During the 1990s, ownership of China's listed firms remained stable: state entities remained in control of restructured state-owned enterprises since only a minority of shares were allowed to trade publicly and to be owned privately. However, since 1999, the ownership of China's listed firms has...

We provide the first comprehensive and robust evidence on the relationship between board independence and firm performance in China. We find that independent directors have an overall positive effect on firm operating performance in China. Our findings are robust to a battery of tests, including...

Chinese data enable investigation of the relationship between underpricing of initial public offerings (IPOs) and legal protection with controlling for time-invariant characteristics of regions. Our investigation of Chinese IPOs between 1997 and 2009 shows that firms from a province with more...

Literature on agency problems arising between controlling and minority owners claim that separation of cash flow and control rights allows controllers to expropriate listed firms, and further that separation emerges when dual class shares or pyramiding corporate structures exist. Dual class...

Our paper examines calendar effects in Chinese stock market, particularly monthly and daily effects. Using individual stock returns, we observe the change of the calendar effect over time. In Shanghai and Shenzhen, the year-end effect was strong in 1991 -- but disappeared later. As the Chinese...

We examine the influence of auditors on mitigating corporate fraud in China, which is known to have weak legal enforcement, weak investor protection along with tight control of the media and labour unions. We find that firms with executives that have lower integrity, indicated by a greater...

A stock exchange is a place to list and trade stocks. Many Anglo-American exchanges have seen a dramatic transformation from mutual membership organizations to for-profit and even self-listed corporations. In contrast, China’s exchanges still maintain the “strange” characteristic – they...

The current state of Chinese privatization remains deeply flawed. While the initial deferral of state-sector privatization in favor of first creating a marketized, non-state sector was, I argue, an economically wise strategy, the government’s current lethargic response toward solving the...

Empirical evidence shows that takeovers are value-maximizing events for target firm shareholders and enhance social efficiency. Takeovers are commonly thought to play a key role in reducing managerial slack in corporate governance through the replacement of inefficient management. Additionally,...

The aim of this paper is to critically examine China’s regulation for securities offerings in light of the recent financial global crisis and, based on these findings, make policy recommendations for future reform. The Chinese regulatory regime contains the key element of merits review, apart...