In this study, I summarize the current state of executive compensation, discuss measurement and incentive issues, document recent trends in executive pay in both U.S. and international firms, and analyze the evolution of executive pay over the past century. Most recent analyses of executive...

The main objective of financial reporting is to provide useful information to a firm's stakeholders. However, it is questionable whether this goal can be fully realized without effective enforcement, which ensures faithful and consistent application of the relevant accounting standards. Within...

This paper studies the market-level effects of litigation rights in an imperfectly competitive capital market with a market maker, an information-acquiring investor, and liquidity traders. Litigation rights have the following equilibrium effects. (i) The investor acquires more private...

Clearinghouses are systemic nodes in financial markets that handle trillions of dollars’ worth of transactions. Yet, these critical market infrastructures stand on fragile foundations. The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act of 2010, the sweeping financial reform that followed the 2008 financial...

Shareholder activism has been overlooked in Hong Kong (HK) — Asia's global financial centre and the gateway for investors to access the China Mainland markets. The HK Disclosure of Interests regime provides insufficient information on activist investments to the public, as compared to The...

This study examines the association between real earnings management, governance attributes, and IPO failure risk. Using a sample of 4174 IPOs firms that went public over the period of 1998-2011, we find evidence that real earnings management and governance attributes are associated with IPO...

In view of recent corporate scandals, it is argued that corporate governance can learn from public governance. Institutions devised to control and discipline the behaviour of executives in the political sphere can give new insights into how to improve the governance of firms. Some proposal such...

I examine the economic consequences of Say on Pay (SoP) for firms with different governance qualities in a setting where shareholders face informational constraints in evaluating the efficiency of the firm's compensation policy and where the firm's governance structure is endogenous. I find that...