 1162 126

                                      lt001 lt001

                                      Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                      Sales

                                      55 257 000

                                      Net Income

                                      55 10303 589

                                      011 lt001

                                      Assets

                                      55 1047 099

                                      003 lt001

                                      37

                                      Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                      Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                      Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                      Test of Diff (p-value)

                                      Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                      38

                                      Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                      This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                      Country

                                      N (1)

                                      Sales (millions)

                                      (2)

                                      Total Sales (3)

                                      N (4)

                                      Sales (million)

                                      (5)

                                      Total Sales (6)

                                      Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                      39

                                      Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                      40

                                      Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                      41

                                      Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                      42

                                      Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                      43

                                      Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                      Governance

                                      No Governance (same sample)

                                      Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                      CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                      Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                      • Cover for paperpdf
                                      • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                        18

                                        the majority of their sales Country coverage in Worldscope is not available for countries

                                        representing 004 percent of total firm sales (per BEA)

                                        4 Empirical results

                                        41 Independent variables

                                        Recall that our objective is to examine the overall relation between excess firm value and

                                        multinational operations Our proxy for the extent of multinational operations is the percentage

                                        of total firm sales made by foreign operations (Foreign Sales) By this measure the extent of

                                        multinational activity in our sample of MNCs is non-trivial ndash Table 2 Panel B shows that

                                        approximately 24 percent of sales are generated by foreign operations on average Our first

                                        analysis estimates ordinary least square regressions of Excess Value on Foreign Sales and

                                        control variables (discussed below)

                                        We include variables in our regression to control for other potential determinants of excess

                                        value These are the percentage of sales made by the firm outside its primary industry (Industry

                                        Other) to control for any relation between industrial diversification and excess value as in Berger

                                        and Ofek (1995) For this purpose we obtain industry sales using Compustat Segment data19 A

                                        firmrsquos primary industry is the industry in which the firm generates the majority of its sales and

                                        we determine industry sales at the business segment level We set Industry Other equal to zero

                                        for firms that operate in a single business segment

                                        Consistent with prior research we also include controls for firm size (Log Size) the ratio of

                                        long term debt to total market value (Debt Firm Value) the ratio of capital expenditures to total

                                        sales (CAPX Sales) the ratio of earnings before interest and taxes to total sales (EBIT Sales)

                                        the ratio of research and development expenses to total sales (RampD Sales) and the ratio of 19 Our results are unaffected by using BEA data to measure Industry Other

                                        19

                                        advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

                                        control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

                                        use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

                                        firm level

                                        42 Primary regression analysis

                                        In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

                                        activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

                                        Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

                                        foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

                                        (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

                                        indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

                                        remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

                                        column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

                                        Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

                                        effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

                                        46 in column (2)20

                                        Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

                                        firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

                                        2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

                                        measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

                                        20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

                                        20

                                        countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                                        result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                                        whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                                        abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                                        productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                                        ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                                        To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                                        firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                                        their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                                        productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                                        effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                                        (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                                        on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                                        and Denis et al 2002)

                                        The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                                        on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                                        methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                                        different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                                        diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                                        a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                                        extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                                        benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                                        21

                                        more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                                        value implications of a multinational network

                                        5 Robustness

                                        51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                                        Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                                        value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                                        Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                                        their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                                        likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                                        Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                                        robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                                        control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                                        the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                                        and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                                        previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                                        values

                                        Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                                        lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                                        lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                                        channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                                        Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                                        periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                                        22

                                        present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                                        dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                                        the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                                        estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                                        We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                                        industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                                        Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                                        treated as endogenous

                                        Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                                        model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                                        model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                                        explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                                        with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                                        variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                                        (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                                        this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                                        variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                                        The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                                        the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                                        excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                                        diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                                        Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                                        model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                                        23

                                        serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                                        correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                                        model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                                        test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                                        indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                                        known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                                        the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                                        52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                                        Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                                        value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                                        fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                                        sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                                        expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                                        and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                                        coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                                        operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                                        21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                                        24

                                        typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                                        these reasons we do not implement an event study

                                        53 Control premium

                                        A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                                        source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                                        enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                                        prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                                        ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                                        firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                                        the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                                        such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                                        MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                                        Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                                        weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                                        included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                                        Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                                        when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                                        value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                                        extract large control premiums

                                        23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                                        25

                                        54 Cost of capital

                                        As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                                        network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                                        capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                                        establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                                        and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                                        is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                                        between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                                        markets in which it operates

                                        We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                                        rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                                        imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                                        of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                                        significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                                        (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                                        we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                                        A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                                        do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                                        capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                                        24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                                        26

                                        55 Corporate governance

                                        In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                                        we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                                        governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                                        discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                                        governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                                        are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                                        of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                                        ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                                        (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                                        (Governance Index)

                                        As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                                        almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                                        None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                                        on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                                        conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                                        sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                                        2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                                        virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                                        the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                                        governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                                        27

                                        6 Conclusion

                                        Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                                        domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                                        degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                                        examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                                        incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                                        important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                                        Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                                        increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                                        value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                                        This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                                        firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                                        firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                                        The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                                        whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                                        panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                                        account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                                        we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                                        control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                                        premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                                        in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                                        multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                                        corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                                        28

                                        industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                        explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                        remains significant

                                        Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                        evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                        international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                        to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                        premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                        what factors influence the premium

                                        29

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                                        Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

                                        Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                        evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                        Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                        components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                                        reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                                        Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                        Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                        data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                        Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                        and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                        choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                        destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                        Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                        Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                        wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                        International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

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                                        Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                        Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                        Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                        Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                        Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                        Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                        diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                        Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                        Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                        Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                        US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                        firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                        44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                        American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                        discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                        of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                        border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                        Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                        31

                                        Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                        Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                        of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                        Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                        market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                        Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                        comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                        Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                        165-186

                                        Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                        Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                        Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                        Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                        365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                        Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                        Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                        Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                        corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                        32

                                        Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                        We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                        Dependent variable

                                        Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                        Independent variables

                                        Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                        Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                        Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                        Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                        CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                        EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                        RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                        Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                        Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                        Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                        33

                                        CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                        Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                        Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                        Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                        34

                                        Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                        35

                                        Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                        2003

                                        4 6

                                        2004

                                        25 38

                                        2005

                                        8 12

                                        2006

                                        6 9

                                        2007

                                        7 11

                                        2008

                                        5 8

                                        2009

                                        5 8

                                        2010

                                        5 8

                                        2011

                                        1 2

                                        66

                                        Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                        IFRS

                                        47 71

                                        Canadian GAAP

                                        12 18

                                        Israeli GAAP

                                        2 3

                                        Dutch GAAP

                                        1 2

                                        Indian GAAP

                                        1 2

                                        Japanese GAAP

                                        1 2

                                        Norwegian GAAP

                                        1 2

                                        Swiss GAAP

                                        1 2

                                        66

                                        36

                                        (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                        Percent different from US GAAP

                                        Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                        N Mean Median

                                        Mean Median

                                        Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                        Sales

                                        66 236 000

                                        Net Income

                                        66 10653 647

                                        005 lt001

                                        Assets

                                        66 1162 126

                                        lt001 lt001

                                        Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                        Sales

                                        55 257 000

                                        Net Income

                                        55 10303 589

                                        011 lt001

                                        Assets

                                        55 1047 099

                                        003 lt001

                                        37

                                        Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                        Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                        Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                        Test of Diff (p-value)

                                        Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                        38

                                        Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                        This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                        Country

                                        N (1)

                                        Sales (millions)

                                        (2)

                                        Total Sales (3)

                                        N (4)

                                        Sales (million)

                                        (5)

                                        Total Sales (6)

                                        Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                        39

                                        Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                        40

                                        Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                        41

                                        Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                        42

                                        Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                        43

                                        Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                        Governance

                                        No Governance (same sample)

                                        Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                        CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                        Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                        • Cover for paperpdf
                                        • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                          19

                                          advertising expenses to total sales (Ad Sales) Table 2 Panel B provides the distribution of the

                                          control variables All independent variables are Winsorized at 1 In our OLS regressions we

                                          use heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent robust standard errors with clustering at the

                                          firm level

                                          42 Primary regression analysis

                                          In this section we examine the relation between firm excess value and the amount of foreign

                                          activity at US MNCs Table 4 contains the results of regressions of excess value on Foreign

                                          Sales for multiple specifications In column (1) Excess Value is regressed on both the percent of

                                          foreign sales (Foreign Sales) and the percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry

                                          (Industry Other) We add the control variables to the regression in column (2) and year

                                          indicators in column (3) In all three specifications the coefficient on the percent of foreign sales

                                          remains significantly positive (with a p-value lt 001) For a sense of economic magnitude in

                                          column (3) a one standard deviation (197) increase in the percent of foreign sales (Foreign

                                          Sales) is associated with a 41 (equal to (e0349-1) times 0197) increase in firm excess value The

                                          effect is larger for the other two columns ndash 82 increase in firm excess value in column (1) and

                                          46 in column (2)20

                                          Our finding of a premium reconciles with the international trade literature which finds that

                                          firms engaging in international trade are more productive than those that do not (see Helpman

                                          2006 and Syverson 2011 for reviews) Due to data limitations it is difficult to accurately

                                          measure TFP at the firm level especially for firms which operate in multiple industries andor

                                          20 Using the alternative strategy that employs US domiciled single-segment firms as the benchmark for the imputed value of the foreign operations Denis et al (2002) find that greater foreign activity results in a discount to firm value Using the Denis et al (2002) method to calculate excess value in our sample we obtain a significantly negative regression coefficient on Foreign Sales using the models in Table 4 columns (2) and (3) (the coefficient is not significant using the model in column (1) results untabulated)

                                          20

                                          countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                                          result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                                          whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                                          abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                                          productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                                          ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                                          To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                                          firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                                          their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                                          productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                                          effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                                          (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                                          on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                                          and Denis et al 2002)

                                          The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                                          on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                                          methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                                          different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                                          diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                                          a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                                          extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                                          benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                                          21

                                          more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                                          value implications of a multinational network

                                          5 Robustness

                                          51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                                          Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                                          value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                                          Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                                          their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                                          likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                                          Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                                          robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                                          control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                                          the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                                          and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                                          previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                                          values

                                          Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                                          lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                                          lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                                          channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                                          Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                                          periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                                          22

                                          present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                                          dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                                          the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                                          estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                                          We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                                          industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                                          Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                                          treated as endogenous

                                          Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                                          model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                                          model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                                          explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                                          with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                                          variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                                          (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                                          this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                                          variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                                          The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                                          the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                                          excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                                          diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                                          Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                                          model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                                          23

                                          serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                                          correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                                          model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                                          test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                                          indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                                          known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                                          the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                                          52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                                          Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                                          value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                                          fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                                          sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                                          expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                                          and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                                          coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                                          operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                                          21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                                          24

                                          typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                                          these reasons we do not implement an event study

                                          53 Control premium

                                          A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                                          source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                                          enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                                          prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                                          ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                                          firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                                          the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                                          such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                                          MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                                          Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                                          weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                                          included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                                          Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                                          when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                                          value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                                          extract large control premiums

                                          23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                                          25

                                          54 Cost of capital

                                          As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                                          network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                                          capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                                          establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                                          and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                                          is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                                          between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                                          markets in which it operates

                                          We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                                          rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                                          imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                                          of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                                          significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                                          (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                                          we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                                          A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                                          do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                                          capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                                          24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                                          26

                                          55 Corporate governance

                                          In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                                          we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                                          governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                                          discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                                          governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                                          are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                                          of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                                          ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                                          (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                                          (Governance Index)

                                          As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                                          almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                                          None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                                          on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                                          conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                                          sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                                          2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                                          virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                                          the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                                          governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                                          27

                                          6 Conclusion

                                          Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                                          domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                                          degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                                          examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                                          incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                                          important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                                          Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                                          increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                                          value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                                          This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                                          firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                                          firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                                          The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                                          whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                                          panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                                          account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                                          we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                                          control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                                          premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                                          in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                                          multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                                          corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                                          28

                                          industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                          explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                          remains significant

                                          Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                          evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                          international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                          to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                          premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                          what factors influence the premium

                                          29

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                                          Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                          evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                          Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                          components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                                          reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                                          Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                          Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                          data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                          Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                          and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                          choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                          destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                          Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                          Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                          wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                          International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                                          30

                                          Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                          Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                          Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                          Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                          Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                          Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                          diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                          Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                          Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                          Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                          US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                          firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                          44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                          American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                          discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                          of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                          border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                          Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                          31

                                          Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                          Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                          of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                          Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                          market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                          Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                          comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                          Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                          165-186

                                          Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                          Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                          Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                          Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                          365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                          Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                          Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                          Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                          corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                          32

                                          Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                          We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                          Dependent variable

                                          Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                          Independent variables

                                          Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                          Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                          Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                          Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                          CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                          EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                          RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                          Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                          Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                          Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                          33

                                          CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                          Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                          Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                          Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                          34

                                          Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                          35

                                          Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                          2003

                                          4 6

                                          2004

                                          25 38

                                          2005

                                          8 12

                                          2006

                                          6 9

                                          2007

                                          7 11

                                          2008

                                          5 8

                                          2009

                                          5 8

                                          2010

                                          5 8

                                          2011

                                          1 2

                                          66

                                          Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                          IFRS

                                          47 71

                                          Canadian GAAP

                                          12 18

                                          Israeli GAAP

                                          2 3

                                          Dutch GAAP

                                          1 2

                                          Indian GAAP

                                          1 2

                                          Japanese GAAP

                                          1 2

                                          Norwegian GAAP

                                          1 2

                                          Swiss GAAP

                                          1 2

                                          66

                                          36

                                          (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                          Percent different from US GAAP

                                          Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                          N Mean Median

                                          Mean Median

                                          Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                          Sales

                                          66 236 000

                                          Net Income

                                          66 10653 647

                                          005 lt001

                                          Assets

                                          66 1162 126

                                          lt001 lt001

                                          Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                          Sales

                                          55 257 000

                                          Net Income

                                          55 10303 589

                                          011 lt001

                                          Assets

                                          55 1047 099

                                          003 lt001

                                          37

                                          Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                          Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                          Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                          Test of Diff (p-value)

                                          Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                          38

                                          Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                          This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                          Country

                                          N (1)

                                          Sales (millions)

                                          (2)

                                          Total Sales (3)

                                          N (4)

                                          Sales (million)

                                          (5)

                                          Total Sales (6)

                                          Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                          39

                                          Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                          40

                                          Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                          41

                                          Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                          42

                                          Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                          43

                                          Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                          Governance

                                          No Governance (same sample)

                                          Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                          CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                          Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                          • Cover for paperpdf
                                          • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                            20

                                            countries As an alternative method to evaluate whether our finding of a premium is simply the

                                            result of more productive firms also having more multinational operations we investigate

                                            whether the premium is simply an artifact of innate characteristics of firms that choose to invest

                                            abroad For example Helpman et al (2004) present a simple model with heterogeneous

                                            productivity endowments The firms that receive the highest productivity endowments are the

                                            ones capable of paying the fixed costs to establish a foreign subsidiary

                                            To the extent that productivity advantages create excess value one would expect the type of

                                            firms that choose to invest more abroad would be valued at a premium even in the absence of

                                            their foreign investments To control for time invariant firm characteristics (eg innate

                                            productivity advantages) and hence a potential source of endogeneity we add firm-level fixed

                                            effects in column (4) of Table 4 We continue to find that the extent of foreign operations

                                            (Foreign Sales) is positively associated with Excess Value Across all specifications the sign

                                            on all significant control variables is consistent with prior research (eg Berger and Ofek 1995

                                            and Denis et al 2002)

                                            The finding of a premium makes a significant contribution to the relatively sparse literature

                                            on the value effects of multinational activity Our measure of imputed value expands upon the

                                            methods used by Berger and Ofek (1995) and Denis et al (2002) but allows us to answer a

                                            different question than Denis et al (2002) Holding constant the extent of industrial

                                            diversification we ask whether MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of benchmark firms of

                                            a similar geographic footprint In contrast Denis et al (2002) ask whether holding constant the

                                            extent of industrial diversification MNCs are more valuable than a portfolio of domestic (US)

                                            benchmark firms We believe that asking whether an MNCrsquos foreign (domestic) operations are

                                            21

                                            more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                                            value implications of a multinational network

                                            5 Robustness

                                            51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                                            Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                                            value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                                            Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                                            their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                                            likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                                            Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                                            robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                                            control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                                            the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                                            and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                                            previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                                            values

                                            Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                                            lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                                            lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                                            channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                                            Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                                            periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                                            22

                                            present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                                            dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                                            the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                                            estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                                            We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                                            industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                                            Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                                            treated as endogenous

                                            Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                                            model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                                            model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                                            explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                                            with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                                            variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                                            (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                                            this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                                            variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                                            The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                                            the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                                            excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                                            diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                                            Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                                            model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                                            23

                                            serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                                            correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                                            model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                                            test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                                            indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                                            known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                                            the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                                            52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                                            Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                                            value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                                            fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                                            sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                                            expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                                            and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                                            coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                                            operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                                            21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                                            24

                                            typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                                            these reasons we do not implement an event study

                                            53 Control premium

                                            A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                                            source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                                            enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                                            prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                                            ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                                            firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                                            the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                                            such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                                            MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                                            Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                                            weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                                            included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                                            Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                                            when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                                            value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                                            extract large control premiums

                                            23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                                            25

                                            54 Cost of capital

                                            As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                                            network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                                            capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                                            establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                                            and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                                            is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                                            between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                                            markets in which it operates

                                            We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                                            rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                                            imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                                            of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                                            significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                                            (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                                            we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                                            A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                                            do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                                            capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                                            24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                                            26

                                            55 Corporate governance

                                            In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                                            we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                                            governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                                            discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                                            governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                                            are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                                            of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                                            ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                                            (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                                            (Governance Index)

                                            As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                                            almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                                            None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                                            on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                                            conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                                            sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                                            2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                                            virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                                            the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                                            governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                                            27

                                            6 Conclusion

                                            Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                                            domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                                            degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                                            examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                                            incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                                            important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                                            Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                                            increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                                            value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                                            This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                                            firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                                            firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                                            The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                                            whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                                            panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                                            account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                                            we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                                            control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                                            premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                                            in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                                            multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                                            corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                                            28

                                            industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                            explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                            remains significant

                                            Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                            evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                            international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                            to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                            premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                            what factors influence the premium

                                            29

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                                            Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                            evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                            Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                            components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                                            reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                                            Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                            Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                            data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                            Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                            and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                            choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                            destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                            Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                            Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                            wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                            International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                                            30

                                            Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                            Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                            Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                            Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                            Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                            Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                            diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                            Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                            Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                            Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                            US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                            firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                            44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                            American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                            discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                            of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                            border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                            Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                            31

                                            Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                            Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                            of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                            Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                            market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                            Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                            comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                            Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                            165-186

                                            Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                            Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                            Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                            Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                            365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                            Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                            Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                            Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                            corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                            32

                                            Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                            We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                            Dependent variable

                                            Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                            Independent variables

                                            Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                            Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                            Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                            Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                            CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                            EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                            RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                            Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                            Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                            Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                            33

                                            CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                            Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                            Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                            Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                            34

                                            Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                            35

                                            Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                            2003

                                            4 6

                                            2004

                                            25 38

                                            2005

                                            8 12

                                            2006

                                            6 9

                                            2007

                                            7 11

                                            2008

                                            5 8

                                            2009

                                            5 8

                                            2010

                                            5 8

                                            2011

                                            1 2

                                            66

                                            Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                            IFRS

                                            47 71

                                            Canadian GAAP

                                            12 18

                                            Israeli GAAP

                                            2 3

                                            Dutch GAAP

                                            1 2

                                            Indian GAAP

                                            1 2

                                            Japanese GAAP

                                            1 2

                                            Norwegian GAAP

                                            1 2

                                            Swiss GAAP

                                            1 2

                                            66

                                            36

                                            (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                            Percent different from US GAAP

                                            Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                            N Mean Median

                                            Mean Median

                                            Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                            Sales

                                            66 236 000

                                            Net Income

                                            66 10653 647

                                            005 lt001

                                            Assets

                                            66 1162 126

                                            lt001 lt001

                                            Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                            Sales

                                            55 257 000

                                            Net Income

                                            55 10303 589

                                            011 lt001

                                            Assets

                                            55 1047 099

                                            003 lt001

                                            37

                                            Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                            Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                            Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                            Test of Diff (p-value)

                                            Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                            38

                                            Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                            This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                            Country

                                            N (1)

                                            Sales (millions)

                                            (2)

                                            Total Sales (3)

                                            N (4)

                                            Sales (million)

                                            (5)

                                            Total Sales (6)

                                            Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                            39

                                            Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                            40

                                            Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                            41

                                            Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                            42

                                            Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                            43

                                            Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                            Governance

                                            No Governance (same sample)

                                            Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                            CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                            Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                            • Cover for paperpdf
                                            • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                              21

                                              more valuable than those of a foreign (domestic) firm is a more appropriate way to assess the

                                              value implications of a multinational network

                                              5 Robustness

                                              51 Endogeneity related to dynamic relations

                                              Prior research argues that the relation between industrial diversification and excess firm

                                              value could be endogenous through dynamic relationships based on observing past outcomes

                                              Managers of firms likely choose to enter or exit industries or geographic regions based upon

                                              their previous performance For example Campa and Kedia (2002) find that firms are more

                                              likely to enter new industries when prospects in their current lines of business are deteriorating

                                              Similar dynamics could also drive a relation between excess value and FDI We assess the

                                              robustness of the previous results by estimating a dynamic panel data model which allows us to

                                              control for dynamic endogeneity in addition to firm level unobserved heterogeneity We employ

                                              the GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by Arellano and Bond (1991) Arellano

                                              and Bover (1995) and Blundell and Bond (1998) Our results from this analysis confirm our

                                              previous findings that firms with a larger degree of foreign operations have positive excess

                                              values

                                              Dynamic panel data models are generalizations of the traditional fixed effects model where

                                              lags of the dependent variable are added to the right hand side of the equation These additional

                                              lags control for the impact a firmrsquos past performance has on its current performance through the

                                              channels discussed above The GMM estimator for dynamic panel models developed by

                                              Arellano and Bond (1991) starts by differencing the data at the firm level in neighboring time

                                              periods to eliminate any firm specific time invariant unobserved heterogeneity that may be

                                              22

                                              present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                                              dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                                              the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                                              estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                                              We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                                              industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                                              Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                                              treated as endogenous

                                              Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                                              model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                                              model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                                              explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                                              with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                                              variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                                              (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                                              this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                                              variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                                              The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                                              the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                                              excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                                              diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                                              Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                                              model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                                              23

                                              serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                                              correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                                              model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                                              test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                                              indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                                              known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                                              the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                                              52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                                              Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                                              value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                                              fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                                              sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                                              expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                                              and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                                              coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                                              operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                                              21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                                              24

                                              typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                                              these reasons we do not implement an event study

                                              53 Control premium

                                              A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                                              source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                                              enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                                              prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                                              ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                                              firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                                              the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                                              such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                                              MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                                              Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                                              weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                                              included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                                              Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                                              when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                                              value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                                              extract large control premiums

                                              23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                                              25

                                              54 Cost of capital

                                              As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                                              network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                                              capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                                              establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                                              and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                                              is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                                              between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                                              markets in which it operates

                                              We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                                              rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                                              imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                                              of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                                              significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                                              (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                                              we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                                              A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                                              do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                                              capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                                              24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                                              26

                                              55 Corporate governance

                                              In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                                              we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                                              governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                                              discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                                              governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                                              are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                                              of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                                              ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                                              (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                                              (Governance Index)

                                              As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                                              almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                                              None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                                              on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                                              conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                                              sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                                              2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                                              virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                                              the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                                              governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                                              27

                                              6 Conclusion

                                              Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                                              domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                                              degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                                              examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                                              incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                                              important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                                              Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                                              increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                                              value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                                              This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                                              firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                                              firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                                              The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                                              whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                                              panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                                              account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                                              we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                                              control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                                              premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                                              in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                                              multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                                              corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                                              28

                                              industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                              explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                              remains significant

                                              Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                              evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                              international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                              to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                              premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                              what factors influence the premium

                                              29

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                                              Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                              evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                              Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                              components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

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                                              Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                              Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                              data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                              Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                              and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                              choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                              destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                              Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                              Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                              wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                              International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                                              30

                                              Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                              Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                              Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                              Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                              Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                              Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                              diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                              Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                              Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                              Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                              US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                              firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                              44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                              American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                              discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                              of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                              border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                              Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                              31

                                              Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                              Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                              of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                              Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                              market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                              Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                              comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                              Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                              165-186

                                              Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                              Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                              Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                              Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                              365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                              Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                              Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                              Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                              corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                              32

                                              Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                              We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                              Dependent variable

                                              Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                              Independent variables

                                              Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                              Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                              Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                              Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                              CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                              EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                              RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                              Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                              Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                              Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                              33

                                              CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                              Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                              Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                              Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                              34

                                              Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                              35

                                              Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                              2003

                                              4 6

                                              2004

                                              25 38

                                              2005

                                              8 12

                                              2006

                                              6 9

                                              2007

                                              7 11

                                              2008

                                              5 8

                                              2009

                                              5 8

                                              2010

                                              5 8

                                              2011

                                              1 2

                                              66

                                              Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                              IFRS

                                              47 71

                                              Canadian GAAP

                                              12 18

                                              Israeli GAAP

                                              2 3

                                              Dutch GAAP

                                              1 2

                                              Indian GAAP

                                              1 2

                                              Japanese GAAP

                                              1 2

                                              Norwegian GAAP

                                              1 2

                                              Swiss GAAP

                                              1 2

                                              66

                                              36

                                              (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                              Percent different from US GAAP

                                              Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                              N Mean Median

                                              Mean Median

                                              Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                              Sales

                                              66 236 000

                                              Net Income

                                              66 10653 647

                                              005 lt001

                                              Assets

                                              66 1162 126

                                              lt001 lt001

                                              Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                              Sales

                                              55 257 000

                                              Net Income

                                              55 10303 589

                                              011 lt001

                                              Assets

                                              55 1047 099

                                              003 lt001

                                              37

                                              Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                              Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                              Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                              Test of Diff (p-value)

                                              Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                              38

                                              Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                              This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                              Country

                                              N (1)

                                              Sales (millions)

                                              (2)

                                              Total Sales (3)

                                              N (4)

                                              Sales (million)

                                              (5)

                                              Total Sales (6)

                                              Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                              39

                                              Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                              40

                                              Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                              41

                                              Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                              42

                                              Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                              43

                                              Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                              Governance

                                              No Governance (same sample)

                                              Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                              CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                              Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                              • Cover for paperpdf
                                              • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                22

                                                present Eliminating the firm specific fixed effect by differencing the data with lags of the

                                                dependent variable on the right hand side introduces correlation between the new error term and

                                                the differenced explanatory variables This problem is solved by applying the standard GMM

                                                estimator using lags of both the original explanatory variables and excess value as instruments

                                                We note that the dynamic panel data framework allows us to treat both international and

                                                industrial diversification (as well as the other firm-specific control variables) as endogenous

                                                Following Hoechle et al (2012) we also allow contemporaneous values of these variables to be

                                                treated as endogenous

                                                Lagged values of the explanatory variables are valid instruments in a dynamic panel data

                                                model when the model is dynamically complete (eg Wooldridge 2010) A dynamic panel data

                                                model is dynamically complete conditional on the unobserved effect if enough lags of both the

                                                explanatory and dependent variable are included to make the resulting error term uncorrelated

                                                with all the right hand side variables Under this assumption any lags for the explanatory

                                                variables beyond this can be used within the GMM estimator as instruments Like Hoechle et al

                                                (2012) we add two years of lags of a firmrsquos excess value to the right hand side assuming that

                                                this is enough lags to control for dynamic feedback effects We then use past values of all

                                                variables beyond the second lag up to a total of seven years to act as instruments

                                                The results of the dynamic panel data estimator are reported in Table 5 These results confirm

                                                the previous finding of a positive relation between the degree of international operations and

                                                excess value We note that the size and significance level of the coefficient on Foreign Sales

                                                diversification are robust to changes in the number of lags used as instruments The Arellano and

                                                Bond (1991) estimator includes testing diagnostics for correct specification of the model If the

                                                model is correctly specified differences in the residuals from the levels equation should be

                                                23

                                                serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                                                correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                                                model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                                                test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                                                indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                                                known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                                                the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                                                52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                                                Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                                                value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                                                fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                                                sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                                                expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                                                and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                                                coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                                                operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                                                21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                                                24

                                                typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                                                these reasons we do not implement an event study

                                                53 Control premium

                                                A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                                                source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                                                enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                                                prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                                                ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                                                firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                                                the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                                                such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                                                MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                                                Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                                                weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                                                included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                                                Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                                                when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                                                value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                                                extract large control premiums

                                                23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                                                25

                                                54 Cost of capital

                                                As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                                                network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                                                capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                                                establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                                                and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                                                is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                                                between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                                                markets in which it operates

                                                We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                                                rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                                                imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                                                of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                                                significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                                                (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                                                we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                                                A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                                                do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                                                capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                                                24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                                                26

                                                55 Corporate governance

                                                In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                                                we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                                                governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                                                discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                                                governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                                                are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                                                of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                                                ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                                                (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                                                (Governance Index)

                                                As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                                                almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                                                None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                                                on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                                                conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                                                sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                                                2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                                                virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                                                the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                                                governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                                                27

                                                6 Conclusion

                                                Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                                                domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                                                degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                                                examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                                                incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                                                important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                                                Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                                                increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                                                value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                                                This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                                                firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                                                firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                                                The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                                                whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                                                panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                                                account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                                                we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                                                control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                                                premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                                                in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                                                multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                                                corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                                                28

                                                industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                                explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                                remains significant

                                                Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                                evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                                international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                                to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                                premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                                what factors influence the premium

                                                29

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                                                Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                                evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                                Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                                components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                                                reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                                                Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                                Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                                data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                                Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                                and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                                choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                                destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                                Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                                Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                                wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                                International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                                                30

                                                Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                                Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                                Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                                Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                                Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                                Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                                diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                                Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                                Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                                Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                                US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                                firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                                44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                                American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                                discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                                of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                                border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                                Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                                31

                                                Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                                Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                                of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                                Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                                market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                                Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                                comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                                Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                                165-186

                                                Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                                Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                                Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                                Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                                365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                                Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                                Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                                Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                                corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                                32

                                                Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                                We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                                Dependent variable

                                                Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                                Independent variables

                                                Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                                Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                                Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                                Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                                CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                                EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                                RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                                Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                                33

                                                CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                                Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                                Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                                Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                                34

                                                Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                                35

                                                Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                                2003

                                                4 6

                                                2004

                                                25 38

                                                2005

                                                8 12

                                                2006

                                                6 9

                                                2007

                                                7 11

                                                2008

                                                5 8

                                                2009

                                                5 8

                                                2010

                                                5 8

                                                2011

                                                1 2

                                                66

                                                Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                                IFRS

                                                47 71

                                                Canadian GAAP

                                                12 18

                                                Israeli GAAP

                                                2 3

                                                Dutch GAAP

                                                1 2

                                                Indian GAAP

                                                1 2

                                                Japanese GAAP

                                                1 2

                                                Norwegian GAAP

                                                1 2

                                                Swiss GAAP

                                                1 2

                                                66

                                                36

                                                (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                Percent different from US GAAP

                                                Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                N Mean Median

                                                Mean Median

                                                Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                Sales

                                                66 236 000

                                                Net Income

                                                66 10653 647

                                                005 lt001

                                                Assets

                                                66 1162 126

                                                lt001 lt001

                                                Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                Sales

                                                55 257 000

                                                Net Income

                                                55 10303 589

                                                011 lt001

                                                Assets

                                                55 1047 099

                                                003 lt001

                                                37

                                                Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                38

                                                Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                Country

                                                N (1)

                                                Sales (millions)

                                                (2)

                                                Total Sales (3)

                                                N (4)

                                                Sales (million)

                                                (5)

                                                Total Sales (6)

                                                Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                39

                                                Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                40

                                                Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                41

                                                Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                42

                                                Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                43

                                                Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                Governance

                                                No Governance (same sample)

                                                Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                • Cover for paperpdf
                                                • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                  23

                                                  serially uncorrelated at lag one but correlated at lag two The p-values for tests of serial

                                                  correlation of the residuals at lags 1 and 2 are reported in Table 5 and these indicate that the

                                                  model is not rejected We also report in Table 5 the Hansen test for overidentification which is a

                                                  test of the null hypothesis that the instruments are valid The p-value for this test is 030

                                                  indicating that we fail to reject this null hypothesis Finally we report another test for exogeneity

                                                  known as the difference-in-Hansen test which tests the null hypothesis that the instruments in

                                                  the original equation are valid We fail to reject this null hypothesis as well

                                                  52 Identifying value effects of multinational operations via cross-border acquisitions

                                                  Another alternative to investigating a causal link between foreign direct investment and firm

                                                  value is an event study of foreign acquisitions21 Acquired foreign targets represent only a small

                                                  fraction of MNCsrsquo worldwide sales in the year of the acquisition ndash less than 1 percent in our

                                                  sample Additionally cross-border acquisitions are not the primary source of international

                                                  expansion for the average firm We find that foreign acquisitions account for between 18 percent

                                                  and 55 percent of the year-over-year change in foreign sales with the remainder of the growth

                                                  coming from either newly established entities (ie greenfield investments) or growth in existing

                                                  operations22 These results suggest that acquisitions are not a material source of growth for the

                                                  21 Doukas and Travlos (1988) find positive returns when the acquirer is not operating in the target firmrsquos country and insignificant returns when the acquirer is operating in the target firmrsquos country or expanding internationally for the first time Morck and Yeung (1991) find marginal evidence of positive returns for firms with intangible assets Finally Doukas (1995) finds positive returns only for firms with average Tobinrsquos q ratios greater than one More recent work also using an event study methodology provides mixed evidence on valuation effects of global diversification through acquisitions Dos Santos Errunza and Miller (2008) find insignificant returns for firms with already established foreign operations firms establishing initial foreign operations and firms acquiring targets in related industries Doukas and Kan (2006) and Moeller and Schlingemann (2005) find reductions to shareholder value while Francis Hasan and Sun (2008) find positive returns for acquirers of targets in segmented financial markets 22 New foreign affiliates to an MNC group each year report on the BEA survey whether they entered the group as an acquisition or a newly established entity (ie greenfield investment) Affiliates under the lowest reporting threshold do not report this information resulting in our inability to precisely identify the source of 33 percent of the increase in firm sales as either acquisition or greenfield

                                                  24

                                                  typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                                                  these reasons we do not implement an event study

                                                  53 Control premium

                                                  A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                                                  source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                                                  enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                                                  prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                                                  ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                                                  firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                                                  the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                                                  such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                                                  MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                                                  Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                                                  weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                                                  included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                                                  Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                                                  when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                                                  value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                                                  extract large control premiums

                                                  23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                                                  25

                                                  54 Cost of capital

                                                  As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                                                  network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                                                  capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                                                  establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                                                  and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                                                  is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                                                  between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                                                  markets in which it operates

                                                  We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                                                  rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                                                  imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                                                  of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                                                  significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                                                  (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                                                  we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                                                  A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                                                  do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                                                  capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                                                  24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                                                  26

                                                  55 Corporate governance

                                                  In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                                                  we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                                                  governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                                                  discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                                                  governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                                                  are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                                                  of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                                                  ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                                                  (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                                                  (Governance Index)

                                                  As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                                                  almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                                                  None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                                                  on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                                                  conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                                                  sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                                                  2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                                                  virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                                                  the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                                                  governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                                                  27

                                                  6 Conclusion

                                                  Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                                                  domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                                                  degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                                                  examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                                                  incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                                                  important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                                                  Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                                                  increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                                                  value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                                                  This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                                                  firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                                                  firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                                                  The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                                                  whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                                                  panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                                                  account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                                                  we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                                                  control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                                                  premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                                                  in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                                                  multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                                                  corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                                                  28

                                                  industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                                  explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                                  remains significant

                                                  Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                                  evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                                  international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                                  to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                                  premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                                  what factors influence the premium

                                                  29

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                                                  Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

                                                  Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                                  evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                                  Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                                  components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                                                  reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                                                  Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                                  Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                                  data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                                  Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                                  and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                                  choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                                  destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                                  Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                                  Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                                  wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                                  International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                                                  30

                                                  Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                                  Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                                  Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                                  Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                                  Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                                  Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                                  diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                                  Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                                  Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                                  Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                                  US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                                  firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                                  44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                                  American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                                  discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                                  of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                                  border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                                  Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                                  31

                                                  Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                                  Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                                  of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                                  Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                                  market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                                  Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                                  comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                                  Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                                  165-186

                                                  Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                                  Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                                  Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                                  Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                                  365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                                  Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                                  Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                                  Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                                  corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                                  32

                                                  Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                                  We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                                  Dependent variable

                                                  Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                                  Independent variables

                                                  Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                                  Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                                  Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                                  Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                                  CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                                  EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                                  RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                  Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                  Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                                  Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                                  33

                                                  CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                                  Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                                  Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                                  Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                                  34

                                                  Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                                  35

                                                  Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                                  2003

                                                  4 6

                                                  2004

                                                  25 38

                                                  2005

                                                  8 12

                                                  2006

                                                  6 9

                                                  2007

                                                  7 11

                                                  2008

                                                  5 8

                                                  2009

                                                  5 8

                                                  2010

                                                  5 8

                                                  2011

                                                  1 2

                                                  66

                                                  Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                                  IFRS

                                                  47 71

                                                  Canadian GAAP

                                                  12 18

                                                  Israeli GAAP

                                                  2 3

                                                  Dutch GAAP

                                                  1 2

                                                  Indian GAAP

                                                  1 2

                                                  Japanese GAAP

                                                  1 2

                                                  Norwegian GAAP

                                                  1 2

                                                  Swiss GAAP

                                                  1 2

                                                  66

                                                  36

                                                  (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                  Percent different from US GAAP

                                                  Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                  N Mean Median

                                                  Mean Median

                                                  Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                  Sales

                                                  66 236 000

                                                  Net Income

                                                  66 10653 647

                                                  005 lt001

                                                  Assets

                                                  66 1162 126

                                                  lt001 lt001

                                                  Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                  Sales

                                                  55 257 000

                                                  Net Income

                                                  55 10303 589

                                                  011 lt001

                                                  Assets

                                                  55 1047 099

                                                  003 lt001

                                                  37

                                                  Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                  Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                  Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                  Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                  Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                  38

                                                  Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                  This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                  Country

                                                  N (1)

                                                  Sales (millions)

                                                  (2)

                                                  Total Sales (3)

                                                  N (4)

                                                  Sales (million)

                                                  (5)

                                                  Total Sales (6)

                                                  Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                  39

                                                  Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                  40

                                                  Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                  41

                                                  Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                  42

                                                  Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                  43

                                                  Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                  Governance

                                                  No Governance (same sample)

                                                  Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                  CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                  Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                  • Cover for paperpdf
                                                  • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                    24

                                                    typical US MNC suggesting that an event study would lack power and generalizability For

                                                    these reasons we do not implement an event study

                                                    53 Control premium

                                                    A control premium or private benefits of control occurs when ldquosome value whatever the

                                                    source is not shared among all the shareholders in proportion of the shares owned but it is

                                                    enjoyed exclusively by the party in controlrdquo (Dyck and Zingales 2004 p 541) Using stock

                                                    prices of traded shares held by minority shareholders in determining the market value to sales

                                                    ratios of our benchmark firms could underestimate the true value of our benchmark firms if those

                                                    firms face large control premiums This in turn could induce an excess value premium because

                                                    the imputed value of these country-industry segments would be artificially low The existence of

                                                    such benefits is more prevalent in some countries than others and could affect the value of an

                                                    MNCrsquos operations in such domains We use the country-level control premiums from Dyck and

                                                    Zingales (2004) and using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales we obtain a

                                                    weighted average control premium that each MNC faces (Control Premium) For countries not

                                                    included in the Dyck and Zingales (2004) analysis we set the control premium equal to zero23 In

                                                    Table 6 we show that Foreign Sales remains positive and highly significant (p-value lt 001)

                                                    when we include the proxy for control premium As a result it does not appear that the excess

                                                    value premium is driven by MNCs operating in countries where majority shareholders are able to

                                                    extract large control premiums

                                                    23 Results are robust to replacing missing values with the mean control premium of the respective GDP quartile

                                                    25

                                                    54 Cost of capital

                                                    As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                                                    network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                                                    capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                                                    establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                                                    and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                                                    is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                                                    between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                                                    markets in which it operates

                                                    We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                                                    rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                                                    imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                                                    of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                                                    significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                                                    (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                                                    we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                                                    A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                                                    do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                                                    capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                                                    24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                                                    26

                                                    55 Corporate governance

                                                    In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                                                    we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                                                    governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                                                    discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                                                    governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                                                    are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                                                    of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                                                    ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                                                    (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                                                    (Governance Index)

                                                    As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                                                    almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                                                    None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                                                    on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                                                    conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                                                    sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                                                    2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                                                    virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                                                    the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                                                    governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                                                    27

                                                    6 Conclusion

                                                    Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                                                    domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                                                    degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                                                    examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                                                    incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                                                    important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                                                    Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                                                    increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                                                    value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                                                    This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                                                    firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                                                    firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                                                    The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                                                    whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                                                    panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                                                    account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                                                    we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                                                    control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                                                    premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                                                    in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                                                    multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                                                    corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                                                    28

                                                    industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                                    explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                                    remains significant

                                                    Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                                    evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                                    international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                                    to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                                    premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                                    what factors influence the premium

                                                    29

                                                    References

                                                    Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

                                                    Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                                    evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                                    Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                                    components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                                                    reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                                                    Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                                    Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                                    data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                                    Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                                    and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                                    choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                                    destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                                    Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                                    Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                                    wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                                    International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                                                    30

                                                    Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                                    Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                                    Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                                    Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                                    Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                                    Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                                    diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                                    Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                                    Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                                    Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                                    US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                                    firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                                    44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                                    American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                                    discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                                    of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                                    border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                                    Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                                    31

                                                    Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                                    Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                                    of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                                    Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                                    market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                                    Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                                    comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                                    Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                                    165-186

                                                    Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                                    Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                                    Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                                    Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                                    365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                                    Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                                    Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                                    Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                                    corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                                    32

                                                    Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                                    We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                                    Dependent variable

                                                    Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                                    Independent variables

                                                    Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                                    Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                                    Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                                    Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                                    CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                                    EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                                    RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                    Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                    Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                                    Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                                    33

                                                    CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                                    Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                                    Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                                    Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                                    34

                                                    Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                                    35

                                                    Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                                    2003

                                                    4 6

                                                    2004

                                                    25 38

                                                    2005

                                                    8 12

                                                    2006

                                                    6 9

                                                    2007

                                                    7 11

                                                    2008

                                                    5 8

                                                    2009

                                                    5 8

                                                    2010

                                                    5 8

                                                    2011

                                                    1 2

                                                    66

                                                    Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                                    IFRS

                                                    47 71

                                                    Canadian GAAP

                                                    12 18

                                                    Israeli GAAP

                                                    2 3

                                                    Dutch GAAP

                                                    1 2

                                                    Indian GAAP

                                                    1 2

                                                    Japanese GAAP

                                                    1 2

                                                    Norwegian GAAP

                                                    1 2

                                                    Swiss GAAP

                                                    1 2

                                                    66

                                                    36

                                                    (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                    Percent different from US GAAP

                                                    Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                    N Mean Median

                                                    Mean Median

                                                    Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                    Sales

                                                    66 236 000

                                                    Net Income

                                                    66 10653 647

                                                    005 lt001

                                                    Assets

                                                    66 1162 126

                                                    lt001 lt001

                                                    Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                    Sales

                                                    55 257 000

                                                    Net Income

                                                    55 10303 589

                                                    011 lt001

                                                    Assets

                                                    55 1047 099

                                                    003 lt001

                                                    37

                                                    Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                    Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                    Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                    Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                    Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                    38

                                                    Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                    This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                    Country

                                                    N (1)

                                                    Sales (millions)

                                                    (2)

                                                    Total Sales (3)

                                                    N (4)

                                                    Sales (million)

                                                    (5)

                                                    Total Sales (6)

                                                    Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                    39

                                                    Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                    40

                                                    Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                    41

                                                    Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                    42

                                                    Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                    43

                                                    Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                    Governance

                                                    No Governance (same sample)

                                                    Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                    CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                    Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                    • Cover for paperpdf
                                                    • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                      25

                                                      54 Cost of capital

                                                      As discussed in Section 2 when countries have shallow capital markets a multinational

                                                      network may provide the benefit of a lower cost of capital for investments through an internal

                                                      capital market as well as through better access to the US capital market Prior research

                                                      establishes that there is substantial variation in the cost of capital across countries (Erb Harvey

                                                      and Viskanta 1996 and Hail and Leuz 2009) To determine whether the documented premium

                                                      is due to cost of capital advantages we include a control variable to capture the difference

                                                      between the MNCrsquos cost of capital and the cost of capital faced by its competitors in the global

                                                      markets in which it operates

                                                      We compute our Cost of Capital proxy in two steps First we obtain the country-year credit

                                                      rating published by Institutional Investor24 The rating ranges from 0 to 100 where higher values

                                                      imply that a country has a higher default risk Country-level credit risk is a reasonable predictor

                                                      of expected equity market returns and volatility (Erb et al 1996) and exhibits a highly

                                                      significant correlation with international accounting-based estimates of imputed cost of capital

                                                      (Hail and Leuz 2009) Second using each firmrsquos country sales as a percent of total firm sales

                                                      we obtain a weighted average credit risk rating across the countries in which each firm operates

                                                      A higher value implies an MNC operates in countries with higher cost of capital In Table 7 we

                                                      do not find a result consistent with MNCs gaining an advantage from their access to low cost

                                                      capitalndash Cost of Capital is not significantly associated with Excess Value25

                                                      24 We thank Cam Harvey for providing these data 25 Results are consistent using cost of capital as defined in Erb et al 1996

                                                      26

                                                      55 Corporate governance

                                                      In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                                                      we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                                                      governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                                                      discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                                                      governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                                                      are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                                                      of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                                                      ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                                                      (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                                                      (Governance Index)

                                                      As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                                                      almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                                                      None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                                                      on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                                                      conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                                                      sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                                                      2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                                                      virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                                                      the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                                                      governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                                                      27

                                                      6 Conclusion

                                                      Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                                                      domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                                                      degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                                                      examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                                                      incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                                                      important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                                                      Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                                                      increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                                                      value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                                                      This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                                                      firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                                                      firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                                                      The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                                                      whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                                                      panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                                                      account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                                                      we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                                                      control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                                                      premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                                                      in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                                                      multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                                                      corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                                                      28

                                                      industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                                      explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                                      remains significant

                                                      Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                                      evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                                      international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                                      to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                                      premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                                      what factors influence the premium

                                                      29

                                                      References

                                                      Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

                                                      Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                                      evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                                      Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                                      components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                                                      reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                                                      Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                                      Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                                      data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                                      Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                                      and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                                      choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                                      destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                                      Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                                      Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                                      wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                                      International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                                                      30

                                                      Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                                      Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                                      Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                                      Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                                      Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                                      Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                                      diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                                      Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                                      Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                                      Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                                      US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                                      firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                                      44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                                      American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                                      discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                                      of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                                      border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                                      Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                                      31

                                                      Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                                      Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                                      of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                                      Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                                      market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                                      Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                                      comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                                      Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                                      165-186

                                                      Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                                      Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                                      Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                                      Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                                      365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                                      Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                                      Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                                      Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                                      corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                                      32

                                                      Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                                      We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                                      Dependent variable

                                                      Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                                      Independent variables

                                                      Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                                      Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                                      Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                                      Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                                      CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                                      EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                                      RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                      Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                      Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                                      Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                                      33

                                                      CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                                      Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                                      Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                                      Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                                      34

                                                      Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                                      35

                                                      Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                                      2003

                                                      4 6

                                                      2004

                                                      25 38

                                                      2005

                                                      8 12

                                                      2006

                                                      6 9

                                                      2007

                                                      7 11

                                                      2008

                                                      5 8

                                                      2009

                                                      5 8

                                                      2010

                                                      5 8

                                                      2011

                                                      1 2

                                                      66

                                                      Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                                      IFRS

                                                      47 71

                                                      Canadian GAAP

                                                      12 18

                                                      Israeli GAAP

                                                      2 3

                                                      Dutch GAAP

                                                      1 2

                                                      Indian GAAP

                                                      1 2

                                                      Japanese GAAP

                                                      1 2

                                                      Norwegian GAAP

                                                      1 2

                                                      Swiss GAAP

                                                      1 2

                                                      66

                                                      36

                                                      (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                      Percent different from US GAAP

                                                      Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                      N Mean Median

                                                      Mean Median

                                                      Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                      Sales

                                                      66 236 000

                                                      Net Income

                                                      66 10653 647

                                                      005 lt001

                                                      Assets

                                                      66 1162 126

                                                      lt001 lt001

                                                      Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                      Sales

                                                      55 257 000

                                                      Net Income

                                                      55 10303 589

                                                      011 lt001

                                                      Assets

                                                      55 1047 099

                                                      003 lt001

                                                      37

                                                      Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                      Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                      Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                      Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                      Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                      38

                                                      Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                      This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                      Country

                                                      N (1)

                                                      Sales (millions)

                                                      (2)

                                                      Total Sales (3)

                                                      N (4)

                                                      Sales (million)

                                                      (5)

                                                      Total Sales (6)

                                                      Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                      39

                                                      Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                      40

                                                      Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                      41

                                                      Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                      42

                                                      Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                      43

                                                      Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                      Governance

                                                      No Governance (same sample)

                                                      Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                      CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                      Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                      • Cover for paperpdf
                                                      • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                        26

                                                        55 Corporate governance

                                                        In light of the recent finding that corporate governance mitigates the diversification discount

                                                        we examine whether the premium to multinational activity is sensitive to controls for corporate

                                                        governance Hoechle et al (2012) find that the magnitude of the industrial diversification

                                                        discount is decreased and in several specifications no longer significant in the presence of

                                                        governance proxies In the first column of Table 8 we include the five governance proxies that

                                                        are consistently significantly associated with excess value in Hoechle et al (2012) ndash the percent

                                                        of CEO ownership (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent of institutional

                                                        ownership (Institution Ownership) whether the firm has a powerful or influential CEO

                                                        (Powerful CEO) and the governance index from Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003)

                                                        (Governance Index)

                                                        As documented in Table 8 including these control variables reduces our sample size by

                                                        almost 50 (to 2550 observations) and tends to exclude the smaller firms from the analysis

                                                        None of the governance proxies are significant Relative to column (4) of Table 4 the coefficient

                                                        on Foreign Sales is similar in magnitude but is no longer statistically significant at

                                                        conventional levels To investigate whether the decreased significance is due to the smaller

                                                        sample or the inclusion of the governance variables we re-estimate the regression for the same

                                                        2550 observations after removing the governance controls The coefficient and t-statistic are

                                                        virtually identical suggesting that the loss of significance is due to the reduced sample and not

                                                        the governance controls We do not find evidence to suggest that variation in corporate

                                                        governance practices drives variation in excess value for US MNCs

                                                        27

                                                        6 Conclusion

                                                        Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                                                        domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                                                        degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                                                        examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                                                        incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                                                        important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                                                        Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                                                        increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                                                        value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                                                        This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                                                        firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                                                        firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                                                        The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                                                        whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                                                        panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                                                        account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                                                        we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                                                        control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                                                        premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                                                        in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                                                        multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                                                        corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                                                        28

                                                        industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                                        explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                                        remains significant

                                                        Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                                        evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                                        international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                                        to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                                        premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                                        what factors influence the premium

                                                        29

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                                                        Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

                                                        Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                                        evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                                        Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                                        components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                                                        reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                                                        Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                                        Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                                        data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                                        Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                                        and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                                        choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                                        destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                                        Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                                        Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                                        wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                                        International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                                                        30

                                                        Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                                        Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                                        Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                                        Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                                        Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                                        Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                                        diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                                        Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                                        Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                                        Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                                        US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                                        firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                                        44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                                        American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                                        discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                                        of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                                        border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                                        Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                                        31

                                                        Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                                        Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                                        of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                                        Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                                        market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                                        Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                                        comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                                        Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                                        165-186

                                                        Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                                        Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                                        Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                                        Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                                        365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                                        Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                                        Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                                        Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                                        corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                                        32

                                                        Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                                        We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                                        Dependent variable

                                                        Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                                        Independent variables

                                                        Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                                        Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                                        Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                                        Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                                        CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                                        EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                                        RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                        Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                        Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                                        Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                                        33

                                                        CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                                        Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                                        Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                                        Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                                        34

                                                        Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                                        35

                                                        Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                                        2003

                                                        4 6

                                                        2004

                                                        25 38

                                                        2005

                                                        8 12

                                                        2006

                                                        6 9

                                                        2007

                                                        7 11

                                                        2008

                                                        5 8

                                                        2009

                                                        5 8

                                                        2010

                                                        5 8

                                                        2011

                                                        1 2

                                                        66

                                                        Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                                        IFRS

                                                        47 71

                                                        Canadian GAAP

                                                        12 18

                                                        Israeli GAAP

                                                        2 3

                                                        Dutch GAAP

                                                        1 2

                                                        Indian GAAP

                                                        1 2

                                                        Japanese GAAP

                                                        1 2

                                                        Norwegian GAAP

                                                        1 2

                                                        Swiss GAAP

                                                        1 2

                                                        66

                                                        36

                                                        (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                        Percent different from US GAAP

                                                        Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                        N Mean Median

                                                        Mean Median

                                                        Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                        Sales

                                                        66 236 000

                                                        Net Income

                                                        66 10653 647

                                                        005 lt001

                                                        Assets

                                                        66 1162 126

                                                        lt001 lt001

                                                        Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                        Sales

                                                        55 257 000

                                                        Net Income

                                                        55 10303 589

                                                        011 lt001

                                                        Assets

                                                        55 1047 099

                                                        003 lt001

                                                        37

                                                        Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                        Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                        Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                        Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                        Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                        38

                                                        Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                        This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                        Country

                                                        N (1)

                                                        Sales (millions)

                                                        (2)

                                                        Total Sales (3)

                                                        N (4)

                                                        Sales (million)

                                                        (5)

                                                        Total Sales (6)

                                                        Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                        39

                                                        Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                        40

                                                        Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                        41

                                                        Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                        42

                                                        Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                        43

                                                        Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                        Governance

                                                        No Governance (same sample)

                                                        Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                        CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                        Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                        • Cover for paperpdf
                                                        • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                          27

                                                          6 Conclusion

                                                          Using a new method to quantify the valuation effects of foreign direct investment by US

                                                          domiciled firms we find robust evidence of a premium in excess value associated with the

                                                          degree of multinational operations Our method builds on that used in previous studies

                                                          examining firm excess value (eg Berger and Ofek 1995 and Denis et al 2002) by

                                                          incorporating the location in addition to the industry of each corporate affiliate This allows

                                                          important factors such as growth and cost of capital to vary across countries as well as industries

                                                          Examining a sample of multinational firms we find that a one-standard deviation (197)

                                                          increase in foreign operations is associated with an increase of between 41 and 82 in excess

                                                          value minus both a statistically and economically significant finding

                                                          This result complements the finding of the international trade literature that more productive

                                                          firms are more likely to operate internationally However the premium remains after including

                                                          firm fixed effects to control for persistent firm traits (eg productivity)

                                                          The finding of a premium stands up to a succession of robustness tests designed to evaluate

                                                          whether the result arises from alternative methods or explanations First we estimate a dynamic

                                                          panel data model using the generalized method of moments (GMM) estimator to simultaneously

                                                          account for the potential endogeneity of FDI industrial diversification and firm value Second

                                                          we include a control variable to proxy for whether the firm operates in countries with larger

                                                          control premiums which could result in understated multiples and mechanically induce a

                                                          premium Third we include a control variable to measure the cost of capital across the countries

                                                          in which an MNC operates to evaluate whether a relatively low cost of capital borne by

                                                          multinational firms is a meaningful source of the premium Fourth we control for several

                                                          corporate governance proxies which have been found to be correlated with excess values (and

                                                          28

                                                          industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                                          explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                                          remains significant

                                                          Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                                          evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                                          international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                                          to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                                          premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                                          what factors influence the premium

                                                          29

                                                          References

                                                          Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

                                                          Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                                          evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                                          Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                                          components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                                                          reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                                                          Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                                          Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                                          data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                                          Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                                          and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                                          choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                                          destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                                          Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                                          Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                                          wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                                          International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                                                          30

                                                          Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                                          Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                                          Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                                          Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                                          Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                                          Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                                          diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                                          Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                                          Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                                          Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                                          US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                                          firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                                          44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                                          American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                                          discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                                          of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                                          border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                                          Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                                          31

                                                          Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                                          Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                                          of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                                          Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                                          market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                                          Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                                          comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                                          Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                                          165-186

                                                          Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                                          Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                                          Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                                          Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                                          365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                                          Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                                          Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                                          Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                                          corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                                          32

                                                          Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                                          We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                                          Dependent variable

                                                          Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                                          Independent variables

                                                          Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                                          Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                                          Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                                          Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                                          CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                                          EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                                          RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                          Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                          Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                                          Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                                          33

                                                          CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                                          Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                                          Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                                          Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                                          34

                                                          Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                                          35

                                                          Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                                          2003

                                                          4 6

                                                          2004

                                                          25 38

                                                          2005

                                                          8 12

                                                          2006

                                                          6 9

                                                          2007

                                                          7 11

                                                          2008

                                                          5 8

                                                          2009

                                                          5 8

                                                          2010

                                                          5 8

                                                          2011

                                                          1 2

                                                          66

                                                          Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                                          IFRS

                                                          47 71

                                                          Canadian GAAP

                                                          12 18

                                                          Israeli GAAP

                                                          2 3

                                                          Dutch GAAP

                                                          1 2

                                                          Indian GAAP

                                                          1 2

                                                          Japanese GAAP

                                                          1 2

                                                          Norwegian GAAP

                                                          1 2

                                                          Swiss GAAP

                                                          1 2

                                                          66

                                                          36

                                                          (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                          Percent different from US GAAP

                                                          Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                          N Mean Median

                                                          Mean Median

                                                          Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                          Sales

                                                          66 236 000

                                                          Net Income

                                                          66 10653 647

                                                          005 lt001

                                                          Assets

                                                          66 1162 126

                                                          lt001 lt001

                                                          Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                          Sales

                                                          55 257 000

                                                          Net Income

                                                          55 10303 589

                                                          011 lt001

                                                          Assets

                                                          55 1047 099

                                                          003 lt001

                                                          37

                                                          Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                          Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                          Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                          Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                          Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                          38

                                                          Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                          This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                          Country

                                                          N (1)

                                                          Sales (millions)

                                                          (2)

                                                          Total Sales (3)

                                                          N (4)

                                                          Sales (million)

                                                          (5)

                                                          Total Sales (6)

                                                          Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                          39

                                                          Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                          40

                                                          Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                          41

                                                          Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                          42

                                                          Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                          43

                                                          Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                          Governance

                                                          No Governance (same sample)

                                                          Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                          CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                          Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                          • Cover for paperpdf
                                                          • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                            28

                                                            industrial diversification) We fail to find evidence supporting any of these alternative

                                                            explanations ndash the premium in excess value arising at firms with greater multinational operations

                                                            remains significant

                                                            Overall our new method of estimating excess values for multinational firms provides strong

                                                            evidence of a statistically and economically significant premium associated with increased

                                                            international operations The premium is robust to a host of specifications and controls designed

                                                            to evaluate alternative explanations We leave to future research the questions of whether the

                                                            premium to US multinational firms applies more broadly to other countries of domicile and

                                                            what factors influence the premium

                                                            29

                                                            References

                                                            Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

                                                            Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                                            evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                                            Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                                            components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                                                            reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                                                            Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                                            Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                                            data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                                            Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                                            and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                                            choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                                            destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                                            Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                                            Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                                            wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                                            International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                                                            30

                                                            Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                                            Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                                            Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                                            Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                                            Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                                            Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                                            diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                                            Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                                            Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                                            Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                                            US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                                            firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                                            44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                                            American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                                            discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                                            of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                                            border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                                            Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                                            31

                                                            Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                                            Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                                            of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                                            Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                                            market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                                            Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                                            comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                                            Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                                            165-186

                                                            Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                                            Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                                            Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                                            Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                                            365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                                            Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                                            Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                                            Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                                            corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                                            32

                                                            Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                                            We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                                            Dependent variable

                                                            Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                                            Independent variables

                                                            Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                                            Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                                            Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                                            Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                                            CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                                            EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                                            RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                            Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                            Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                                            Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                                            33

                                                            CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                                            Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                                            Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                                            Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                                            34

                                                            Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                                            35

                                                            Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                                            2003

                                                            4 6

                                                            2004

                                                            25 38

                                                            2005

                                                            8 12

                                                            2006

                                                            6 9

                                                            2007

                                                            7 11

                                                            2008

                                                            5 8

                                                            2009

                                                            5 8

                                                            2010

                                                            5 8

                                                            2011

                                                            1 2

                                                            66

                                                            Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                                            IFRS

                                                            47 71

                                                            Canadian GAAP

                                                            12 18

                                                            Israeli GAAP

                                                            2 3

                                                            Dutch GAAP

                                                            1 2

                                                            Indian GAAP

                                                            1 2

                                                            Japanese GAAP

                                                            1 2

                                                            Norwegian GAAP

                                                            1 2

                                                            Swiss GAAP

                                                            1 2

                                                            66

                                                            36

                                                            (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                            Percent different from US GAAP

                                                            Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                            N Mean Median

                                                            Mean Median

                                                            Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                            Sales

                                                            66 236 000

                                                            Net Income

                                                            66 10653 647

                                                            005 lt001

                                                            Assets

                                                            66 1162 126

                                                            lt001 lt001

                                                            Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                            Sales

                                                            55 257 000

                                                            Net Income

                                                            55 10303 589

                                                            011 lt001

                                                            Assets

                                                            55 1047 099

                                                            003 lt001

                                                            37

                                                            Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                            Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                            Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                            Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                            Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                            38

                                                            Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                            This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                            Country

                                                            N (1)

                                                            Sales (millions)

                                                            (2)

                                                            Total Sales (3)

                                                            N (4)

                                                            Sales (million)

                                                            (5)

                                                            Total Sales (6)

                                                            Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                            39

                                                            Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                            40

                                                            Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                            41

                                                            Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                            42

                                                            Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                            43

                                                            Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                            Governance

                                                            No Governance (same sample)

                                                            Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                            CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                            Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                            • Cover for paperpdf
                                                            • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                              29

                                                              References

                                                              Ammann M Hoeschel D and M Schmid 2012 Is there really no conglomerate discount

                                                              Journal of Business Finance and Accounting 39(12) 264-288 Arellano M and Bond S R 1991 Some tests of specification for panel data Monte Carlo

                                                              evidence and an application to employment equations Review of Economic Studies 58 (2) 277-298

                                                              Arellano M and Bover O 1995 Another look at instrumental variables estimation of error

                                                              components models Journal of Econometrics 68 (1) 29-61 Bens D A Berger P G and S J Monahan 2011 Discretionary disclosure in financial

                                                              reporting An examination comparing internal firm data to externally reported segment data The Accounting Review 86(2) 417-449

                                                              Berger P G and E Ofek 1995 Diversificationrsquos effect on firm value Journal of Financial

                                                              Economics 37 39-65 Blundell R and Bond S R 1998 Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel

                                                              data models Journal of Econometrics 87(1) 115-144 Campa J M and S Kedia 2002 Explaining the diversification discount The Journal of

                                                              Finance 57 (4) 1731-1762 Denis D J Denis D K and K Yost 2002 Global diversification industrial diversification

                                                              and firm value The Journal of Finance 57 (5) 1951-1979 Desai M A Foley C F and J R Hines 2004 A multinational perspective on capital structure

                                                              choice and internal capital markets The Journal of Finance 59 (6) 2451-2487 Dos Santos MB V Errunza and D Miller 2008 Does corporate international diversification

                                                              destroy value Evidence from cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 32(12) 2716-2724

                                                              Doukas JA 1995 Overinvestment Tobinrsquos q and gains from foreign acquisitions Journal of

                                                              Banking and Finance 19 1285-1303 Doukas J and N G Travlos 1988 The effect of corporate multinationalism on shareholdersrsquorsquo

                                                              wealth evidence from international acquisitions Journal of Finance 43(5) 1161-1175 Doukas JA and O B Kan 2006 Does global diversification destroy firm value Journal of

                                                              International Business Studies 37(3) 352-371

                                                              30

                                                              Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                                              Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                                              Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                                              Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                                              Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                                              Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                                              diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                                              Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                                              Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                                              Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                                              US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                                              firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                                              44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                                              American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                                              discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                                              of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                                              border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                                              Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                                              31

                                                              Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                                              Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                                              of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                                              Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                                              market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                                              Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                                              comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                                              Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                                              165-186

                                                              Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                                              Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                                              Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                                              Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                                              365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                                              Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                                              Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                                              Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                                              corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                                              32

                                                              Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                                              We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                                              Dependent variable

                                                              Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                                              Independent variables

                                                              Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                                              Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                                              Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                                              Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                                              CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                                              EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                                              RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                              Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                              Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                                              Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                                              33

                                                              CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                                              Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                                              Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                                              Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                                              34

                                                              Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                                              35

                                                              Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                                              2003

                                                              4 6

                                                              2004

                                                              25 38

                                                              2005

                                                              8 12

                                                              2006

                                                              6 9

                                                              2007

                                                              7 11

                                                              2008

                                                              5 8

                                                              2009

                                                              5 8

                                                              2010

                                                              5 8

                                                              2011

                                                              1 2

                                                              66

                                                              Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                                              IFRS

                                                              47 71

                                                              Canadian GAAP

                                                              12 18

                                                              Israeli GAAP

                                                              2 3

                                                              Dutch GAAP

                                                              1 2

                                                              Indian GAAP

                                                              1 2

                                                              Japanese GAAP

                                                              1 2

                                                              Norwegian GAAP

                                                              1 2

                                                              Swiss GAAP

                                                              1 2

                                                              66

                                                              36

                                                              (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                              Percent different from US GAAP

                                                              Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                              N Mean Median

                                                              Mean Median

                                                              Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                              Sales

                                                              66 236 000

                                                              Net Income

                                                              66 10653 647

                                                              005 lt001

                                                              Assets

                                                              66 1162 126

                                                              lt001 lt001

                                                              Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                              Sales

                                                              55 257 000

                                                              Net Income

                                                              55 10303 589

                                                              011 lt001

                                                              Assets

                                                              55 1047 099

                                                              003 lt001

                                                              37

                                                              Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                              Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                              Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                              Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                              Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                              38

                                                              Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                              This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                              Country

                                                              N (1)

                                                              Sales (millions)

                                                              (2)

                                                              Total Sales (3)

                                                              N (4)

                                                              Sales (million)

                                                              (5)

                                                              Total Sales (6)

                                                              Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                              39

                                                              Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                              40

                                                              Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                              41

                                                              Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                              42

                                                              Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                              43

                                                              Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                              Governance

                                                              No Governance (same sample)

                                                              Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                              CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                              Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                              • Cover for paperpdf
                                                              • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                                30

                                                                Dunning J and A Rugman 1985 The influence of Hymerrsquos dissertation on the theory of foreign direct investment The American Economic Review 75(2) 228-232

                                                                Dyck A and L Zingales 2004 Private benefits of control An international comparison The

                                                                Journal of Finance 59 (2) 537-600 Erb C Harvey C and T Viskanta 1996 Expected returns and volatility in 135 countries The

                                                                Journal of Portfolio Management 46-58 Foley C F Desai M A and K J Forbes 2008 Financial constraints and growth

                                                                Multinational and local firm responses to currency depreciations Review of Financial Studies 21 (6) 2857-2888

                                                                Francis B I Hasan and X Sun 2008 Financial market integration and the value of global

                                                                diversification Evidence for US acquirers in cross-border mergers and acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 321522-1540

                                                                Gande A Schenzler C and L Senbet 2009 Valuation effects of global diversification

                                                                Journal of International Business Studies 1515-1532 Gompers P Ishii J and A Metrick 2003 Corporate governance and equity prices Quarterly

                                                                Journal of Economics 118(1) 107-156 Hail L and C Leuz 2009 Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around

                                                                US cross-listings Journal of Financial Economics 93 428-454 Hanson G Mataloni R and M Slaughter 2005 Vertical production networks in multinational

                                                                firms Review of Economics and Statistics 87(4) 1-15 Helpman E 2006 Trade FDI and the Organization of Firms Journal of Economic Literature

                                                                44(3) 289-630 Helpman E Melitz M J and S R Yeaple 2004 Export versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms

                                                                American Economic Review 94(1) 300-316 Hoechle D Schmid M Walter W and D Yermack 2012 How much of the diversification

                                                                discount can be explained by poor governance Journal of Financial Economics 103 41-60 Hope O-K and W B Thomas 2008 Managerial empire building and firm disclosure Journal

                                                                of Accounting Research 46 (June) 591-626 Huizinga H P and J Voget 2009 International taxation and the direction and volume of cross-

                                                                border MampAs Journal of Finance 64 (3) 1217-1249 Jensen M 1986 Agency cost of free cash flow corporate finance and takeovers American

                                                                Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 76 323-329

                                                                31

                                                                Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                                                Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                                                of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                                                Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                                                market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                                                Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                                                comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                                                Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                                                165-186

                                                                Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                                                Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                                                Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                                                Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                                                365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                                                Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                                                Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                                                Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                                                corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                                                32

                                                                Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                                                We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                                                Dependent variable

                                                                Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                                                Independent variables

                                                                Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                                                Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                                                Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                                                Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                                                CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                                                EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                                                RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                                Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                                Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                                                Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                                                33

                                                                CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                                                Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                                                Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                                                Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                                                34

                                                                Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                                                35

                                                                Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                                                2003

                                                                4 6

                                                                2004

                                                                25 38

                                                                2005

                                                                8 12

                                                                2006

                                                                6 9

                                                                2007

                                                                7 11

                                                                2008

                                                                5 8

                                                                2009

                                                                5 8

                                                                2010

                                                                5 8

                                                                2011

                                                                1 2

                                                                66

                                                                Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                                                IFRS

                                                                47 71

                                                                Canadian GAAP

                                                                12 18

                                                                Israeli GAAP

                                                                2 3

                                                                Dutch GAAP

                                                                1 2

                                                                Indian GAAP

                                                                1 2

                                                                Japanese GAAP

                                                                1 2

                                                                Norwegian GAAP

                                                                1 2

                                                                Swiss GAAP

                                                                1 2

                                                                66

                                                                36

                                                                (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                                Percent different from US GAAP

                                                                Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                                N Mean Median

                                                                Mean Median

                                                                Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                                Sales

                                                                66 236 000

                                                                Net Income

                                                                66 10653 647

                                                                005 lt001

                                                                Assets

                                                                66 1162 126

                                                                lt001 lt001

                                                                Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                                Sales

                                                                55 257 000

                                                                Net Income

                                                                55 10303 589

                                                                011 lt001

                                                                Assets

                                                                55 1047 099

                                                                003 lt001

                                                                37

                                                                Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                                Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                                Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                                38

                                                                Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                                This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                                Country

                                                                N (1)

                                                                Sales (millions)

                                                                (2)

                                                                Total Sales (3)

                                                                N (4)

                                                                Sales (million)

                                                                (5)

                                                                Total Sales (6)

                                                                Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                                39

                                                                Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                                40

                                                                Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                                41

                                                                Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                42

                                                                Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                43

                                                                Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                                Governance

                                                                No Governance (same sample)

                                                                Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                                CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                                Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                                • Cover for paperpdf
                                                                • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                                  31

                                                                  Laeven L and R Levine 2007 Is there a diversification discount in financial conglomerates

                                                                  Journal of Financial Economics 85 331-367 Lang L and R Stulz 1994 Tobinrsquos Q corporate diversification and firm performance Journal

                                                                  of Political Economy 102 1248-1280 Mataloni R 2003 US multinational companies Operations in 2001 Survey of Current

                                                                  Business 85-105 Matvos G and A Seru 2011 The dynamic tradeoff between corporate socialism and financial

                                                                  market dislocation Estimates from internal capital markets Working paper University of Chicago Booth School of Business

                                                                  Moeller SB and F P Schlingemann 2005 Global diversification and bidder gains A

                                                                  comparison between cross-border and domestic acquisitions Journal of Banking and Finance 29 533-564

                                                                  Morck R and B Yeung 1991 Why investors value multinationality Journal of Business 64

                                                                  165-186

                                                                  Morck R and B Yeung 2001 Why firms diversify Internatization vs agency behavior In Intangibles B Lev (ed) Oxford University Press pp 269-302

                                                                  Myers S C and N S Majluf 1984 Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have Journal of Financial Economics 13 187-221

                                                                  Schmid M and I Walter 2009 Do financial conglomerates create or destroy economic value

                                                                  Journal of Financial Intermediation 18 193-216 Syverson C 2011 What determines productivity Journal of Economic Literature 49(2) 326-

                                                                  365 Villalonga B 2004a Diversification discount or premium New evidence from the Business

                                                                  Information Tracking Series Journal of Finance 59 479-506 Villalonga B 2004b Does diversification cause the diversification discount Financial

                                                                  Management 33 5-27 Wooldridge JM 2010 Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (Second

                                                                  Edition) Cambridge MA MIT Press Yamin M 1991 A reassessment of Hymerrsquos contribution to the theory of the transnational

                                                                  corporation C Pitelis and R Sugden (eds) The Nature of the Transnational Firm London Routledge

                                                                  32

                                                                  Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                                                  We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                                                  Dependent variable

                                                                  Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                                                  Independent variables

                                                                  Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                                                  Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                                                  Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                                                  Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                                                  CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                                                  EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                                                  RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                                  Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                                  Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                                                  Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                                                  33

                                                                  CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                                                  Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                                                  Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                                                  Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                                                  34

                                                                  Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                                                  35

                                                                  Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                                                  2003

                                                                  4 6

                                                                  2004

                                                                  25 38

                                                                  2005

                                                                  8 12

                                                                  2006

                                                                  6 9

                                                                  2007

                                                                  7 11

                                                                  2008

                                                                  5 8

                                                                  2009

                                                                  5 8

                                                                  2010

                                                                  5 8

                                                                  2011

                                                                  1 2

                                                                  66

                                                                  Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                                                  IFRS

                                                                  47 71

                                                                  Canadian GAAP

                                                                  12 18

                                                                  Israeli GAAP

                                                                  2 3

                                                                  Dutch GAAP

                                                                  1 2

                                                                  Indian GAAP

                                                                  1 2

                                                                  Japanese GAAP

                                                                  1 2

                                                                  Norwegian GAAP

                                                                  1 2

                                                                  Swiss GAAP

                                                                  1 2

                                                                  66

                                                                  36

                                                                  (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                                  Percent different from US GAAP

                                                                  Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                                  N Mean Median

                                                                  Mean Median

                                                                  Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                                  Sales

                                                                  66 236 000

                                                                  Net Income

                                                                  66 10653 647

                                                                  005 lt001

                                                                  Assets

                                                                  66 1162 126

                                                                  lt001 lt001

                                                                  Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                                  Sales

                                                                  55 257 000

                                                                  Net Income

                                                                  55 10303 589

                                                                  011 lt001

                                                                  Assets

                                                                  55 1047 099

                                                                  003 lt001

                                                                  37

                                                                  Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                                  Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                  Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                  Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                                  Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                                  38

                                                                  Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                                  This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                                  Country

                                                                  N (1)

                                                                  Sales (millions)

                                                                  (2)

                                                                  Total Sales (3)

                                                                  N (4)

                                                                  Sales (million)

                                                                  (5)

                                                                  Total Sales (6)

                                                                  Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                                  39

                                                                  Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                                  40

                                                                  Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                                  41

                                                                  Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                  42

                                                                  Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                  43

                                                                  Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                                  Governance

                                                                  No Governance (same sample)

                                                                  Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                                  CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                                  Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                                  • Cover for paperpdf
                                                                  • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                                    32

                                                                    Appendix A Variable Definitions

                                                                    We obtain information regarding firmsrsquo operations by country and industry from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) unless otherwise noted Acronyms used below reflect Compustat mnemonics and thus indicate when we obtain data from the Compustat North America Fundamentals Annual database All independent variables are winsorized at 1

                                                                    Dependent variable

                                                                    Excess Value = The log of the ratio of actual firm value to imputed firm value Actual firm value is equal to market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ) Imputed firm value is calculated as the sum of the imputed values of a firmrsquos operations in each country-industry The imputed value for each country-industry is equal to sales generated in that country-industry times a multiple equal to the ratio of a benchmark firmrsquos actual value to total sales A benchmark firm is defined as a median single-segment firm operating in the same country-industry All multiples require at least five firms listed in the respective country-industry on Compustat (domestic) or Worldscope (foreign) with less than 10 of sales income and assets outside the country of domicile Similar to Berger and Ofek (1995) we eliminate extreme values where the ratio of actual to imputed firm value exceeds 400 or is less than 025

                                                                    Independent variables

                                                                    Foreign Sales = Sales made by the foreign operations of US MNCs as a percent of total firm sales

                                                                    Industry Other = Sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry as a percent of total sales (SALE) Equal to zero for firms operating in a single business segment

                                                                    Log Size = Log of total sales (SALE)

                                                                    Debt Firm Value = Ratio of long-term debt (DLTT) to total market value (market capitalization (MVE) + book value of total assets (AT) ndash book value of shareholdersrsquo equity (SEQ))

                                                                    CAPX Sales = Ratio of capital expenditures (CAPX) to total sales (SALE)

                                                                    EBIT Sales = Ratio of earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) to total sales (SALE)

                                                                    RampD Sales = Ratio of research and development expenses (XRD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                                    Ad Sales = Ratio of advertising expenses (XAD) to total sales (SALE)

                                                                    Control Premium = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level control premium from Dyck and Zingales (2004)

                                                                    Cost of Capital = A weighted-average (based on the sales in a given country as a percent of total firm sales) of the country-level credit rating from Institutional Investor (httpwwwinstitutionalinvestorcom) The country-level rating is available for 160 countries and ranges from 0 to 100 Higher values imply greater credit risk

                                                                    33

                                                                    CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                                                    Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                                                    Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                                                    Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                                                    34

                                                                    Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                                                    35

                                                                    Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                                                    2003

                                                                    4 6

                                                                    2004

                                                                    25 38

                                                                    2005

                                                                    8 12

                                                                    2006

                                                                    6 9

                                                                    2007

                                                                    7 11

                                                                    2008

                                                                    5 8

                                                                    2009

                                                                    5 8

                                                                    2010

                                                                    5 8

                                                                    2011

                                                                    1 2

                                                                    66

                                                                    Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                                                    IFRS

                                                                    47 71

                                                                    Canadian GAAP

                                                                    12 18

                                                                    Israeli GAAP

                                                                    2 3

                                                                    Dutch GAAP

                                                                    1 2

                                                                    Indian GAAP

                                                                    1 2

                                                                    Japanese GAAP

                                                                    1 2

                                                                    Norwegian GAAP

                                                                    1 2

                                                                    Swiss GAAP

                                                                    1 2

                                                                    66

                                                                    36

                                                                    (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                                    Percent different from US GAAP

                                                                    Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                                    N Mean Median

                                                                    Mean Median

                                                                    Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                                    Sales

                                                                    66 236 000

                                                                    Net Income

                                                                    66 10653 647

                                                                    005 lt001

                                                                    Assets

                                                                    66 1162 126

                                                                    lt001 lt001

                                                                    Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                                    Sales

                                                                    55 257 000

                                                                    Net Income

                                                                    55 10303 589

                                                                    011 lt001

                                                                    Assets

                                                                    55 1047 099

                                                                    003 lt001

                                                                    37

                                                                    Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                                    Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                    Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                    Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                                    Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                                    38

                                                                    Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                                    This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                                    Country

                                                                    N (1)

                                                                    Sales (millions)

                                                                    (2)

                                                                    Total Sales (3)

                                                                    N (4)

                                                                    Sales (million)

                                                                    (5)

                                                                    Total Sales (6)

                                                                    Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                                    39

                                                                    Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                                    40

                                                                    Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                                    41

                                                                    Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                    42

                                                                    Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                    43

                                                                    Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                                    Governance

                                                                    No Governance (same sample)

                                                                    Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                                    CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                                    Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                                    • Cover for paperpdf
                                                                    • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                                      33

                                                                      CEO Ownership = Percent of shares owned by the CEO from Execucomp

                                                                      Institution Ownership = Percent of shares owned by institutional investors from Thomson Reuterrsquos Institutional Holdings database

                                                                      Powerful CEO = Indicator variable equal to one if the CEO is the only insider on the board of directors and also serves as the chairman and president based on data from RiskMetrics Directors database Equal to zero otherwise

                                                                      Governance Index = Count measure of takeover defenses used in Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) from RiskMetrics Governance database As the governance data are not available for every year we follow Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) and assume that the firmsrsquo governance attributes are unchanged until publication of the subsequent series

                                                                      34

                                                                      Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                                                      35

                                                                      Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                                                      2003

                                                                      4 6

                                                                      2004

                                                                      25 38

                                                                      2005

                                                                      8 12

                                                                      2006

                                                                      6 9

                                                                      2007

                                                                      7 11

                                                                      2008

                                                                      5 8

                                                                      2009

                                                                      5 8

                                                                      2010

                                                                      5 8

                                                                      2011

                                                                      1 2

                                                                      66

                                                                      Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                                                      IFRS

                                                                      47 71

                                                                      Canadian GAAP

                                                                      12 18

                                                                      Israeli GAAP

                                                                      2 3

                                                                      Dutch GAAP

                                                                      1 2

                                                                      Indian GAAP

                                                                      1 2

                                                                      Japanese GAAP

                                                                      1 2

                                                                      Norwegian GAAP

                                                                      1 2

                                                                      Swiss GAAP

                                                                      1 2

                                                                      66

                                                                      36

                                                                      (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                                      Percent different from US GAAP

                                                                      Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                                      N Mean Median

                                                                      Mean Median

                                                                      Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                                      Sales

                                                                      66 236 000

                                                                      Net Income

                                                                      66 10653 647

                                                                      005 lt001

                                                                      Assets

                                                                      66 1162 126

                                                                      lt001 lt001

                                                                      Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                                      Sales

                                                                      55 257 000

                                                                      Net Income

                                                                      55 10303 589

                                                                      011 lt001

                                                                      Assets

                                                                      55 1047 099

                                                                      003 lt001

                                                                      37

                                                                      Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                                      Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                      Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                      Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                                      Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                                      38

                                                                      Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                                      This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                                      Country

                                                                      N (1)

                                                                      Sales (millions)

                                                                      (2)

                                                                      Total Sales (3)

                                                                      N (4)

                                                                      Sales (million)

                                                                      (5)

                                                                      Total Sales (6)

                                                                      Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                                      39

                                                                      Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                                      40

                                                                      Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                                      41

                                                                      Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                      42

                                                                      Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                      43

                                                                      Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                                      Governance

                                                                      No Governance (same sample)

                                                                      Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                                      CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                                      Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                                      • Cover for paperpdf
                                                                      • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                                        34

                                                                        Figure 1 Trends in multinational activity and industrial diversification from 1984-2008 This figure presents a plot of the mean percent of foreign sales and the mean percent of sales outside the firmrsquos primary industry (industrial diversification) from 1984 through 2008 Dotted lines above and below the primary lines represent 95 confidence intervals To compile the plot we include the full population of firms in Compustat

                                                                        35

                                                                        Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                                                        2003

                                                                        4 6

                                                                        2004

                                                                        25 38

                                                                        2005

                                                                        8 12

                                                                        2006

                                                                        6 9

                                                                        2007

                                                                        7 11

                                                                        2008

                                                                        5 8

                                                                        2009

                                                                        5 8

                                                                        2010

                                                                        5 8

                                                                        2011

                                                                        1 2

                                                                        66

                                                                        Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                                                        IFRS

                                                                        47 71

                                                                        Canadian GAAP

                                                                        12 18

                                                                        Israeli GAAP

                                                                        2 3

                                                                        Dutch GAAP

                                                                        1 2

                                                                        Indian GAAP

                                                                        1 2

                                                                        Japanese GAAP

                                                                        1 2

                                                                        Norwegian GAAP

                                                                        1 2

                                                                        Swiss GAAP

                                                                        1 2

                                                                        66

                                                                        36

                                                                        (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                                        Percent different from US GAAP

                                                                        Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                                        N Mean Median

                                                                        Mean Median

                                                                        Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                                        Sales

                                                                        66 236 000

                                                                        Net Income

                                                                        66 10653 647

                                                                        005 lt001

                                                                        Assets

                                                                        66 1162 126

                                                                        lt001 lt001

                                                                        Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                                        Sales

                                                                        55 257 000

                                                                        Net Income

                                                                        55 10303 589

                                                                        011 lt001

                                                                        Assets

                                                                        55 1047 099

                                                                        003 lt001

                                                                        37

                                                                        Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                                        Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                        Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                        Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                                        Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                                        38

                                                                        Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                                        This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                                        Country

                                                                        N (1)

                                                                        Sales (millions)

                                                                        (2)

                                                                        Total Sales (3)

                                                                        N (4)

                                                                        Sales (million)

                                                                        (5)

                                                                        Total Sales (6)

                                                                        Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                                        39

                                                                        Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                                        40

                                                                        Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                                        41

                                                                        Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                        42

                                                                        Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                        43

                                                                        Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                                        Governance

                                                                        No Governance (same sample)

                                                                        Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                                        CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                                        Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                                        • Cover for paperpdf
                                                                        • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                                          35

                                                                          Table 1 Analysis of accounting data for firms reporting under multiple accounting standards This table provides a comparison of sales net income and assets for firms that changed accounting standards to or from US GAAP Comparisons are provided for the 66 firms that changed to or from US GAAP and for which we could obtain accounting data electronically and in English under both standards for the same fiscal year (eg the firm presented the accounting numbers originally under one set of standards and then restated the prior year numbers in the subsequent year under the new set of standards) Panel A shows the distribution of firms by year Panel B shows the other accounting standards to which US GAAP is compared Panel C shows the mean and median percent that the other accounting standard differs from US GAAP for the same fiscal year and accounting number Two samples are shown in Panel C The first is the full sample of firms with a change in accounting standards to or from US GAAP for which data was available The second is the subset of these firms that occurred during the sample window used in this study (ie excluding changes post-2008) The percent difference in sales is compared to the percent difference in net income and assets Tests of means are based on matched-pair t-tests Tests of medians are based on Wilcoxon matched-pair signed-rank tests Panel A Accounting standard changes by year

                                                                          2003

                                                                          4 6

                                                                          2004

                                                                          25 38

                                                                          2005

                                                                          8 12

                                                                          2006

                                                                          6 9

                                                                          2007

                                                                          7 11

                                                                          2008

                                                                          5 8

                                                                          2009

                                                                          5 8

                                                                          2010

                                                                          5 8

                                                                          2011

                                                                          1 2

                                                                          66

                                                                          Panel B Accounting standards compared to US GAAP

                                                                          IFRS

                                                                          47 71

                                                                          Canadian GAAP

                                                                          12 18

                                                                          Israeli GAAP

                                                                          2 3

                                                                          Dutch GAAP

                                                                          1 2

                                                                          Indian GAAP

                                                                          1 2

                                                                          Japanese GAAP

                                                                          1 2

                                                                          Norwegian GAAP

                                                                          1 2

                                                                          Swiss GAAP

                                                                          1 2

                                                                          66

                                                                          36

                                                                          (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                                          Percent different from US GAAP

                                                                          Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                                          N Mean Median

                                                                          Mean Median

                                                                          Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                                          Sales

                                                                          66 236 000

                                                                          Net Income

                                                                          66 10653 647

                                                                          005 lt001

                                                                          Assets

                                                                          66 1162 126

                                                                          lt001 lt001

                                                                          Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                                          Sales

                                                                          55 257 000

                                                                          Net Income

                                                                          55 10303 589

                                                                          011 lt001

                                                                          Assets

                                                                          55 1047 099

                                                                          003 lt001

                                                                          37

                                                                          Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                                          Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                          Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                          Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                                          Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                                          38

                                                                          Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                                          This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                                          Country

                                                                          N (1)

                                                                          Sales (millions)

                                                                          (2)

                                                                          Total Sales (3)

                                                                          N (4)

                                                                          Sales (million)

                                                                          (5)

                                                                          Total Sales (6)

                                                                          Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                                          39

                                                                          Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                                          40

                                                                          Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                                          41

                                                                          Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                          42

                                                                          Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                          43

                                                                          Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                                          Governance

                                                                          No Governance (same sample)

                                                                          Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                                          CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                                          Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                                          • Cover for paperpdf
                                                                          • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                                            36

                                                                            (Table 1 continued) Panel C Tests of differences between US GAAP and other accounting standards

                                                                            Percent different from US GAAP

                                                                            Comparison to sales (p-values)

                                                                            N Mean Median

                                                                            Mean Median

                                                                            Full Sample (2001-2011)

                                                                            Sales

                                                                            66 236 000

                                                                            Net Income

                                                                            66 10653 647

                                                                            005 lt001

                                                                            Assets

                                                                            66 1162 126

                                                                            lt001 lt001

                                                                            Study Sample (2001-2008)

                                                                            Sales

                                                                            55 257 000

                                                                            Net Income

                                                                            55 10303 589

                                                                            011 lt001

                                                                            Assets

                                                                            55 1047 099

                                                                            003 lt001

                                                                            37

                                                                            Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                                            Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                            Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                            Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                                            Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                                            38

                                                                            Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                                            This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                                            Country

                                                                            N (1)

                                                                            Sales (millions)

                                                                            (2)

                                                                            Total Sales (3)

                                                                            N (4)

                                                                            Sales (million)

                                                                            (5)

                                                                            Total Sales (6)

                                                                            Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                                            39

                                                                            Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                                            40

                                                                            Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                                            41

                                                                            Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                            42

                                                                            Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                            43

                                                                            Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                                            Governance

                                                                            No Governance (same sample)

                                                                            Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                                            CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                                            Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                                            • Cover for paperpdf
                                                                            • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                                              37

                                                                              Table 2 Descriptive statistics Panel A reports the mean and medians of Excess Value for the multinational firms and single-segment benchmark firms as well as univariate tests across the subsamples Panel B reports summary statistics for the independent variables for the multinational firms The p-values of the tests of differences in means are based on t-tests The p-values of tests of differences in the medians are for a Wilcoxon rank-sum test All variables are defined in Appendix A Panel A Excess Value by sample Multinational All Benchmark Benchmark Subgroups Sample Firms US Foreign

                                                                              Value Value Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                              Test of Diff (p-value) Value

                                                                              Test of Diff (p-value)

                                                                              Mean 0067 0006 lt001 -0028 lt001 0014 lt001 Median 0076 0000 lt001 -0025 lt001 0000 lt001 N 4950 33074 5998 27076 Panel B Distribution of independent variables for the multinational firms N Mean 25th 50th 75th StDev Foreign Sales 4950 0238 0074 0190 0363 0197 Industry Other 4950 0212 0000 0166 0414 0215 Log Size 4950 6955 5823 6989 8140 1687 Debt Firm Value 4950 0136 0009 0097 0212 0145 CAPX Sales 4950 0054 0020 0033 0054 0101 EBIT Sales 4950 0065 0031 0077 0121 0138 RampD Sales 4950 0049 0000 0013 0059 0083 Ad Sales 4950 0008 0000 0000 0005 0018

                                                                              38

                                                                              Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                                              This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                                              Country

                                                                              N (1)

                                                                              Sales (millions)

                                                                              (2)

                                                                              Total Sales (3)

                                                                              N (4)

                                                                              Sales (million)

                                                                              (5)

                                                                              Total Sales (6)

                                                                              Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                                              39

                                                                              Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                                              40

                                                                              Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                                              41

                                                                              Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                              42

                                                                              Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                              43

                                                                              Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                                              Governance

                                                                              No Governance (same sample)

                                                                              Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                                              CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                                              Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                                              • Cover for paperpdf
                                                                              • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                                                38

                                                                                Table 3 BEA and Worldscope samples

                                                                                This table reports details on affiliate sales for significant countries pooled from 1998-2008 Significant countries are defined as those in which the operations of US MNCs represent at least 02 of total firm sales (per the BEA) For significant countries the table compares their representation in terms of MNC affiliate sales in the BEA data to the distribution of firm observations in Worldscope US Foreign Affiliates (BEA) Foreign Firms (Worldscope)

                                                                                Country

                                                                                N (1)

                                                                                Sales (millions)

                                                                                (2)

                                                                                Total Sales (3)

                                                                                N (4)

                                                                                Sales (million)

                                                                                (5)

                                                                                Total Sales (6)

                                                                                Australia 1344 73305 056 859 255865 210 Belgium 894 52755 040 169 26136 021 Brazil 959 60245 046 1143 683167 560 Canada 2730 536767 407 1181 526750 432 China 922 75907 057 822 276541 227 France 1852 183942 139 540 105447 086 Germany 2182 275577 209 480 103888 085 Hong Kong 867 48100 036 157 34094 028 Ireland 478 36754 028 34 3467 003 Italy 1178 82116 062 111 47948 039 Japan 1494 148032 112 2281 1119223 917 Korea South 659 34500 026 3530 2752791 2255 Malaysia 386 26027 020 837 168683 138 Mexico 1405 113623 086 362 237173 194 Netherlands 1149 85105 064 47 22631 019 Singapore 1098 94917 072 139 32913 027 Spain 871 63094 048 129 37419 031 Sweden 712 32682 025 235 23090 019 Switzerland 726 60288 046 74 20242 017 Taiwan 592 30313 023 2949 787049 645 United Kingdom 3054 423934 321 1997 882423 723 United States (domicile) 4950 10460880 7923 na na na Other - Covered by WorldScope 6893 199394 151 9000 4057894 33 Other -Not Covered by WorldScope 713 5352 004 - - - Total 38108 13203609 1000 27076 12204834 100

                                                                                39

                                                                                Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                                                40

                                                                                Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                                                41

                                                                                Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                                42

                                                                                Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                                43

                                                                                Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                                                Governance

                                                                                No Governance (same sample)

                                                                                Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                                                CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                                                Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

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                                                                                  39

                                                                                  Table 4 OLS regressions of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the results of OLS regressions of firm excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of sales outside a firmrsquos primary industry (Industry Other) and control variables All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat Coefficient t-stat (1) (2) (3) (4) Foreign Sales 0349 419 0209 293 0189 266 0278 210 Industry Other -0134 -186 -0047 -072 -0053 -081 -0326 -325 Log Size 0066 634 0065 624 -0044 -096 Debt Firm Value -0196 -213 -0241 -260 -0685 -588 CAPX Sales 0901 425 0893 435 0488 227 EBIT Sales 1154 542 1170 547 0408 189 RampD Sales 2908 1242 2932 1237 1544 379 Ad Sales 1869 263 2003 280 -1696 -119 Year indicators No No Yes Yes Firm indicators No No No Yes R2 0017 0212 0226 0768 Observations 4950 4950 4950 4950

                                                                                  40

                                                                                  Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                                                  41

                                                                                  Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                                  42

                                                                                  Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                                  43

                                                                                  Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                                                  Governance

                                                                                  No Governance (same sample)

                                                                                  Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                                                  CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                                                  Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                                                  • Cover for paperpdf
                                                                                  • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                                                    40

                                                                                    Table 5 Dynamic panel GMM model regressing firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales This table reports the result from a regression of the excess value on the percent of foreign sales (Foreign Sales) the percent of non-primary industry sales (Industry Other) and control variables using a dynamic panel GMM estimator All control variables are considered to be endogenous with the exception of the year indicator variables AR(1) and AR(2) are tests for first-order and second-order serial correlation in the first differenced residuals with the null hypothesis of no serial correlation The null hypothesis of the Hansen test of overidentification is that all instruments are valid The null hypothesis of the difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity is that the instruments used for the equation in levels are exogenous All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Excess Value (one lag) -0018 -082 Excess Value (two lags) -0048 -272 Foreign Sales 0371 270 Industry Other -0163 -171 Log Size 0010 123 Debt FirmValue -1135 -820 CAPX Sales 0590 342 EBIT Sales -0047 -300 RampD Sales 1376 531 Ad Sales -0751 -040 AR(1) test (p-value) 000 AR(2) test (p-value) 017 Hansen test of over-identification (p-value) 030 Difference-in-Hansen test of exogeneity (p-value) 093 Year indicators Yes Number of firms 1016 Number of observations 4090

                                                                                    41

                                                                                    Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                                    42

                                                                                    Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                                    43

                                                                                    Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                                                    Governance

                                                                                    No Governance (same sample)

                                                                                    Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                                                    CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                                                    Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                                                    • Cover for paperpdf
                                                                                    • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                                                      41

                                                                                      Table 6 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for a control premium This table reports the result of the OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level ownership control premium (Control Premium) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0303 224 Industry Other -0327 -325 Log Size -0045 -100 Debt FirmValue -0683 -585 CAPX Sales 0490 226 EBIT Sales 0409 189 RampD Sales 1545 379 Ad Sales -1689 -119 Control Premium -1004 -062 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                                      42

                                                                                      Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                                      43

                                                                                      Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                                                      Governance

                                                                                      No Governance (same sample)

                                                                                      Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                                                      CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                                                      Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                                                      • Cover for paperpdf
                                                                                      • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                                                        42

                                                                                        Table 7 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for the cost of capital This table contains the results of an OLS regression of firm excess value including firm and year fixed effects with an additional control variable to proxy for a country-level cost of capital (Cost of Capital) All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed) Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0255 178 Industry Other -0326 -324 Log Size -0043 -094 Debt FirmValue -0687 -589 CAPX Sales 0485 225 EBIT Sales 0406 188 RampD Sales 1539 379 Ad Sales -1703 -120 Cost of Capital 0004 039 Year indicators Yes Firm indicators Yes R2 0768 Observations 4950

                                                                                        43

                                                                                        Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                                                        Governance

                                                                                        No Governance (same sample)

                                                                                        Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                                                        CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                                                        Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                                                        • Cover for paperpdf
                                                                                        • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

                                                                                          43

                                                                                          Table 8 OLS regression of firm excess values on the percent of foreign sales controlling for aspects of corporate governance This table reports the results of two OLS regressions In the first column are the results of the firm excess value regression including firm and year fixed effect with five proxies for corporate governance included ndash the percent of shares owned by the CEO and the percent squared (CEO Ownership and CEO Ownership squared) the percent owned by institutional investors (Institution Ownership) whether there is a powerful CEO (Powerful CEO) and the Gompers Ishii and Metrick (2003) governance index (Governance Index) In the second column the regression includes the same sample and variables with the exception of the governance proxies which are excluded All variables are defined in Appendix A T-statistics and significance levels are computed using clustered standard errors with firm level clustering Significance levels are indicated by and representing 1 5 and 10 levels respectively (2-tailed)

                                                                                          Governance

                                                                                          No Governance (same sample)

                                                                                          Dep Variable = Excess Value Coef t-stat Coef t -stat Foreign Sales 0259 159 0251 154 Industry Other -0099 -080 -0099 -079 Log Size -0105 -185 -0102 -180 Debt FirmValue -0813 -478 -0817 -482 CAPX Sales 0440 252 0438 249 EBIT Sales 0457 247 0457 246 RampD Sales 1717 284 1716 286 Ad Sales -2210 -143 -2190 -143 CEO Ownership 0010 007

                                                                                          CEO Ownership squared -0029 -017 Institution Ownership 0047 067 Powerful CEO -0003 -014 Governance Index 0009 103

                                                                                          Year indicators Yes Yes Firm indicators Yes Yes R2 0811 0810 Observations 2550 2550

                                                                                          • Cover for paperpdf
                                                                                          • crrz_20130603_SMUpdf

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