​This paper examines the governance role of banks in replacement of underperforming CEOs in firms listed on Chinese stock exchanges. Under most circumstances, the findings suggest that the presence of outstanding loans does not increase the probability that a poorly performing CEO will be...

By allowing large classes of movable assets to be used as collateral, the Property Law reform trans-formed the secured transactions in China. Difference-in-differences tests show firms operating with ex-ante more movable assets expand access to bank credit and prolong debt maturity. However, the...

In this paper, I tackle the question whether "one share - one vote" should become a European law rule. I examine, first of all the economic theory concerning one share - one vote and its optimality, and the law and economics literature on dual class recapitalizations and other deviations from...

The paper investigates the determinants of trade credit and its interactions with borrowing constraints and the input combination of the firm, within an incomplete contract setting in which firms use a two-input technology and collateralised credit contracts. Assuming that the supplier is better...

Die Krise der internationalen Finanzmärkte hat die allgemeine Wahrnehmung für die in diesen Märkten inhärenten Risiken merklich verändert. Glaubten manche Anleger in den Boomphasen der Finanzmärkte, dass sich eine hohe Kapitalrendite mit geringem Risiko verbinden ließe, wenn man nur die...

This paper investigates under what circumstances boards of directors fire CEOs and whether this action leads to better firm performance. We use unique and detailed data, covering 473 companies in the transition region, on boards’ actions, expectations and beliefs about CEO ability. We find...

In today's uncertain financial climate it is particularly important for entities to explain their financial performance relative to their expectations. Therefore, the paper analyzes the quality and quantity of management reporting in Germany's publicly traded MDAX and SDAX companies using a...

We test under what circumstances boards discipline managers and whether such interventions improve performance. We exploit exogenous variation due to the staggered adoption of corporate governance laws in formerly Communist countries coupled with detailed ‘hard’ information about the...

Most pre-crisis explanations of the various corporate governance systems have considered the separation between ownership and control to be an advantage of the Anglo-American economies. They have also attributed the failure of other countries to achieve these efficient arrangements to their...

For nearly two years, the two of us have had a running discussion of the costs and benefits of automatic stays in bankruptcy for qualified financial contracts (QFCs) such as derivatives and repurchase agreements, particularly those held by systemically important major dealer banks. Under current...