We analyze the optimal contract between a risk-averse manager and the initial shareholders in a two-period model where the manager's investment effort, carried out in period 1, and her current effort, carried out in period 2, both impact the second-period profit, so that it may be difficult to...

We analyze a hand-collected dataset of 1669 executive compensation packages at 34 firms included in the main German stock market index (DAX) for the years 2006- 2014 in order to investigate the impact of the 2009 say on pay legislation. First, we observe that the compensation packages of...

Contrary to previous literature we hypothesize that labor's interest may well – like that of shareholders – aim at securing the long-run survival of the firm. Consequently, employee representatives on the supervisory board could well have an interest in increasing incentive-based...

Relative performance evaluation (RPE) is, at least on paper, enjoying widespread popularity in determining the level of executive compensation. Yet existing empirical evidence of RPE is decidedly mixed. Two principal explanations are held responsible for this discord. A constructional challenge...

This paper investigates whether observed executive compensation contracts are designed to provide risk-taking incentives in addition to effort incentives. We develop a stylized principal-agent model that captures the interdependence between firm risk and managerial incentives. We calibrate the...

We analyze a hand-collected dataset of 1682 executive compensation packages at 34 firms included in the main German stock market index (DAX) for the years 2009-2017 in order to investigate the impact of the 2009 say on pay legislation. The findings provide important insights beyond the German...

We study how US chief executive officers (CEOs) invest their deferred compensation plans depending on the firm's profitability. By looking at the correlation between the CEO's return on these plans and the firm's stock return, we show that deferred compensation is to a large extent invested in...

Panel OLS and GMM-IV estimates indicate that executives respond to the adoption of a compensation clawback provision by decreasing firm risk. The mechanisms that transmit incentives to decisions and decisions to risk appear to be more conservative investment and financial policies and preemptive...