We use a sample of U.S. dual-class companies to examine how the divergence between insider voting rights and cash-flow rights affects managerial extraction of private benefits of control. We find that as the divergence widens at dual-class companies, corporate cash holdings are worth less to...

We present evidence on the benefits of changes in control from mergers and acquisitions. We find that the stronger the acquirer's shareholder rights relative to the target's, the higher the synergy created by an acquisition. This result supports the hypothesis that acquisitions of firms with...

Because analysts strategically allocate more effort to portfolio firms that are relatively more important for their careers, a firm's information environment is impacted by other firms covered by its analysts. Controlling for analyst and firm characteristics, an analyst makes more accurate,...

We examine the potential for management-worker alliances when employees have substantial voting rights, and how such alliances affect the balance of power between managers and shareholders. We find that substantial employee voting rights exacerbate the manager-shareholder conflicts....

We examine how corporate cash policy is related to the level of social trust in a country, with trust defined as the subjective probability that an individual assigns to the event of a potential counter-party performing an action that is beneficial or at least not harmful to that individual. We...

An unintended consequence of recent governance reforms in the U.S. is firms' greater reliance on older director candidates, resulting in noticeable board aging. We investigate this phenomenon and its implications for corporate governance. We document that older independent directors exhibit poor...