This paper examines whether takeover defenses (i.e., poison pills and classified boards) can enhance the bargaining position of the target firm, especially when the target advisor is a top-tier investment bank. I find that classified boards and poison pills are positively linked to target's...

Extant theory and empirical evidence indicate that equity-based compensation can align the interests of managers with those of shareholders, but it has a side effect of aggravating bondholder-shareholder conflicts by increasing managers' risk-shifting incentives. Recent evidence confirms that...

"We examine the corporate governance ratings provided by three premier US rating agencies and find that summary scores are generally poor predictors of primary and secondary measures of future firm performance. However, some component sub-ratings that focus on the eight key dimensions of dynamic...

Using a unique sample of plant level data from the Longitudinal Research Database of the U.S. Census Bureau, which enables us to correctly identify the parent and spun-off entities prior to spin-offs, we establish that efficiency improves following spin-offs. A spin-off refers to the separation...

We analyze how increased access to financing affects firm total factor productivity (TFP) by exploiting a natural experiment following interstate banking deregulations which increased access to bank financing. We find that firms' TFP increases after their states implement these deregulations....

Using a unique sample from the Longitudinal Research Database (LRD) of the U.S. Census Bureau, we study several related questions regarding the efficiency gains generated by venture capital (VC) investment in private firms. First, does VC backing improve the efficiency (total factor...