Firms targeted by hedge fund activists experience significantly higher returns when there are fewer external monitors in place at the target firm. Using analyst coverage and institutional ownership as measures of external monitoring presence, we find that low-monitored activist targets...

We explore the labor market effects of gender and race by examining board leadership appointments. Prior studies are often limited by observing only hired candidates, whereas the boardroom provides a controlled setting where both hired and unhired candidates are observable. Although diverse...

Recent studies document the increasing effectiveness of shareholder voting as a monitoring mechanism. Because both directors and the market respond to shareholder votes, management has stronger incentives to influence voting outcomes. We identify one channel through which management can affect...

Firms falling short of earnings expectations are more likely to cite stakeholder-focused objectives in their public communications around earnings announcements. This behavior suggests that managers push to be evaluated by subjective stakeholder-based performance criteria when falling short on...

We document a network of information flow between activists and other investors prior to 13D filings. We use EDGAR search activity matched to investor IP addresses to identify specific investors who persistently download information on an individual activist's campaign targets in the days prior...