Differences in Governance Practices between U.S. and Foreign Firms: Measurement, Causes, and Consequences

A-Tier
Journal: The Review of Financial Studies
Year: 2009
Volume: 22
Issue: 8
Pages: 3131-3169

Authors (4)

Reena Aggarwal (not in RePEc) Isil Erel (not in RePEc) René Stulz (Ohio State University) Rohan Williamson (not in RePEc)

Score contribution per author:

1.005 = (α=2.01 / 4 authors) × 2.0x A-tier

α: calibrated so average coauthorship-adjusted count equals average raw count

Abstract

We construct a firm-level governance index that increases with minority shareholder protection. Compared with U.S. matching firms, only 12.68% of foreign firms have a higher index. The value of foreign firms falls as their index decreases relative to the index of matching U.S. firms. Our results suggest that lower country-level investor protection and other country characteristics make it suboptimal for foreign firms to invest as much in governance as U.S. firms do. Overall, we find that minority shareholders benefit from governance improvements and do so partly at the expense of controlling shareholders. The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Society for Financial Studies. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please e-mail: [email protected]., Oxford University Press.

Technical Details

RePEc Handle
repec:oup:rfinst:v:22:y:2009:i:8:p:3131-3169
Journal Field
Finance
Author Count
4
Added to Database
2026-01-29