Author Archives: Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation

2018 Annual Corporate Governance Review

We are pleased to present the 2018 Annual Corporate Governance Review. For the second year in a row, Georgeson partnered with Proxy Insight on the coordination of voting data and analytics. Proxy Insight was instrumental in sourcing the annual meeting and proxy voting data contained in this report. New This Year The 2018 report provides […]

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Bebchuk-Hirst Study of Index Funds Wins IRRC Institute Prize

The IRRC Institute has announced that its 2018 annual investor research prize will be awarded to a study by Lucian Bebchuk and Scott Hirst, Index Funds and the Future of Corporate Governance: Theory, Evidence, and Policy. Upon announcing the study winning the $10,000 prize, the IRRC Institute’s Executive Director Jon Lukomnik described the study as making “a […]

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Manager Sentiment and Stock Returns

In this study, we investigate the asset pricing implications of manager sentiment, focusing on its predictability for future U.S. stock market returns. Intuitively, investors may simply follow managers’ sentiment in financial disclosures, even though this sentiment may not represent fully the underlying fundamentals of the firm. Hence, high manager sentiment may lead to speculative market […]

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Corporate Governance Case Study: Tesla, Twitter, and the Good Weed

Perhaps no company in the world has the perception of its brand being tied to one person more than Tesla Inc. (Tesla) and its CEO and now former chairman of the board, Elon Musk. As at least one journalist phrased it, “Elon Musk is Tesla. Tesla is Elon Musk.” And Musk is not just the […]

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CEO Transitions: Mitigating Risks and Accelerating Value Creation

CEO transitions have always been challenging, but never more so than in today’s environment. As a board governance, leadership consulting and search firm, Russell Reynolds Associates is asked regularly to conduct CEO searches and support long-term CEO succession planning. We advise our clients not to forget about transition planning as a distinct process that needs […]

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SEC Rulemaking Over the Past Year, the Road Ahead and Challenges Posed by Brexit, LIBOR Transition and Cybersecurity Risks

Thank you Jason [Healey] for that kind introduction. For many, December is a time to reflect on the past year and to look forward to what the New Year may bring. I believe organizations also should mark milestones, take stock of what has been done and what needs to be done, and adjust course accordingly. […]

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Opening Remarks at the Municipal Securities Conference

Good morning and welcome. I am delighted to help kick off the inaugural Municipal Securities Conference, although I regret that because of other meetings and commitments, I am doing so from our New York office. Before going any further, I want to make it clear that my remarks are my own and do not necessarily […]

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Weekly Roundup: November 30-December 6, 2018

Proxy Voting and the Future of Corporations Posted by David A. Katz and Laura A. McIntosh, Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, on Friday, November 30, 2018 Tags: Corporate Social Responsibility, Institutional Investors, Institutional voting, International governance, Long-Term value, Proxy voting, SEC, Securities regulation, Shareholder activism, Shareholder value, Shareholder voting PLX, Burden of Proof for Damages, and the Internal Logic of Delaware Law Posted by Holger Spamann (Harvard […]

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Principles for a Responsible Civilian Firearms Industry

As investors, we have come together to develop a framework to advance a responsible civilian firearms industry in the United States of America. We believe in the rule of law and respect the 2nd Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. As asset owners and asset managers, we have a duty to our beneficiaries who depend on […]

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Acquirer Reference Prices and Acquisition Performance

How do investors adjust their estimates of a stock’s value in response to an acquisition announcement? Rationally, the acquirer’s new stock price should reflect the synergistic gains associated with the merger, the premium paid to target company shareholders, the method of payment, and other value-relevant information associated with the acquisition. But what if the acquirer’s […]

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