Executive compensation and corporate risk management

We provide the first evidence on the effects of executive compensation on corporate risk management for insurers. Our unique data set allows the construction of a new, more complete measure of corporate risk management behavior. Specifically, we include hedging-driven usage of not only derivatives but also insurance. To address potential endogeneity, we utilize a difference-in-differences approach, based on the implementation of FAS 123R that required firms to expense stock-based compensation at fair value. We find that the decline in the convexity of executive compensation following FAS 123R led firms to significantly increase corporate risk management, primarily through increased demand for insurance.     

A Reduced Form Coefficients Analysis of Executive Ownership, Corporate Value, and Executive Compensation

Most simultaneous equations studies analyze the coefficients from the structural forms of the models, which provide estimates of the direct effects of independent variables on the dependent variables in each equation, but ignore the indirect effects these independent variables have on dependent variables in other equations. This paper modifies the work of Chung and Pruitt (1996) by extending the model to include board composition and institutional ownership variables and then estimating the structural and derived reduced form coefficients for the extended model. The signs and significance of the reduced form coefficients differ in several material respects from the results of the structural form coefficient analysis, which suggests that analysis of only the structural form coefficients is incorrect and potentially misleading.     

Executive Compensation Tied to ESG Performance: International Evidence

Using a wide sample of international publicly traded firms, this paper studies the rapidly increasing practice of incorporating Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) metrics in executive compensation contracts. Our evidence suggests that this compensation practice varies at the country, industry, and firm levels in ways that are consistent with efficient incentive contracting. We also observe that reliance on ESG metrics in executive compensation arrangements is associated with engagement, voting, and trading by institutional investors, which suggests that firms could be adopting this practice to align their management's objectives with the preferences of certain shareholder groups. Finally, we find that the adoption of ESG Pay is accompanied by improvements in key ESG outcomes, but not by improvements in financial performance.     

Executive compensation in less regulated markets: the impact of debt monitoring

This paper shows that in the lightly regulated Alternative Investment Market (AIM) voluntary corporate board structures might not reduce agency costs between shareholder and executive directors. In this less regulated market, we find that the extent of debt affects executive pay. In addition, the theoretical determinants of executive pay affect CEO and other executives’ pay and incentives differently in this market. We find no evidence that debt levels affect CEO pay in a matched sample of Main Market firms. Our results suggest that debtholders could be better monitors of executive directors’ actions, in comparison to voluntary governance committees in less regulated markets.     

Repricing and Executive Turnover

We examine whether the threat of executive turnover faced by a firm affects its decision to reprice stock options held by its executives. We estimate a model of voluntary turnover among top executives and show that the predicted turnover from this model is positively related to the probability of repricing. The relationship is robust to the inclusion of several known determinants of repricing. Our results are consistent with a model in which a tight labor market makes executives hard to replace, forcing firms to reprice stock options when they go underwater.     

Pensions as a Form of Executive Compensation

This paper investigates the role of pensions as an element of total executive compensation, and the relationship between pensions and performance‐based compensation in executive pay. Using hand‐collected data on FTSE 100 CEOs and senior executives from 2004?2011, we document that pensions function as a substitute for performance‐based compensation (primarily bonuses) in both cross‐sectional and time‐series settings. We also examine the effect of corporate governance characteristics on executive pensions. We find that corporate governance characteristics associated with stronger board monitoring play a constraining role on the magnitude of pensions. Our evidence of substitution effects between pensions and performance‐based compensation is consistent with a managerial power view of executive compensation‐setting, and the use of pensions as a ‘stealth’ element of compensation. Our findings are robust to considering different types of pensions, product market competition, and cross‐listing. Sub‐period analysis shows that pensions decrease and substitution effects weaken following the 2008 financial crisis. Moreover, we find no evidence that the use of compensation consultants with potential conflicts of interest is associated with higher pensions. Overall, our study contributes to a greater understanding of the role of pensions in executive compensation, and shows the importance of including pensions in analysis of executive compensation.     

Bidder CEO and Other Executive Compensation in UK M&As

This paper investigates the impact of M&As on bidder (CEO and other) executive compensation employing a unique sample of 100 completed bids in the UK over the 1998–2001 period. Our findings indicate that less independent and larger boards award CEOs significantly higher bonuses and salary following M&A completion both for the full sample and for the UK and US sub‐samples. UK CEOs and executives are rewarded more for the effort exerted in accomplishing intra ‐ industry or large mergers than for diversifying or small mergers and their cash pay is unaffected by other measures of their managerial skill or performance. US bidders are rewarded at higher levels than their UK counterparts and their remuneration is related only to measures of CEO dominance over the board of directors. Overall our findings offer support for the managerial power rather than the agency theory perspective on managerial compensation.     

Chief Audit Executive as Supervisory Board Member and Executive Compensation Contracts

This paper studies a unique phenomenon in China's corporate governance—that chief audit executives (CAEs) sit on supervisory boards (CAE duality)—and examines its effects on executive compensation contracts. Using a sample of listed firms between 2010 and 2018, we find a significant positive relation between CAE duality and pay-for-performance sensitivity, which suggests that the dual position helps integrate monitoring resources and reduces agency costs. This positive relation is more pronounced when companies face a stricter monitoring environment and in non-state-owned enterprises (non-SOEs) than in SOEs. In addition, we find that the recent reforms on compensation strengthen the role of CAE duality in SOEs. Further analysis identifies the reliability of performance information (i.e., earnings quality) and reduced executive self-interested behaviours (i.e., perquisite consumption) as the influencing mechanisms that increase the demand for performance-based compensation and thus improve pay-for-performance sensitivity.     

Pay me Right: Reference Values and Executive Compensation

This paper examines the importance of reference values for executive compensation contracts. We rely on a quasi‐experimental setting (the adoption of pay guidelines), and a well‐defined measure of individual‐specific reference values to provide evidence on how a change in CEO reference compensation leads to subsequent changes of actual pay. We find that executive compensation adjusts gradually towards the new reference values, and that the speed of the adjustment depends on the corporate governance characteristics: the firm ownership structure, the role of the State and of the employees in the firm decision making. These results provide empirical support for theoretical models of bargaining that take into account reference values.     

The Impact of Corporate Governance on Executive Compensation

This paper examines the relationship between the compensation of the top five executives at a set of over 400 publicly listed Canadian firms and various internal and external corporate governance‐related factors. The media is full of stories suggesting a relationship between large executive compensation packages and failures in governance at various levels within organisations, but there exists little formal analysis of many of these relationships. Our analysis provides empirical evidence supporting some of these assertions, refuting others and documenting new relationships. We find that variances in internal governance related to differences across firms in the characteristics of the CEO, compensation committee and board of directors do influence both the level and composition of executive compensation, especially for the CEO. Considering external measures of corporate governance, we find that different types of shareholders and competitive environments impact executive compensation. We do not find that either the internal or external governance characteristics dominate.     

The price of reputation: Executive compensation of sin companies

This study examines how and why managers receive pay premiums when vulnerable to social reputation loss. We define sin companies as those operating in the alcohol, gambling and tobacco industries. We show that company managers receive a higher asymmetric pay-for-performance sensitivity in their pay in addition to receiving higher total compensation. In other words, their pay increases with firm performance at a faster rate than that of their non-sin company peers. This finding is consistent with our prediction that sin companies provide greater rewards to their managers upon satisfactory performance, generating a pay premium. We propose two explanations for the reputation pay premium associated with sin-industry managers: the limited future career opportunities and the difficulty of reconciling managers’ self-identity with the employer's social identity. We find stronger support for the latter explanation. The sin-industry pay premium is larger when managers have pro-social and religious tendencies. However, we do not find a smaller pay premium when managers are close to their retirement. Since the career concern should be reduced for managers who are near retirement, this finding is inconsistent with the career opportunity explanation. Overall, our findings are consistent with the notion that managers associate their self-image with employers’ social identities.     

国企高管薪酬影响企业社会绩效的实证研究

基于利益相关者理论,将社会绩效引入高管薪酬显性契约缔约过程,构建了高管薪酬与企业社会绩效关系模型,并以137家国有上市公司为实证样本,采用因子分析、回归分析方法检验了模型的假设关系。研究发现:年薪与企业强社会绩效和企业总体社会绩效显著正相关,与企业弱社会绩效负相关;高管持股与企业社会绩效没有显著相关性。     

Trade Credit Risk Management: The Role of Executive Risk‐Taking Incentives

In this study we investigate how executive equity incentives affect companies’ risk‐taking behavior in relationships with their customers. We hypothesize and find that executive risk‐taking incentives provided by options are positively related to the degree of trade credit riskiness measured both as the amount of total trade credit a firm extends to all its customers and as the amount of trade credit a firm extends to customers with a high probability of default. We also find that the measures of trade credit riskiness are positively related to the firm's future stock return volatility, suggesting that the customer default risk inherent in customer‐supplier trade credit relationships represents an important economic source of the overall supplier‐firm riskiness. The findings of the study provide insights into why firms facing financial difficulties are not denied trade credit.     

Non‐compliance in Executive Compensation Disclosure: the Brazilian Experience

We examine the determinants and consequences of firms’ choice not to comply with a new executive compensation disclosure regulation. We exploit a unique feature of Brazilian markets, where a change in the regulation of executive compensation disclosure could arguably lead to personal security‐related costs for executives. This major reform in executive compensation disclosure in Brazil became effective in December 2009. While some firms complied with the change in regulation, other firms explicitly refused to comply fully with the regulation by using a court injunction. After controlling for firm‐specific characteristics and both social and economic inequality measures, we find that the degree of criminality in the state in which the firm is headquartered (a proxy for security‐related costs) and the level of CEO compensation are important determinants of a firm's decision not to fully disclose executive compensation information. We also show that firms which do not fully comply with the regulation face costs in the form of higher bid‐ask spreads, suggesting investors are leery of the decision not to comply with the regulation. We discuss the potential implications of our results in the context of executive compensation disclosure reform.     

高管薪酬粘性、风险承担与企业投资效率——管理者权力与融资约束的调节作用

本文选取2010―2019年中国A股上市公司数据,实证分析了高管薪酬粘性对企业投资效率的影响及其作用机制。研究表明:(1)高管薪酬粘性对企业投资效率具有负向影响,会加剧企业过度投资,由此加大非效率投资及降低投资效率。(2)高管薪酬粘性对企业投资效率的负向影响仅对“奖优-低惩劣”薪酬契约有效。相对于非国有、高估值与制造业企业,高管薪酬粘性对国有、低估值与非制造业企业投资效率的负向影响更为显著。(3)管理者权力的提高会加剧高管薪酬粘性对企业投资效率的负向影响,加剧高管权力寻租引发的薪酬补偿效应,由此稀释薪酬奖惩对业绩变动的敏感度。融资约束程度的提高会减弱高管薪酬粘性对企业投资效率的负向影响,这种负向影响主要针对投资不足企业,对过度投资企业不显著。(4)风险承担在高管薪酬粘性与企业投资效率的关系中承担着中介作用,高管薪酬粘性通过影响企业风险承担来影响企业投资效率,“高管薪酬粘性-风险承担-企业投资效率”的传导渠道有效。     

Executive Compensation: A Model of Disclosure Choice

Recent public policy debates have led to increased calls for full transparency of executive compensation. However, in practice, many firms are reluctant to disclose the full details of how they link executive compensation to performance. One possible reason for lack of full disclosure is that managers use their power to hide the details of their compensation plan in order to disguise opportunistic rent extraction. If this is the reason for secrecy, then public policy designed to force firms to provide full disclosure is unlikely to be resisted by shareholders. However, another possible explanation for less than full transparency is that some degree of secrecy about executive compensation may be in the interest of the company and its shareholders. If this explanation is correct, then public policy moves to increase transparency may be met by counter moves designed to protect managers and shareholders from such policies. In this paper we investigate if full disclosure of executive compensation arrangements is always optimal for shareholders. We develop a model where optimal executive remuneration solves a moral hazard problem. However, the degree to which the moral hazard problem affects the shareholders depends on hidden information, so that disclosure of the executive compensation scheme will typically reveal the hidden information, which can be harmful to shareholders. The model derives, therefore, the optimal disclosure policy and the optimal remuneration scheme. We find that the shareholders are better off pre‐committing not to disclose the executive compensation scheme whenever possible. Executive directors are shown to be better off too in the absence of disclosure of executive compensation schemes. An argument for mandating disclosure is that it provides better information to shareholders but our analysis demonstrates that disclosure does not necessarily achieve this objective. The results suggest that less than full disclosure can be in the interest of shareholders, the reason for this being that disclosures cannot be made selectively to shareholders but will also be made to strategic opponents. This will be the case if the board of directors and the remuneration committee includes enough independent directors. Whether or not non‐disclosure to shareholders is in their interest is however an empirical matter involving a trade‐off between the proprietary costs associated with disclosure to shareholders and the costs of potential collusion between executive and non‐executive directors associated with non‐disclosure.     

How Firms Use Director Networks in Setting CEO Pay

We examine how firms use the network of overlapping directorships to determine chief executive officer (CEO) compensation. We contribute to related work by empirically exploring two competing hypotheses. In the first hypothesis, networks propagate relevant information used to establish good pay practices. In the second hypothesis, director networks are used opportunistically to benefit the CEO. The empirical findings are generally consistent with the first hypothesis. Yet, the importance of director networks is reduced when the CEO is entrenched and when management hires a compensation consultant. The latter finding is especially pronounced when director networks predict a reduction in CEO pay.     

高管控制下的财务重述与高管薪酬关系研究

本文在西方学者的管理层权力论基础上,结合中国垄断企业的特点,进一步提出了高管控制论,以2000～2008年曾发生过财务重述的我国代表性垄断行业上市公司共148个重述样本作为研究对象,深入分析高管控制与高管薪酬的相关性,考察了高管以财务重述为路径,影响企业财务业绩进而提高薪酬的可能性。研究发现:高管控制与高管薪酬显著正相关;虽然我国绝大部分国有垄断企业的高管不拥有或较少拥有股票和期权,财务重述仍然会影响公司高管的薪酬。     

Executive Agencies within the Scotland Territorial Programme

This article supplements the cross-sectional survey literature by focusing upon a subset of executive agencies which, though highly disparate on many dimensions, share the experience of being part of the command of the Secretary of State for Scotland. Agencies operating within the context of territorial management face markedly different operating environments. In particular, centralised financial control by the territorial department is an essential continuing feature of the public expenditure control system. The characteristics of those activities which have been agencified in Scotland are closely examined, followed by an evaluation of the implications for internal management, external accountability, the reform of the parliamentary system of Supply, and the extension of accruals accounting across central government.