Download or read book THREE STUDIES ON THE USE OF CEO EQUITY COMPENSATION written by JANG WOOK LEE and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page 116 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This dissertation contains three studies relating to executive equity compensation. In the first study (Chapter 2), I investigate whether firms adjust CEO's equity incentives in response to the firms' prior earnings management. I find that the risk-taking incentives from new equity grants are lower for firms with higher prior real earnings management (REM), but not for firms with higher accruals-based earnings management (AEM). My finding suggests that boards perceive the consequences of REM are more value-reducing than AEM and that they take stronger actions against REM by reducing the CEO's risk-taking incentives arising from equity incentives. In addition, I this result is driven by firms with higher institutional ownership, suggesting that institutional investors play an important monitoring role in structuring executive compensation contracts to limit the CEOs' value-reducing behaviors. In the second study (Chapter 3), I investigate how the firm's downside risk and upside potential differentially affect the choice between cash and equity compensation and the choice between stock options and restricted stock compensation. First, I find that, as downside risk (upside potential) increases, boards grant more cash compensation (more equity compensation) and less equity compensation (less cash compensation). This is consistent with the idea that, when downside risk increases, a CEO requires a higher risk premium for equity compensation and, thus, the board shifts compensation away from equity compensation to cash compensation. The reverse is true for the increased upside potential. When upside potential increases, the observed compensation contract will contain less cash and more equity compensation. Second, I find that the proportion of CEO option compensation increases with downside risk and decreases with upside potential. This is because, when downside risk increases, the probability of a stock option finishing out of the money (i.e., zero intrinsic value) increases but restricted stock has positive value as long as the stock price is positive. In contrast, when upside potential increases, because of stock options' leverage effect, a CEO will prefer stock options to restricted stock. In the third study (Chapter 4), I study how executive stock options differentially affect the firm's systematic and idiosyncratic risk by exploiting the passage of Financial Accounting Standard (FAS) 123R as an exogenous shock to CEO option compensation. I find that option-based compensation and the proportion of idiosyncratic risk in total risk is negatively associated. This is consistent with the idea that since, unlike risk-neutral investors, risk-averse CEOs have limited ability to eliminate firm specific idiosyncratic, idiosyncratic risk is unwanted by under-diversified CEOs. Thus, CEO option compensation creates incentives to increase the firm's systematic risk relative to the firm's idiosyncratic risk.

Download or read book An Analysis of CEO Equity Compensation in an Incomplete Contracting Framework written by Matthias Kiefer and published by Matthias Kiefer. This book was released on 2015-01-01 with total page 262 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: I investigate whether equity grants increase the costs of CEO dismissal or departure (Oyer, 2004; Almazan and Suarez, 2003). I argue that costs of dismissal are increased because equity grants become exercisable upon forced departure. Equity grants can increase the costs of leaving because voluntarily departing CEOs forfeit equity compensation upon departure. I follow Rajgopal, Shevlin and Zamora (2006) in linking CEO equity compensation to a measure of labor market competition in a sample of S&P1500 companies from 1996 to 2010. I find that the intensity of labor market competition measured by a Herfindahl-Hirschman Index across industries and states affects equity grants and that the correlation is reversed in the penultimate year of forced CEO departure. This is consistent with the view that CEOs are concerned about being replaced in competitive labor markets and therefore demand more compensation that converts into severance pay. Conversely, when a dismissal is anticipated, I argue that CEOs are concerned about finding new employment and are then insured against a lack of outside opportunities. In addition, I conduct an empirical investigation of the relationship between stock options, restricted stock grants and other long-term compensation between 2001 and 2006. I argue that the Sarbanes-Oxley Act did not increase managerial accountability (see for example Cohen, Dey and Lys, 2005) and that new accounting rules did not increase accounting costs of stock options (see for example Hayes, Lemmon and Qiu, 2012). Instead, I suggest that the effective prohibition of executive loans from firms and brokers made it prohibitively costly for CEOs to exercise stock options. I find that stock options began to be replaced with other long-term compensation as early as 2004. CEOs began to accumulate vested but unexercised stock options. I do not find evidence that CEOs sold vested stock to raise funds.In the final empirical chapter, I consider whether a Herfindahl-Hirschman Index across industries and states can be interpreted as a proxy for labor market competition. Aggarwal and Samwick (1999) argue that it is product market competition that affects CEO equity grants. My results are consistent with Rajgopal, Shevlin and Zamora (2006) who do not find evidence that product market competition has any significant impact on equity grants. Instead, I find that labor market competition retains a significant and positive impact in our tests, and notably holds for the largest single product market. The principal limitations of the project were found to be the difficulty of collecting data of intended turnover and classifying it into forced and voluntary turnover. With respect to loans to executives, loans by brokers are usually not disclosed. This study is the first to analyze equity compensation as severance arrangement. CEO cash constraints in exercising options is an unexplored explanation for their disappearance.

Download or read book CEO Compensation Board Diversity Innovation and Firm Risk written by Ha Nguyen and published by . This book was released on 2020 with total page 239 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This thesis comprises three studies on internal corporate governance mechanisms. The first study examines whether CEOs with a large portion of inside debt pay reduce firm innovation, which is measured by the number of firm patents and citations. Inside debt compensation is an important component of the total executive pay package. The empirical results show that CEOs with high inside debt incentives decrease innovative output. The negative effect of inside debt compensation on innovative output is due mainly to pension benefits. CEOs with extensive inside debt holdings are associated with lower conversion of R&D spending into patents and a negative impact on innovation efficiency (research quotient). The second study explores the link between board diversity and CEO pay incentives. This research examines whether multi-dimensionally diverse boards adjust CEO pay incentives to encourage CEOs to follow less risky policies. Overall, the results show that heterogeneous boards reduce CEO equity incentives and increase the inside debt incentives to encourage CEOs to take less risk. The link between board diversity and CEO pay incentives is mainly attributable to the diversity of non-executive directors. More diverse compensation committees also tend to decrease CEO equity incentives and increase the inside debt incentives. The final study examines the impact of board faultlines and the interactive effect of multidimensional board diversity and faultlines on firm risk. This research shows that when the board faultline strength is higher (having greater cohesion between the subgroups in the board), the negative relationship between board diversity and stock return volatility becomes weaker. The diversity of both executive and non-executive directors has a positive association with firm risk when the board faultline strength increases.

Download or read book Three Essays on CEO Equity based Compensation written by 余尚恩 and published by . This book was released on 2010 with total page 105 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Pay Without Performance written by Lucian A. Bebchuk and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2004 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The company is under-performing, its share price is trailing, and the CEO gets...a multi-million-dollar raise. This story is familiar, for good reason: as this book clearly demonstrates, structural flaws in corporate governance have produced widespread distortions in executive pay. Pay without Performance presents a disconcerting portrait of managers' influence over their own pay--and of a governance system that must fundamentally change if firms are to be managed in the interest of shareholders. Lucian Bebchuk and Jesse Fried demonstrate that corporate boards have persistently failed to negotiate at arm's length with the executives they are meant to oversee. They give a richly detailed account of how pay practices--from option plans to retirement benefits--have decoupled compensation from performance and have camouflaged both the amount and performance-insensitivity of pay. Executives' unwonted influence over their compensation has hurt shareholders by increasing pay levels and, even more importantly, by leading to practices that dilute and distort managers' incentives. This book identifies basic problems with our current reliance on boards as guardians of shareholder interests. And the solution, the authors argue, is not merely to make these boards more independent of executives as recent reforms attempt to do. Rather, boards should also be made more dependent on shareholders by eliminating the arrangements that entrench directors and insulate them from their shareholders. A powerful critique of executive compensation and corporate governance, Pay without Performance points the way to restoring corporate integrity and improving corporate performance.

Download or read book The Handbook of the Economics of Corporate Governance written by Benjamin Hermalin and published by Elsevier. This book was released on 2017-09-18 with total page 762 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Handbook of the Economics of Corporate Governance, Volume One, covers all issues important to economists. It is organized around fundamental principles, whereas multidisciplinary books on corporate governance often concentrate on specific topics. Specific topics include Relevant Theory and Methods, Organizational Economic Models as They Pertain to Governance, Managerial Career Concerns, Assessment & Monitoring, and Signal Jamming, The Institutions and Practice of Governance, The Law and Economics of Governance, Takeovers, Buyouts, and the Market for Control, Executive Compensation, Dominant Shareholders, and more. Providing excellent overviews and summaries of extant research, this book presents advanced students in graduate programs with details and perspectives that other books overlook. Concentrates on underlying principles that change little, even as the empirical literature moves on Helps readers see corporate governance systems as interrelated or even intertwined external (country-level) and internal (firm-level) forces Reviews the methodological tools of the field (theory and empirical), the most relevant models, and the field’s substantive findings, all of which help point the way forward

Download or read book Executive Compensation and Shareholder Value written by Jennifer Carpenter and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-04-17 with total page 159 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Executive compensation has gained widespread public attention in recent years, with the pay of top U.S. executives reaching unprecedented levels compared either with past levels, with the remuneration of top executives in other countries, or with the wages and salaries of typical employees. The extraordinary levels of executive compensation have been achieved at a time when U.S. public companies have realized substantial gains in stock market value. Many have cited this as evidence that U.S. executive compensation works well, rewarding managers who make difficult decisions that lead to higher shareholder values, while others have argued that the overly generous salaries and benefits bear little relation to company performance. Recent conceptual and empirical research permits for the first time a truly rigorous debate on these and related issues, which is the subject of this volume.

Download or read book CEO Stock Option Awards written by Stephen Bryan and published by . This book was released on 1999 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Much of the existing empirical evidence on the use of stock option compensation conflicts with theoretical predictions. This has led some to conclude that the theories are incomplete or that stock option compensation policies are not optimal, on average. However, most studies use data from the 1980s or earlier. Stock option compensation is dynamic as evidenced by the considerable growth in its popularity as a form of CEO compensation. Further, partly as a result of the increase in stock option compensation, the SEC began requiring firms in 1992 to disclose significantly more detail on executive compensation in their proxy statements. In this study, we use these detailed proxy disclosures to study over 1500 proxy filers (over the years 1992-1997) as we re-visit the controversy. We review the earlier inconsistent findings and we then re-test the theories using a variety of research designs and proxies. Our findings are overwhelmingly supportive of the theoretical predictions. Specifically, both the intensity of incentives provided by CEO stock option awards (also referred to as the pay-performance sensitivity in some earlier studies) and the mix (ratio) of CEO stock option compensation to cash compensation are related to (1) the level of difficulty in monitoring executives? actions; (2) the agency costs of equity and debt; (3) tax costs; and (4) liquidity constraints. Our single exception pertains to financial reporting cost where we do not find, as expected, that firms with high costs of reporting low earnings substitute stock option awards for cash compensation.

Download or read book Explaining Executive Pay written by Lukas Hengartner and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2007-12-31 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lukas Hengartner shows that both firm complexity and managerial power are associated with higher pay levels. This suggests that top managers are paid for the complexity of their job and that more powerful top managers receive pay in excess of the level that would be optimal for shareholders.

Download or read book Indispensable and Other Myths written by Michael Dorff and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2014-08-01 with total page 326 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Prodded by economists in the 1970s, corporate directors began adding stock options and bonuses to the already-generous salaries of CEOs with hopes of boosting their companiesÕ fortunes. Guided by largely unproven assumptions, this trend continues today. So what are companies getting in return for all the extra money? Not much, according to the empirical data. In Indispensable and Other Myths: Why the CEO Pay Experiment Failed and How to Fix It, Michael Dorff explores the consequences of this development. He shows how performance pay has not demonstrably improved corporate performance and offers studies showing that performance pay cannot improve performance on the kind of tasks companies ask of their CEOs. Moreover, CEOs of large established companies do not typically have much impact on their companiesÕ results. In this eye-opening exposŽ, Dorff argues that companies should give up on the decades-long experiment to mold compensation into a corporate governance tool and maps out a rationale for returning to the era of guaranteed salaries.

Download or read book Three Essays on CEO Compensation in the UK written by Marizah Minhat and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This thesis comprises three studies on CEO compensation in the UK. It specifically examines the role of CEO defined-benefit pensions, compensation consultants and CEO stock options. Firstly, research on the role of executive pensions is still at a stage of infancy due to data difficulties (Sundaram and Yermack, 2007). By taking advantage of better disclosure requirements with the introduction of Directors' Remuneration ReportRegulations (DRRR) in 2002, this thesis examines the determinants and effects of CEO defined-benefit pensions. Consistent with rent extraction hypothesis (Bebchuk and Fried, 2005; Kalyta and Magnan, 2008), it finds that pensions are largely determined by CEO power over boards of directors. There is no evidence that pensions reduce the agency cost of debt as suggested by Edmans (2008) and Sundaram and Yermack (2007). Instead they increase the agency cost of equity by discouraging CEO risk-taking and reducing pay-performance relationship. Consistent with the argument in Gustman et al. (1994), Ippolito (1991) and Lazear(1990), this thesis also finds that pensions do bond a CEO to the firm she manages. Secondly, because of the lack of disclosure regarding compensation consultants used by companies, the empirical evidence is so far limited on how the practice of employing compensation consultants influences CEO pay. By taking advantage of better disclosure requirements since the publication of the DRRR (2002), this thesis examines the effect of using compensation consultants on CEO pay. Unlike Murphy and Sandino (2008), this thesis finds no evidence that firms use multiple pay consultants to justify or legitimize higher CEO pay. In light of the managerial power theory, this thesis instead finds that pay consultants are more concerned with the risk of losing business with their client firms. This latter finding explains why the use of pay consultants is associated with greater executive pay (see Armstrong, Ittner and Larcker, 2008; Cadman, Carter and Hillegeist, in press; Conyon, Peck andSadler, 2009; Murphy and Sandino, 2008; Voulgaris, Stathopoulos and Walker,2009). Thirdly, despite the importance of the issue, the existence of a link between theCEO stock options and earnings management is currently understudied in the UK. The UK context is appealing because of two distinctive corporate governance features that limit opportunistic earnings management. These are the absence of CEO duality in general (Cornett, Marcus, and Tehranian, 2008) and the increased outside director's membership on boards since the publication of the Cadbury Report (1992) (Peasnell, Pope, and Young, 2000). By examining earnings management prior to stock option grant and exercise periods, this thesis adds to the study of Kuang (2008) that examines earnings management during stock option vesting periods. Overall, some evidence has been found that earnings are managed downwards prior to stock option grant periods. Consistent with the US-based studies, this thesis finds strong evidence of upward earnings management prior to a stock option exercise period. It shows that the UK's distinctive governance features have not restrained opportunistic earnings management prior to stock option grants and exercises. In brief, this thesis provides some empirical evidence that the use of two pay components in the CEO pay package, namely, the defined-benefit pensions and stock options, do not necessarily promote CEO-shareholder interest alignment. The use of pay consultants in CEO pay-setting is also fraught with managerial influence. In support of the managerial power theory, I therefore suggest that these three factors can be abused by CEOs to extract excess compensation at the expense of shareholders. In this context, these three factors can themselves be considered as the sources of the agency cost. Future research might examine the mechanisms that can be deployed to govern the use of defined-benefit pensions, stock options and pay consultants in CEO pay design.

Download or read book Mergers and Acquisitions and Executive Compensation written by Virginia Bodolica and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-06-26 with total page 246 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over the past decades, the total value of executive compensation packages has been rising dramatically, contributing to a wider pay gap between the chief executive officer and the average worker. In the midst of the financial turmoil that brought about a massive wave of corporate failures, the lavish executive compensation package has come under an intense spotlight. Public pressure has mounted to revise the levels and the structure of executive pay in a way that will tie more closely the executive wealth to that of shareholders. Merger and acquisition (M&A) activities represent an opportune setting for gauging whether shareholder value creation or managerial opportunism guides executive compensation. M&As constitute major examples of high-profile events prompted by managers who typically conceive them as a means for achieving higher levels of pay, even though they are frequently associated with disappointing returns to acquiring shareholders. Mergers and Acquisitions and Executive Compensation reviews the existing empirical evidence and provides an integrative framework for the growing body of literature that is situated at the intersection of two highly debated topics: M&A activities and executive compensation. The proposed framework structures the literature along two dimensions, such as M&A phases and firm’s role in a M&A deal, allowing readers to identify three main streams of research and five different conceptualizations of causal relationships between M&A transactions and executive compensation. The book makes a comprehensive review of empirical studies conducted to date, aiming to shed more light on the current and emerging knowledge in this field of investigation, discuss the inconsistencies encountered within each stream of research, and suggest promising directions for further exploration. This book will appeal to researchers and students alike in the fields of organizational behavior and governance as well as accounting and accountability.

Download or read book How Monitoring Affects the Structure of CEO Equity Based Compensation written by Fan Yu and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: I study how board and institutional monitoring affect the structure of equity-based compensation, specifically, the split between restricted stock and options. I find that firms adjust the structure of equity-based compensation to manage the total contractual incentives provided to their CEOs. Better monitored firms tend to have higher proportions of restricted stock in the CEO's total equity-based compensation. The higher ratio is associated with lower total contractual incentives and total pay level. The findings support the view that monitoring and contractual incentives are substitutes, rather than complements.

Download or read book The Compensation Committee Handbook written by James F. Reda and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2008-03-21 with total page 561 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW AND UPDATED INFORMATION ON THE LAWS AND REGULATIONS AFFECTING EXECUTIVE COMPENSATION Now in a thoroughly updated Third Edition, Compensation Committee Handbook provides a comprehensive review of the complex issues facing compensation committees in the wake of Sarbanes-Oxley. This new and updated edition addresses a full range of functional issues facing compensation committees, including organizing, planning, and best practices tips. As the responsibilities of the compensation committee continue to increase, the need for practical and comprehensive material has become even more imperative. Complete with compliance advice on the latest rules and regulations that have developed since the publication of the last edition, Compensation Committee Handbook, Third Edition provides the most up-to-date and reliable information on: * The latest regulations impacting executive compensation, including new regulations issued by the SEC, recently revised GAAP accounting rules, and the just-finalized IRS regulations impacting the taxation of stock options * The roles and responsibilities of the compensation committee, including best practice tips and techniques * Selecting and training compensation committee members * How to make compensation committees a performance driver for a company * Practical applications, including incentive compensation and equity-based compensation Compensation Committee Handbook, Third Edition will help all compensation committee members and interested professionals succeed in melding highly complex technical information and concepts with both corporate governance principles and sound business judgment.

Download or read book The Founder s Dilemmas written by Noam Wasserman and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2013-04 with total page 490 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Founder's Dilemmas examines how early decisions by entrepreneurs can make or break a startup and its team. Drawing on a decade of research, including quantitative data on almost ten thousand founders as well as inside stories of founders like Evan Williams of Twitter and Tim Westergren of Pandora, Noam Wasserman reveals the common pitfalls founders face and how to avoid them.

Download or read book The CEO Pay Machine written by Steven Clifford and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2017 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The pay gap between chief executive officers of major U.S. firms and their workers is higher than ever before--depending on the method of calculation, CEOs get paid between 300 and 700 times more than the average worker. Such outsized pay is a relatively recent phenomenon, but ... few detractors truly understand the numerous factors that have contributed to the dizzying upward spiral in CEO compensation. Steven Clifford, a former CEO who has also served on many corporate boards, has a name for these procedures and practices: 'The CEO Pay Machine.' [This book] is Clifford's ... explanation of the 'machine'--how it works, how its parts interact, and how every step pushes CEO pay to higher levels"--

Download or read book CEO Pay and Firm Performance written by Paul L. Joskow and published by . This book was released on 1994 with total page 56 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study explores the dynamic structure of the pay-for- performance relationship in CEO compensation and quantifies the effect of introducing a more complex model of firm financial performance on the estimated performance sensitivity of executive pay. The results suggest that current compensation responds to past performance outcomes, but that the effect decays considerably within two years. This contrasts sharply with models of infinitely persistent performance effects implicitly assumed in much of the empirical compensation literature. We find that both accounting and market performance measures influence compensation and that the salary and bonus component of pay as well as total compensation have become more sensitive to firm financial performance over the past two decades. There is no evidence that boards fail to penalize CEOs for poor financial performance or reward them disproportionately well for good performance. Finally, the data suggest that boards may discount extreme performance outcomes -both high and low - relative to performance that lies within some `normal' band in setting compensation.