We examine the determinants of Japanese foreign direct investment (FDI) focusing on institutional and social factors. Using panel data on 59 countries from 1995 to 2008, we find that host countries with free and open markets and greater cultural distance from Japan attract Japanese FDI. Good...

This article investigates the gender diversity of the corporate board of European Union banks. Employing a large sample of 612 European banks from 20 European countries, it identifies organizational characteristics that could be predictive of women’s presence on bank boards. We identify three...

Purpose – This paper aims to focus on a number of unexpected disclosures by major Australian banks, to highlight the subjectivity of financial reports and their failure to present an accurate portrayal of the underlying realities, and to propose that corporate governance disclosures are...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to test two agency-based hypotheses regarding the effect of ownership concentration on dividend policy using a large sample of Japanese firms. Design/methodology/approach – Level regressions associating payout rates to ownership concentration are run....

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore disclosure on corporate governance mechanisms in annual reports of Islamic commercial banks in Indonesia. Design/methodology/approach – Employing a sample comprising seven Islamic commercial banks in Indonesia, the present study constructs...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the UAE national banks' practices of corporate governance (CG) and the perception of the UAE national banks of the effects of CG on performance and financial distress. Design/methodology/approach – A modified questionnaire has been...

This paper assesses conflicts of interest between banks and their client firms via the merger transaction by examining the wealth gain of merger acquirers who were listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange in 1990–2004. The paper reports two main findings. First, acquiring firms did not gain from...

This paper investigates the relationship between ownership concentration and market value of European banks, and the role of the institutional environment in shaping this relationship. Using GMM dynamic estimator on a sample of European banks over a 13-year period (1993–2005) we find on...

The Japanese system of corporate governance andin particular the role played by banks andother financial institutions have been thesubject of considerable research andcontroversy in recent years. We estimate theimpact of equity ownership by financialinstitutions on firm performance in Japan...