How do active managers engage with portfolio firms? And, what role does monitoring and engagement play in their trading decisions? We use proprietary data from a large UK active asset manager with a long-standing commitment to stewardship to answer these questions. Our sample, based on nine...

This paper summarises the main results of a research project, quot;Who Controls Corporate Europe?quot;, undertaken by teams of researchers from the various countries investigated, and coordinated by the European Corporate Governance Network in 1996-98. The project relied on a common shareholder...

Globalisation and privatisation have created a demand for liquid stock markets in continental Europe. As a result, European companies, blockholders and governments are faced with a corporate governance dilemma. Liquidity requires dispersed share ownership. When control is relinquished in order...

This paper provides evidence on the incidence, characteristics, and performance of activist engagements across countries. We find that the incidence of activism is greatest with high institutional ownership, particularly for U.S. institutions. We use a sample of 1,740 activist engagements across...

Corporate governance is concerned with the resolution of collective action problems among dispersed investors and the reconciliation of conflicts of interest between various corporate claimholders. In this survey we review the theoretical and empirical research on the main mechanisms of...

This paper analyses the control of Belgian listed companies. The analysis reveals that control of listed companies in Belgium is highly concentrated. Business groups, holding companies, and voting pacts, play an important role in bringing about this concentration. The main characteristics of the...

This paper summarises the main results of a research project, quot;Who Controls Corporate Europe?quot;, undertaken by teams of researchers from the various countries investigated, and coordinated by the European Corporate Governance Network in 1996-98. The project relied on a common shareholder...

We study how deregulation of corporate law affects the decision of entrepreneurs of where to incorporate. Recent rulings by the European Court of Justice (ECJ) have enabled entrepreneurs to select their country of incorporation independently of their real seat. We analyze foreign incorporations...

The contractual theory of the firm predicts that companies adopt charters that maximise firm value, regardless of the default rule. We test this proposition around an exogenous switch of the default from one share-one vote to tenure voting following a law reform in France. In initial public...