报告题目：Minority Shareholder Activism and Its Ex-Ante Monitoring Role in Corporate M&A Decisions: Evidence from China

报告人： 刘彧 博士（中山大学）

时间：2023年10月17日9:00-14:00

地点：大玩家彩票A南303

报告内容摘要：

Minority shareholder protection is especially important in countries with weak institutions. Prior studies indicate that social media facilitates minority shareholder activism by connecting otherwise isolated individual shareholders and increasing their bargaining power against the controlling shareholders. Whereas prior studies focus on the ex-post monitoring role of social media in corporate governance, we investigate whether and how minority shareholder social media engagement could deter insiders’ entrenchment incentives in an ex-ante fashion. Specifically, using high merger premiums and private placement financing as proxies for activities that reflect insider entrenchment incentives in M&As, we find that higher social media engagement lowers M&A premiums and the likelihood of using private placement to benefit the controlling shareholders. This result holds after we control for the governance role of conventional media, analyst coverage, and institutional investors. Our mechanism analysis reveals that the effectiveness of social media in curbing entrenchment incentives in M&A is conditional on the perceived capital market consequences and the perceived likelihood of proposal vetoes. Further analysis shows that minority shareholder activism plays a greater role in curbing entrenchment in M&As when the minority sentiment expressed on social media is more negative and more M&A-specific, as well as when social media facilitates higher quality discussions following an exogenous regulatory shock. We also find that minority shareholder activism is associated with better M&A performance. Our study highlights the ex-ante governance role of social media in weak institutions and informs regulators on the critical need to provide a platform for minority shareholders to effectively voice their concerns.

【刘彧个人简介】

刘彧博士，中山大学岭南学院博士后，在中山大学获经济学博士学位。已有研究发表于Research in International Business and Finance、International Journal of Finance & Economics、International Review of Financial ysis等期刊。研究领域包括公司金融、并购重组、公司治理。曾作为核心成员参加国家自然科学基金、广东省自然科学基金，主持广东省基础与应用基础研究基金联合基金项目。

欢迎有兴趣的教师，全体博士生、硕士生参加。

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2023-10-14