We address the question of whether hedge fund and private equity investments in public firms are motivated by corporate governance improvements. As opposed to traditional financial investors both HF and PE are likely to have the incentives to alleviate agency conflicts. However, against the...

Prior literature shows that choices regarding board composition are associated with earnings management. We add to this literature by examining the effects of the presence of a foreign board member on earnings management. Using a sample of 3,249 firm-year observations representing 586...

This study documents a positive, economically meaningful impact of executives’ general managerial skills on shareholder value. Examining 171 sudden executive deaths over thirty years, we find that a one-standard-deviation increase in the general ability index corresponds to at least a 1.5...

This study examines the role of the institutional environment in influencing the migration of corporate governance best practice into 22 emerging African economies. Using a unique and comprehensive sample hand-collected sample of 202 IPO firms from across the continent, we adopt a novel...

This study examines how globalization of corporate governance practices influence the risk of European CEOs being dismissed. We argue that the harsh monitoring of the American corporate governance system spills over to the rest of the world as a result of this globalization. We focus on direct...

Scholars have previously investigated country and organizational-level factors associated with the incidence of female directors on boards. These studies, however, cannot explain why, in countries with strong gender equality and pressure for female directorships, firms are still hesitant to...

This study examines globalization of monitoring practices by focusing on how American (U.S.) influences on European firms impact the dismissal risk for these firms' CEOs. Specifically, we argue that the stronger short term orientation of the American corporate governance system increase the...

This study documents a positive, economically meaningful impact of executives' general managerial skills on shareholder value. Examining 171 sudden executive deaths over thirty years, we find that a one-standard-deviation increase in the general ability index corresponds to at least a 1.5...

We analyze the decision to announce an open market share repurchase and the share price reaction to the announcement. We use a conditional estimation approach which takes into account that the repurchase decision is made rationally and that, consequently, there is a potential selection bias....