We examine the effects of controlling shareholder stock pledge on corporate acquisition decisions and associated performance. Consistent with our aggravated expropriation hypothesis, we find that pledging firms in China initiate more takeovers, but these acquisitions conducted by pledging firms...

Using a proprietary data set on the undisclosed voting records of analysts and professional investors on listed firms for Investor Relation (IR) Awards in Hong Kong, we show that the valuation effect of IR award announcements is positively significant. More importantly, awardees receiving...