My study examines how institutional features of transition economies, i.e., goverment ownership, legal investor protection, and government regulation distort the choice of directors, and the firm value impact of independent director and political-connected director in China. We find that SOEs...

This paper analyses the German corporate law reform's effect on the publicly listed companies' ownership and performance. First, theoretically plausible implications of the most important laws that were issued 1990-2009 are provided, then an empirical analysis using 1997-2008 panel data...

We investigate the impact of corporate board meetings on corporate performance for a sample of 169 listed corporations from 2002 to 2007 in South Africa (SA). Our findings suggest a statistically significant and positive association between the frequency of corporate board meetings and corporate...

Executive compensation in the U.S. banking industry has been criticized as a root cause of the recent financial crisis. This study examines the relationship between executive compensation, ownership structure, and firm performance for Chinese financial corporations during 2001-2009. The results...

In December 2006, the Securities and Exchange Commission issued new rules that require enhanced disclosure on how firms tie CEO compensation to performance. We use this new available data to study the terms of performance-based awards in CEO compensation contracts in S&P 500 firms. We observe...

Using 2,956 CEO turnovers from 1993 to 2009, I find that default probability is useful in understanding and predicting forced CEO turnovers for non-distressed firms, controlling for conventional performance measures, such as stock performance. The high predictive power is not explained by...

This study investigates the determinants of residual government ownership and the impact of such ownership on post-privatization performance in China. Using panel data on 514 firms for the period from 1999 to 2004, the similar sample period with previous studies, we find that government...

This paper investigates the relationship between director shareownership and corporate performance in South Africa using a sample of 169 listed firms from 2002 to 2007. Our results suggest a statistically significant and positive association between director shareownership and corporate...

Has the value of firms' political connections declined during the course of China's market transition? Some argue that China has experienced a tipping point after which the importance of political connections in conducting business has diminished, whereas others expect the value of political...

We examine how executives' behavior outside the workplace, as measured by their ownership of luxury goods (low “frugality”) and prior legal infractions, is related to financial reporting risk. We predict and find that CEOs and CFOs with a legal record are more likely to perpetrate fraud. In...