Using a geographic measure of unethical culture developed by Parsons, Sulaeman and Titman (2018) and a novel dataset of financial advisors' childhood residences, we show that advisors who grow up in U.S. counties with less ethical cultures are more likely to commit misconduct as adults. Our...

We provide the first examination of hedge fund boards and their directors. The majority of directorships are held by extremely busy independent directors. These directors are sought after by funds because they have more reputational capital at stake, making them independent and credible monitors...

We examine the role of race and racial concordance between financial advisors and their local community. We document significant differences in stock market participation based on community racial composition as well as differences in the characteristics of communities served by minority...

Using a panel of mandatory SEC disclosure filings we test the predictability of investment fraud. We find that past regulatory and legal violations, conflicts of interest, and monitoring, are significantly associated with future fraud. Avoiding the 5% of firms with the highest fraud risk allows...

We test the predictability of investment fraud using a panel of mandatory disclosures filed with the SEC. We find that disclosures related to past regulatory and legal violations, conflicts of interest, and monitoring have significant power to predict fraud. Avoiding the 5% of firms with the...

Using a novel data set of U.S. financial advisors that includes individuals' employment histories and misconduct records, we show that co-workers influence an individual's propensity to commit financial misconduct. We identify co-workers' effect on misconduct using changes in co-workers caused...

We examine the effect of investors' prior experience with mutual fund families on their subsequent investment decisions. Using a sample from a large discount broker, we find that investors are significantly more likely to purchase funds from families with which they have previous experience. Our...

We show that the allocation of managerial ownership to individuals within firms varies depending upon the joint distribution of decision control and decision management rights. Using a unique dataset of institutional investment management firms, we show that ownership is higher for managers:...

Differences in accrued gains and investors' tax-sensitivity induce variation in a capital gains lock-in effect across mutual funds even for the same stock at the same time. Exploiting this variation, we show this effect influences funds' governance decisions: higher capital gains decrease the...