While US companies mainly list their board of directors alphabetically, this is not the case for Chinese companies, most of which list their independent directors last. We interpret the listing order of Chinese directors as board hierarchy, reflecting power allocation within the board. Based on...

Using a unique sample of Chinese business group firms required by the government to disclose double financial statements for the parent and its subsidiaries, we examine the impact of a decentralized decision structure on executive compensation and further tests its mechanism. Our findings show...