Superstar CEOS and Corporate Law
Larger-than-life corporate leaders, who can move fast and disrupt entrenched players, are often perceived as having the vision, superior leadership,...
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Returns to Shareholder Activism: Evidence from a Clinical Study of the Hermes U.K. Focus Fund
This article reports a unique analysis of private engagements by an activist fund. It is based on data made available to us by Hermes, the fund manager...
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Does Institutional Ownership Matter for International Stock Return Comovement?
We study the link between international stock return comovements and institutional investment. We test whether the rise of institutional ownership...
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Do Institutional Investors Monitor their Large-Scale vs. Small-Scale Investments Differently? Evidence from the Say-On-Pay Vote
We examine the relation between an institution’s stock ownership and its tendency to support corporate management through the “Say-on-Pay”...
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Index Funds and the Future of Corporate Governance: Theory, Evidence, and Policy
Index funds own an increasingly large proportion of American public companies. The stewardship decisions of index fund managers—how they monitor,...
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Corporate Governance Through Voice and Exit
How do active managers engage with portfolio firms? And, what role does monitoring and engagement play in their trading decisions? We use proprietary...
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Understanding the (Ir)Relevance of Shareholder Votes on M&A Deals
Has corporate law and its bundles of fiduciary obligations become irrelevant? Over the last thirty years, the American public corporation has...
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Do Institutional Investors Stabilize Equity Markets in Crisis Periods? Evidence from COVID-19
During the COVID-19 crash, U.S. stocks with higher institutional ownership performed worse. This under-performance was unrelated to revisions in...
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Coordinated Engagements
We study coordinated engagements by a prominent international network of long-term shareholders cooperating to influence firms on environmental and...
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Institutional Investors in China: Corporate Governance and Policy Channeling in the Market Within the State
The extraordinary rise of China’s economy has made understanding Chinese corporate governance an issue of global importance. A rich literature has...
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Did the Introduction of a Reputation Mechanism for Stewardship Code Voluntary Disclosures Improve Investor Engagement
Institutional investors have limited resources dedicated to engagement activities, yet, in many cases they hold thousands of stocks in their...
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Mavericks, Universal, and Common Owners - The Largest Shareholders of U.S. Public Firms
Using a novel data set, we show that up to one-fifth of America's largest firms had an activist, non-financial blockholder, or insider as their largest...
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