Conventional wisdom is that diversification weakens governance by spreading an investor too thinly. We show that, when an investor owns multiple firms ("common ownership"), governance through both voice and exit can strengthen -- even if the firms are in unrelated industries. Under common...

Does corporate governance structure matter for firm value? We develop a model in which the allocation of control rights between shareholders and managers (“governance structure”) affects managers' incentive to invest (strong governance tightens managerial freedom and weak governance loosens...

This paper studies how directors' reputational concerns affect board structure, corporate governance, and firm value. In our setting, directors affect their firms' governance, and governance, in turn, affects firms' demand for new directors. Whether the labor market rewards a...

This paper studies the corporate governance and asset pricing implications of investors owning blocks in multiple firms. Common wisdom is that multi-firm ownership weakens governance because the blockholder is spread too thinly. We show that this need not be the case. In a single-firm benchmark,...