We survey the theory and evidence of behavioral corporate finance, which generally takes one of two approaches. The market timing and catering approach views managerial financing and investment decisions as rational managerial responses to securities mispricing. The managerial biases approach...

Equity research analysts tend to cover firms about which they have favorable views. We exploit this tendency to infer analysts' preferences for corporate policies from their coverage decisions. We then use exogenous analyst disappearances to examine the effect of these preferences on corporate...

This paper examines local bias in the context of venture capital (VC) investments. Based on a sample of US VC investments between 1980 and June 2009, we find more reputable VCs (older, larger, more experienced, and with stronger IPO track record) and VCs with broader networks exhibit less local...

In this paper, we consider the corporate governance challenge of protecting outside investors in listed, controlled firms. European jurisdictions are supposed to be more veteran and skilled in dealing with these firms in comparison to the U.S. But we argue that outside investors in European...

We study the effect of investor horizons on a comprehensive set of corporate decisions. We argue that monitoring by long-term investors generates decision making that maximizes shareholder value. We find that long-term investors strengthen governance and restrain managerial misbehaviors such as...

Passive institutional investors are an increasingly important component of U.S. stock ownership. To examine whether and by which mechanisms passive investors influence firms' governance, we exploit variation in ownership by passive mutual funds associated with stock assignments to the Russell...

Over the past two decades, hedge fund activism has emerged as new form of corporate governance mechanism that brings about operational, financial and governance reforms to a corporation. Many prominent business executives and legal scholars are convinced that the entire American economy will...

In his essay, <em>The Myth That Insulating Boards Serves Long-Term Value</em>, Professor Lucian Bebchuk draws a stark dichotomy between so-called “insulation advocates” and proponents of shareholder-driven direct democracy. This Essay begins by rejecting this crude divide between “good” and...

Notwithstanding the focus on hedge fund activism, fundamental questions remain. How much does hedge fund activism really matter? What has academic study contributed to the understanding of hedge fund activism? And what, if anything, does research on hedge fund activism illuminate about the...

We document a positive relation between shareholder monitoring and total payout to shareholders. This relation is stronger for firms with greater potential for agency problems. We also show that monitoring is positively associated with future improvements in payout, operating performance, and...