We investigate how company-level corporate governance practices and country-level legal investor protection jointly affect company performance. We find that in any legal regime a few specific governance practices improve performance. Companies with good governance practices operating in...

Shareholder valuations are economically and statistically positively correlated with independent directors' power, gauged by social network power centrality. Powerful independent directors' sudden deaths reduce shareholder value significantly; other independent directors' deaths do not. More...

This paper evaluates the primary mechanisms for changing management or obtaining control in publicly traded corporations with dispersed ownership. Specifically, we analyze and compare three mechanisms: (1) proxy fights (voting only); (2) takeover bids (buying shares only); and (3) a combination...

This paper assesses how Italian companies have implemented the regulation on related party transactions enacted by Consob in 2010. Companies have been given some degree of freedom in devising their internal codes: they may “opt-up” or “opt-down” from some of the default provisions set...

We examine how creditor protection affects firms with different levels of owners' and managers' personal costs of bankruptcy. Theoretically, we show that firms with high personal costs of bankruptcy borrow and invest more under a more debtor-friendly management stay system, whereas firms with...

Are courts effective monitors of corporate decisions? In a controversial landmark case, the Delaware Supreme Court held directors personally liable for breaching their fiduciary duties, signaling a sharp increase in Delaware's scrutiny over corporate decisions. In our event study, low-growth...

We study the impact of institutional investors' “voice” on 201 going private tender offers by controlling shareholders ("freeze-out" offers) in Israel. Israeli regulatory intervention in freeze-out tender offers is relatively mild, thus institutional investors' activism becomes crucial. We...

We test the hypothesis that foreign direct investment promotes corporate governance spillovers in the host country. Using firm-level data from 64 countries during the period 2005-2014, we find that cross-border M&A activity is associated with subsequent improvements in the governance of...

We examine the effects of a law amendment in Israel in 2011 that imposes a set of minimum corporate governance standards on privately held firms that issue publicly traded bonds. Two main results emerge. First, consistent with US evidence, the improved bondholder protection boosts the immediate...