IPOs on the EuroNMs have shown very high underpricing. The majority of these IPOs possess specific characteristics such as lock-up agreements, venture-capital financing, ownership by the underwriter and over-allotment options. We study how these characteristics influence the underpricing of...

This paper reviews the vast academic literature on the market for corporate control. Our main focus is the cyclical wave pattern that this market exhibits. We address the following questions: Why do we observe recurring surges and downfalls in Mamp;A activity? Why do managers herd in their...

This article examines the relation between executive cash compensation and corporate governance in Europe. Most research performed on the pay-for-performance relation has been conducted in the United States and the United Kingdom, because the widely held nature of shareholding makes the...

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) refers to the incorporation of Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) considerations into corporate management, financial decision making, and investors' portfolio decisions. Socially responsible firms are expected to internalize the externalities (e.g....

We investigate whether acquisition experience of executive and non-executive directors is priced in their remuneration. We find that acquisition experience generates a contractual premium, and the relative size of this premium is higher for non-executive directors than for executives. Only a...

This paper provides an overview of the academic literature on the market for corporate control, and focuses specifically on firms' performance around and after a takeover. Despite the aggregate M&A market amounting to several trillions USD on an annual basis, acquiring firms often underperform...

Do corporate donations enhance shareholder wealth or reflect agency problems? We address this question for a global sample of firms whereby we distinguish between charitable and political donations, as well as between donations in cash and in kind. We find that charitable donations are...

Predicting worker's effort is important in many different areas, but is often difficult. Using a laboratory experiment, we test the hypothesis that confidence, i.e. person-specific beliefs about her abilities, can be used as a generic proxy to predict effort provision. We measure confidence in...

In the corporate finance tradition, starting with Berle and Means (1932), corporations should generally be run to maximize shareholder value. The agency view of corporate social responsibility (CSR) considers CSR an agency problem and a waste of corporate resources. Given our identification...