Corporate governance is concerned with the resolution of collective action problems among dispersed investors and the reconciliation of conflicts of interest between various corporate claimholders. In this survey we review the theoretical and empirical research on the main mechanisms of...

We allow the preference of a political majority to determine boththe corporate governance structure and the division of profits betweenhuman and financial capital. In a democratic society where financialwealth is concentrated, a political majority may prefer to restraingovernance by dispersed...

This study investigates the transition from being a listed company with a dispersed ownership structure to being a privately held company with a concentrated ownership structure. We consider a sample of private equity backed portfolio companies to evaluate the consequences of the corporate...

This study examines changes in block ownership for a large sample of listed and non-listed German firms. The frequency of block trading is similar to other countries, and the vast majority of block trades leads to changes in ultimate ownership (control transfers). Such changes are more likely...

This study provides new stylized facts on the determinants of corporate failure and acquisition in Germany. It also offers important lessons for the design of empirical studies. We show that firms experiencing failure or acquisition are significantly different from surviving firms on a number of...

We use a panel data set of European firms to analyse the effects of domestic and international M&As on target firms' investment, growth and financial constraints. Combining propensity score matching with a difference-in-differences estimator, our results indicate that upon acquisition, target...

We examine the effects of controlling shareholder stock pledge on corporate acquisition decisions and associated performance. Consistent with our aggravated expropriation hypothesis, we find that pledging firms in China initiate more takeovers, but these acquisitions conducted by pledging firms...

If a bidder launches a takeover offer for a listed company being part of a stock market index, then index funds and exchange traded funds (ETF) as shareholders of this company cannot easily tender their shares without losing track of the index. This paper analyzes the impact of index fund and...

We examine the governance transfer effect of corporate blockholders in a sample of 892 block acquisitions across 42 countries from 1990 to 2008. Using earnings management as a proxy for corporate governance outcome, we find that target firms' earnings management is aligned with that of block...