Web Spammer and Resource Allocation Efficiency:A Study Based on the Perspective of Major Shareholder Reduction
The arrival of the 4G era has accelerated the development of the"Mobile Internet"and related industries.As the influence of the internet becomes increasingly widespread,the supervision and governance of the online environment are crucial for building a harmonious society.The report of the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China emphasized the need to"strengthen the construction of internet content,establish a comprehensive gov-ernance system for the internet,and create a clean and clear cyber-space",which has become one of the three major tasks of internet development at this stage.Based on the attention from the govern-ment,China has issued a series of laws and regulations to standard-ize the security of the online environment and content construction,such as the"Cybersecurity Law"and the"Internet Forum and Com-munity Service Management Regulations".The issuance of these laws and regulations indicates that China's internet construction has entered an important stage,and it also means that there are still many problems in the current internet environment.In particular,the web spammers,a special group on major online platforms char-acterized by their speculative and manipulative nature,are widely active in areas such as shopping websites,making them a key target for rectification in the recent online environment.These web spam-mers disrupt normal information transmission and communication through paid deletion of posts,paid posting,and illegal advertising,severely hindering the healthy and sustainable development of the market.Based on this,many studies have explored the existence,character-istics,and impact of web spammers,but mainly focus on industries such as retail,catering,and hotels in the real economy.Some studies have found that the competition and brand advantage are the main considerations for businesses to hire web spammers(Mayzlin et al.,2014;Luca et al.,2016),while other studies have found that web spammers can quickly increase the employer's visibility,influence consumer decision-making,but the probability and severity of pun-ishment are low(Xu et al.,2015;Zheng et al.,2015;Lappas et al.,2016).Existing literature overlooks the existence,characteristics,and impact of web spammers in the capital market,where informa-tion provision,exchange,and application are the main carriers.This paper attempts to address this research gap by understanding the role of web spammers in the capital market,which not only helps to recognize the problems in China's internet construction but also provides important assistance in improving the efficiency of the capital market.This paper takes the major shareholders'share selling as the re-search setting to investigate the role of web spammers in the capital market.The reasons are as follows.Firstly,combining a specific setting(such as share selling)can highlight the motivations of web spammers.If we directly examine the economic consequences of web spammers,such as the information content during their communications in stock forums,we face numerous alternative explanations and potential endogeneity issues.Using share selling as the research setting not only allows for a direct observation of the behavioral changes of web spammers during the period of major shareholders'share selling but also makes it easier to verify the po-tential motivations behind their actions,namely,shareholders hiring web spammers to mislead other investors.These enhance the cred-ibility of the research conclusions.Secondly,the role of web spam-mers in the capital market is not clear,and combining the setting of shareholders'share selling helps to determine the nature of web spammers'activities.Existing research has found that major share-holders severely infringe on the rights of retail investors through ir-regular means such as"information manipulation"and"high stock dividends"(Wu et al.,2010;Li et al.,2014).If web spammers play a role in the process of major shareholders'share selling,they dis-rupt the trading order of the secondary market and play a negative role in the capital market.In addition,under the goal of pursuing high-quality development of the capital market in China,exploring whether web spammers have become a new means for major share-holders to squeeze retail investors is of great significance.In this paper,a new identification strategy for web spammers is established,and we explore the main factors that induce their activ-ities.The results show that:(1)Compared with the absence of major shareholders'share selling,the activity of web spammers increases significantly during major shareholders'share selling.(2)The above trend is more obvious in firms with high stock price volatility,high individual investor attention,and a low number of analyst tracks.(3)For the samples of major shareholder reductions in the presence of web spammers,the share price rises rapidly before the comple-tion of the reduction,and falls in a"cliff-like"manner after the reduction is done.The normal shareholder reductions group does not show this tendency.(4)The relationship between the reduction of financial institutions,shareholders with lower stock ownership rankings and the activity of web spammers is not obvious.(5)During the process of major shareholders increasing their holdings,the change of web spammers'activity is not significant.The above results indicate that the major shareholders will sell stocks when the corresponding price is pulled up by the hired web spammers,which reduces the efficiency of resource allocation in the capital market.The research significance of this paper includes the following four points:First,it makes a pioneering study on the behavior of web spammers in the capital market and their influence.Limited by data and models,academic research on web spammers has only fo-cused on service industries(such as catering and retail).This paper explores the formation mechanism of web spammers in the capital market,which has a strong inspiration for subsequent research.Sec-ondly,a new method for identifying web spammers is provided.At present,most of the models for identifying web spammers cannot be directly applied to the research of capital market.Based on the unique structure of the guba,this paper finds out the core identifi-cation feature of web spammers,and adds the conventional features from the literature to more accurately capture the activity of web spammers.Thirdly,this study has important practical significance for strengthening the protection of individual investors.In the era of rapid development of the internet,major shareholders"squeezing re-tail investors"form is also updated iteration.Web spammers may be used by certain groups to mislead investors,and ultimately infringe the interests of individual investors.Fourthly,it plays an important role in the supervision of China's network information environment.The forum community,as an important part of the internet,has been given importance by the government departments.This paper finds that web spammers may damage the market order and pricing function.Understanding this point is conducive to a comprehensive understanding of China's internet environment and existing prob-lems,so as to provide new ideas for network governance.
Internet EnvironmentWeb SpammersSocial MediaInvestor ProtectionMajor Shareholder Reduction
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