We analyze why the control of listed German and U.K. companies is so different. As shareholders in Germany are less protected and control is less expensive, German investors prefer controlling stakes. We also focus on economic factors such as profitability, risk, and growth to predict the...

This study investigates how investments in paintings compare with those in stocks in terms of risk--return trade-off using Sharpe and Treynor ratios and Markowitz efficient frontiers. A large database was analysed consisting of more than 10,500 auction prices of Belgian paintings over the period...

Economic theory points to five parties active in disciplining management of poorly performing firms: holders of large share blocks, acquirers of new blocks, bidders in take-overs, non-executive directors, and investors during periods of financial distress. This Paper reports the first...

The markets for management buyouts in the U.K. and continental Europe have experienced dramatic growth in the past ten years. In the U.K., buyouts accounted for half of the total M&A activity (measured by value) in 2005. And as in the U.S. during the'80s, the greatest number of U.K. buyouts in...

"We investigate the investment-cash flow sensitivity of a large sample of the UK listed firms and confirm that investment is strongly cash flow-sensitive. Is this sensitivity a result of agency problems when managers with high discretion overinvest, or of asymmetric information when managers...