When facing hedge fund activists, target firms often fight back. Targets with agency problems and those confronting the threat of investor coordination frequently engage in hostile resistance by implementing governance changes associated with managerial entrenchment. The market negatively...

The presentation is following the publication of two papers by the Institute for Governance of Private and Public Organizations answering the question “Does hedge fund activism create long-term shareholder value?” In the presentation, the question is rephrased to consider whether activist...

This paper studies how hedge fund activism impacts corporate innovation. Firms targeted by activists improve their innovation efficiency over the five-year period following hedge fund intervention. Despite a tightening in R&D expenditures, target firms increase innovation output, as measured by...

Hedge fund activism emerged as a major force of corporate governance in the 2000s. By the mid-2000s, there were between 150 and 200 activist hedge funds in action each year, advocating for changes in 200–300 publicly listed companies in the United States. In this article, we review the...

This paper studies how hedge fund activism reshapes corporate innovation. Firms targeted by hedge fund activists experience an improvement in innovation efficiency during the five-year period following the intervention. Despite a tightening in R&D expenditures, target firms experience increases...