Thanks to all the corporate controversies, CEO scandals, bailouts, and bankruptcies in recent years, investors have lost trust in some of the country’s largest public companies. However, even today, many corporations are models of openness and integrity.
由于近些年里出现的公司争议、CEO丑闻、财政救助和破产事件，投资者已经对美国某些大型上市公司失去了信任。但即使在如今的环境下，很多企业仍然堪称开放与诚信的楷模。
To identify the most transparent and trustworthy businesses that trade on American exchanges, Forbes turned to GMI Ratings (GMI), a pioneer in the application of non-traditional risk measures for financial analysis.
为了找出最透明、最值得信赖的美国上市公司，《福布斯》采用了GMI Ratings公司（GMI）的数据。该公司率先把非传统风险评估指标应用于财务分析。
“In order to rank companies from the most to the least trustworthy, we look at over 60 different governance and forensic accounting measures, ” says GMI vice chair and chief executive James A. Kaplan. “Those companies that persistently display the most accounting transparency; have the lowest incidence of high-risk events; and have appropriate Board supervision are typically ranked the highest. Companies on this list reflect these practices.
“为了把各家公司按照从最值得信赖到最不值得信赖的顺序进行排名，我们使用了60多种不同的企业治理和法务会计评估指标。”GMI副董事长兼CEO詹姆斯·卡普兰（James A. Kaplan）说，“排名最高的公司通常展现出了最大的会计透明度，并拥有最低的高风险事件发生率和恰当的董事会监管。这个榜单上的公司都反映了上述特征。”
GMI’s quantitative and qualitative analysis looks beyond the raw data on companies’ income statements and balance sheets to better assess the quality of corporate accounting and management practices.
GMI的定量和定性分析远远超过了企业损益表和资产负债表上原始数据的范畴，从而能够更好地评估企业会计和管理实践的质量。
For the sixth year, GMI has provided Forbes with a list of companies that are at the other end of the spectrum from the beleaguered firms that make so many of today’s headlines. GMI finds that its 100 Most Trustworthy Companies have consistently demonstrated transparent and conservative accounting practices and solid corporate governance and management. They do not play games with revenue and expense recognition, or with asset valuation.
这是GMI第六年为《福布斯》提供美国最值得信赖上市公司榜单。榜单上的公司与如今那些备受指责、频繁成为新闻头条的企业截然不同。GMI发现，这100家最值得信赖的公司始终展现出了透明和保守的会计实践以及稳妥可靠的企业治理和管理，没有在营收、费用确认或者资产估值上玩花招。
GMI’s evaluation penalizes companies for unusual or excessive executive compensation, high levels of management turnover, substantial insider trading relative to their corporate peers, or high levels of short-term executive compensation, which encourages management to focus on short-term results. Good housekeeping practices leave companies better prepared to handle financial turmoil, which is crucial during tough economic times. The absence of negative events counts as much as the existence of positive events.
在GMI的评估中，扣分因素包括高管薪酬异常或过高，管理层变动频繁，相对同行存在大量内幕交易，以及促使管理人员只关注短期业绩的高水平短期高管薪酬。良好的内部管理使公司可以更好地应对金融动荡，这在经济不景气时期非常关键。杜绝负面事件与促成正面事件同等重要。
“It’s a fact of life that fraud, malfeasance, class action suits, bankruptcies, and other negative events make the headlines; not companies that are fair and open in their dealings with shareholders over the long term, ” Kaplan says. “While good management and transparency do not necessarily mean a business is fundamentally good or is valued appropriately, we think it’s important to recognize that in this environment of negativity, there are companies that do a consistently good job of managing their business.”
“欺诈、不当行为、集体诉讼、破产和其他负面事件会成为新闻头条，而在与股东打交道时长期秉持公平公开的公司则不会。这是不争的事实。”卡普兰说，“虽然良好的管理和很高的透明度未必意味着企业有良好的基本面的或是恰当的估值，但我们认为，在如今这种消极环境中认识到还有些公司在管理上始终表现出色，这具有重要意义。”
To create the list, GMI examines more than 8, 000 companies traded on U.S. exchanges. Every three months it assigns each company an accounting and governance risk score, or AGR, based on proprietary modeling designed to identify practices that historically have had a high correlation with increasing shareholder risk.
为了编制这份榜单，GMI评估了8,000多家在美国上市的公司，每三个月都会根据其独有的模型对各家公司进行AGR（会计和管理风险）评分。该模型旨在识别那些与股东风险增加存在高度关联性的公司行为。
GMI rates the 15% of companies in its universe with the highest AGR scores as “conservative” and the 10% of companies with the lowest scores as “very aggressive.” Companies in between those extremes are rated either “average” or “aggressive.”
在接受评估的公司中，GMI把AGR得分最高的那15%评为“保守”，把AGR得分最低的那10%的公司评为“非常激进”。介于这两个极端之间的公司被评为“普通”或“激进”。
GMI claims that it has established a direct correlation between its AGR assessments and the likelihood of negative events such as class-action litigation, Securities and Exchange Commission enforcement actions, financial reporting delays, bankruptcy filings, and poor stock price performance.
GMI声称，他们已经在AGR评分与出现负面事件的可能性之间建立了直接关联。这些负面事件包括集体诉讼、美国证券交易委员会（SEC）的强制执行、财报延期、破产申请和糟糕的股价表现。
GMI has sorted its 100 Most Trustworthy Companies into four groupings, according to market capitalization. Last year three small-cap companies received a perfect AGR score of 100. In this year’s crop, the highest score is a 99. Five small cap companies and four mid-cap firms have a current AGR score of 99. NetSuite, a California-based software firm, is the only large-cap company to achieve this near-perfect score.
GMI根据市值大小把这100家最值得信赖的公司分成四类。去年，三家小市值公司得到了100分的AGR满分。今年的AGR最高得分为99分。五家小市值公司和四家中等市值公司获得了99分的AGR当前得分。加州软件公司NetSuite是唯一一家得到这种接近满分分数的大市值公司。
To qualify for the roster, the 100 companies all had to have market caps of $250 million or more at the time GMI prepared the list (March 7, 2013). Over the last four quarters the companies must have maintained AGR ratings of “conservative” or “average, ” and had no amended filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, no SEC enforcement actions, and no material restatements. They also had to rank high in GMI’s Equity Risk Ranking, which indicates a positive forecast for equity returns, and have minimal likelihood of financial distress as measured by GMI’s Bankruptcy Risk model.
上榜条件包括：在GMI制榜时（2013年3月7日）拥有不低于2.5亿美元的市值；在过去四个季度里维持“保守”或“普通”的AGR评级；没有修改向SEC提交的文件；没有受到SEC的强制执行；没有做出重大的财务报表重述；在GMI的股本风险评级（Equity Risk Ranking）中获得高分，这表明了对股本回报率的积极预测；在GMI的破产风险模型（Bankruptcy Risk model）评估中出现财务困境的可能性极小。
“There are two unique factors to this list, ” Kaplan says. “First of all, it is compiled using a different set of tools. AGR uses governance and forensic accounting measures that are rarely incorporated in traditional analysis. These extra-financial measures are, in our view, an important factor in trying to understand value. Secondly, to our knowledge there are no other lists that focus on the trustworthiness of a business. There are many lists that focus on other attributes.”
“这份榜单有两个独特的因素。”卡普兰说，“首先，在制榜时使用了不同的工具组合。AGR评分所采用的管理和法务会计评估方法很少用于传统的企业分析。在我们看来，这些额外的财务评估方法是理清价值的重要因素。其次，据我们所知，还没有其他榜单专注于企业的可信赖程度。很多榜单都专注于其他方面。”
Here says there is a great deal of evidence to support the fact that “the cost of capital for the most trustworthy companies is lower because their level of transparency is recognized in the marketplace.”
他说，有大量证据证明以下这个事实：“最值得信赖公司的资本成本较低，因为它们的透明性得到了市场的认可。”
He continues: “Also, we have found evidence that, on balance, the most trustworthy companies outperform their peers over the long term. Of course the greatest benefit to a well-managed company is that their risk of negative events is minimized.”
他继续说道：“另外，我们还发现有证据显示，总的来说，最值得信赖公司的长期股价表现要好于同行。当然，对治理良好的公司而言，最大的好处是他们面临负面事件的风险极低。”
|
