We examine the potential confounding effects that awarding outside directors stock options may have on the quality of financial disclosure. By aligning their interests with those of shareholders, directors should be more inclined to monitor and disclose relevant information to investors....

On theoretical grounds, monitoring of top executives by the (supervisory) board is expected to be value relevant. The empirical evidence is ambiguous and we analyze three non-competing explanations for this ambiguity: (i) The positive effect on firm value of board monitoring is hidden in stock...

This study examines the relationship between cross-listing and managerial compensation of Chinese firms that concurrently issued A- and B-shares or A- and H-shares during 2001 - 2010. The results show that executive compensation is a positive factor to motivate Chinese A-share firms to...

On theoretical grounds, monitoring of top executives by the (supervisory) board is expected to be value relevant. The empirical evidence is ambiguous and we analyze three non-competing explanations for this ambiguity: (i) The positive effect on firm value of board monitoring is hidden in stock...

The litmus test for an effective compensation program is whether it provides “pay for performance.” While the concept of pay for performance is simple, its implementation is not. In particular, boards must consider not only whether a compensation plan encourages executives to pursue...

We examine the efficacy of proxy voting to limit inflated CEO pay. We find that the percentage of dissenting votes that go against director-sponsored compensation proposals increases following a staggered rejection of the Inevitable Disclosure Doctrine (RIDD), which increases CEOs’ job...

We investigate the suggested substitutive relation between executive compensation and the disciplinary threat of takeover imposed by the market for corporate control. We complement other empirical studies on managerial compensation and corporate control mechanisms in three distinct ways. First,...

Building on a unique panel data set of German Prime Standard companies for the period 2005-2008, this paper investigates the influencing factors of both director compensation levels and structure, i.e. the probability of performance-based compensation. Drawing on agency theory arguments and...

This study seeks to disentangle the human capital and the social capital of directors to improve our understanding of the value that directors bring to their boardroom. Employing social network analysis (SNA) to measure the social capital of directors and using a unique and comprehensive sample...

We examine professional directors—board members with no employment outside of serving as independent directors. We find that boards with a higher percentage of professional directors engage in more acquisitions, experience lower acquisition-announcement returns, and exhibit lower...