There is growing interest in trying to explain differing corporate ownership structures in different countries. La Porta, Lopez-de-Silanes, Shleifer and Vishny (1998) find that the quality of legal protection of shareholders helps determine ownership concentration: in countries with relatively...

Diffuse share ownership is not as pronounced in the U.S. as many would assume. This has led to a body of research examining large shareholders, or blockholders. Issues addressed include whether firms with a blockholder perform better or worse than widely-held firms; whether firms with a...

This research report, published jointly by the Centre for Corporate Law and Securities Regulation at the University of Melbourne and Corporate Governance International, contains the results of a study of proxy voting at a sample of major listed Australian companies during 1999.When institutional...

This report was prepared at the request of the Australian Institute of Superannuation Trustees to assist its members deal with corporate governance issues relevant to the shareholding investment of trustees of Australian superannuation funds. The report: (a) outlines the meaning and importance...

Infrastructure as an asset class has commanded increasing attention from investors and the financial press over the past two years. Major asset sales in the UK - most notably of ports and water utilities such as Thames Water - and ongoing attention on road infrastructure in the United States and...

CEO compensation is topical and controversial and accordingly receiving considerable attention by various stakeholders. We investigate whether rent extraction or labour demand explains CEO compensation level in Australia. We do so by examining the determinants (economic, governance and...

Over the last few years there has been increasing public concern about the size of termination payments to departing senior executives of publicly traded companies. When those termination payments are granted during or following a period of poor company performance, the controversy is...

Empirical evidence from the United States indicates a statistically significant relationship - but not a particularly strong economic relationship - between the CEO's remuneration and corporate performance. In Australia, the limited number of studies in this field have found that CEO pay is...

This paper examines the impact of board composition on corporate performance and executive remuneration in large Australian companies. In particular, we focus on the proportion of independent directors on the board. Whether corporate performance is assessed using accounting or share-price...

This paper examines the structure of share ownership and control in companies listed on the Australian Stock Exchange (ASX). A comparison is made with the structure of share ownership and control in companies listed on the London Stock Exchange. The paper shows that the level of institutional...