Since the separation of ownership from management, administration of company affairs is given to managers selected by owners (shareholders). Shareholders are not able to observe daily activities of managers to make sure whether their decisions are in line with shareholders’ interests; therefore, shareholders don’t have enough information about the operations of mangers. This is called information asymmetry in the representation theory. Investment in research & development expenditures as a mechanism of information asymmetry gains significance for two reasons. First, providing research and development expenditure requires a long-term time horizon for investment and there is no agreement among shareholders for its analysis. Second, companies that focus on research and development possess information that are limited in their disclosure to the public and such a limitation makes research and development a mechanism of information asymmetry. Considering the role of information asymmetry in conservative acts of managers for holding cash, the following hypothesis is suggested (D.Mello & et al. 2008).
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