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Corporate governance theory predicts that leverage affects agency costs and thereby influences firm performance. We propose a new approach to test this theory using profit efficiency, or how close a firm’s profits are to the benchmark of a best-practice firm facing the same exogenous conditions. We are also the first to employ a simultaneous-equations model that accounts for reverse causality f...

Using a large dataset of performance goals employed in executive incentive contracts we find that a disproportionately large number of firms exceed their goals by a small margin as compared to the number that fall short of the goal by a similar margin. This asymmetry is particularly acute for earnings and profit goals, when compensation is contingent on a single goal and is present for both lon...

This paper considers the effect of different firm leadership on the innovative performance of firms from seven EU countries. We investigate whether owner-led or manager-led firms achieve a larger share of their turnover with product innovations. Economic theory does not propose clear answers to this question. In the empirical analysis, it turns out that the manager-led firms are more active inn...

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This paper explores the development of Cote d’Ivoire’s formal private sector in the years preceding and immediately following the political crises in 1999-2000 and the Civil War that began in 2002. Notably, during the conflict politicians exploited and ex­ acerbated anti-foreigner sentiments, tolerating increasing number of attacks targeting foreigners. We use a unique database from the Registr...

Corporate Governance deals with the issue of how the suppliers of finance to various corporations assure themselves of getting a return on their investment. Several Studies have examined the relationship between ownership structure and firm performance. Using different data samples from different countries, most of the studies provide evidence that ownership influence firm performance. This stu...

The impact of strategies used to appropriate innovation rents on firm performance is analyzed using a sample of U.S. public manufacturing firms. Stronger appropriability at the firm level, achieved through patent protection or the ownership of specialized complementary assets, leads to superior economic performance, as measured by the stock market valuation of a firm’s R&D assets. Among commonl...

This study investigated the relationship between main dimensions in the strategy-making process, environmental complexity, and performance in pharmaceutical companies of Iran. Results argue that pharmaceutical companies like other industries place differing emphasis on strategy-making and employ different modes of strategy-making. It offers a typology of different modes of strategy-making that ...