초록 열기/닫기 버튼
We investigate whether Korean bank managers consider the tax, regulatory, and financial reporting costs of their decisions concurrently. We specifically concentrate on four decision items that bank managers often employ in achieving their tax, regulatory, and/or financial reporting objectives; actual write-offs, loan loss provisions, securities gains, and external funding. Unlike most prior research in this area in which only one of these four decision items is individually dealt with, we examine all of the four items simultaneously because in reality bank managers would consider these items as a portfolio of decision variables. Our research interest lies in the issue of whether Korean bank managers attempt to trade off tax costs against non-tax costs (i.e., regulatory and financial reporting costs). To test this, we extract a sample of 534 firm-years from the 2001 to 2006 period and analyze these data by using ordinary least squares (OLS) regressions first and then by employing a set of simultaneous equations to factor into the potential simultaneity of the four decision variables. The main discovery of our study is as follows: First, we find that the banks with relatively high tax costs take larger write-offs and loan loss provisions to reduce their tax liability. Second, with regard to regulatory costs, banks increase their Bank for International Settlement (BIS) capital ratios by taking more write-offs, securities gains, and external funding, but fewer loan loss provisions. Furthermore, the banks with high financial reporting costs reduce their loan loss provisions to report higher earnings. Finally, with respect to the tradeoffs between tax and non- tax costs, banks facing high financial reporting costs tend to decrease their loan loss provisions to increase reported earnings, thus forgoing tax savings. Commercial banks with high financial reporting costs are also likely to increase securities gains to boost their reported earnings. However, we are unable to find any significant trade-off effect between tax and regulatory costs.
본 연구는 은행 경영자의 주요목적함수인 절세, 적정 BIS비율 유지, 적정 보고이익 유지를 세금비용과 비세금비용의 상충관계 맥락하에서 분석하되 재량적 의사결정인 대손상각, 대손충당금설정액, 유가증권 처분, 외부 자금조달을 종합적으로 고려하여 분석하였다. 본 연구에서는 2001년부터 2006년까지 534개의 은행-연도자료(일반상업은행과 저축은행)를 추출하여 네 가지 의사결정 변수의 동시성을 고려하는 연립방정식(simultaneous equations)과 일반회귀방정식(OLS)을 사용하여 분석하였으며, 주요한 실증결과는 다음과 같다. 첫째, 세금비용이 높은 은행은 절세를 위해 대손상각과 대손충당금설정액을 늘렸다. 둘째, 규제비용측면에서 은행은 BIS비율을 늘리기 위해 대손상각, 유가증권 처분이익, 외부 자금조달을 증가시켰고 대손충당금설정액을 감소시켰다. 셋째, 재무보고비용이 높은 은행은 보고이익을 늘리기 위해 대손충당금설정액을 줄였다. 마지막으로 세금비용과 비세금비용의 상충관계 측면에서, 재무보고비용이 높은 은행은 보고이익을 늘리기 위해 대손충당금설정액을 감소시킴으로써 절세의 기회를 포기했다. 특히 재무보고비용이 높은 일반상업은행은 보고이익을 증가시키기 위해 유가증권처분이익을 늘리는데 이를 통해 세금비용과 재무보고비용간에 상충관계가 있음을 추가로 발견하였다. 하지만 세금비용과 규제비용간의 상충관계는 발견하지 못하였다.
