We provide a model that explains the following empirical observations: i) private ownership is more efficient than public ownership, ii) privatizations are associated with increases in efficiency and iii) the increase in efficiency predates the privatization. The two key mechanisms explaining...

We provide a model that explains the following empirical observations: i) private ownership is more efficient than public ownership, ii) privatizations are associated with increases in efficiency and iii) the increase in efficiency predates the privatization. The two key mechanisms explaining...

Public spending (i.e., “G”) enables governments to fulfill their fiscal policies. This paper takes a micro perspective and quantifies the impact of procurement spending - a specific component of G - on firm survival. We find that firms that receive public contracts survive longer, ceteris...

This study provides the first comparative evidence of foreign and domestic acquisitions in Germany. A propensity score matching approach combined with a difference-in-difference estimator were performed separately for foreign and domestic acquisitions to account for a general takeover effect....

This study focuses on ex ante performance of domestic and foreign takeover targets in Germany, one of the most important FDI inflow destinations worldwide. Using a new database from German official statistics, unconditional comparisons as well as binary response model estimations of takeover...

This paper is a primer on corporate performance, corporate governance, and their interrelationships and measurement systems, with particular focus on Small and Medium- Sized Enterprises (SMEs). This is the first report of a larger on going research project. In the domain of performance...

An interlock between two firms occurs if the firms share one or more directors in their boards of directors. We explore the effect of interlocks on firm performance for 101 large Dutch firms using a large and new panel database. We use five different performance measures, and for each...

Do shareholders of acquiring companies profit from acquisitions, or do acquiring CEOs overbidand destroy shareholder value? Answering this question is difficult since the hypotheticalcounterfactual is hard to determine. We exploit merger contests to address the identificationissue. In those...

This paper analyses the turnover of board of directors members on a sample of companies listed on the Milan Stock Exchange in the period 1988-1996. Our aim is to investigate if board members change more frequently when company performance is poor, as the literature suggests, if this relationship...

Cash-rich bidders in UK have better announcement abnormal returns than cash-poor ones during 1984-2007, contrasting previous findings in the US. The positive cash reserve effect is mainly from bidders of high long-run growth or those with non-trivial institutional holdings. Moreover, cash-rich...