In Chapter 1, we set up an equilibrium model which emphasizes cost of corporate governance. The model indicates that better corporate governance increases the likelihood of dispersed corporate ownership structure. In Chapter 2, we use a sample of democratic firms (with 5 or less anti-takeover provisions) from the Investor Responsibility Research Center (IRRC) database and use idiosyncratic volatility as a proxy for information from the market of corporate control as in Ferreira and Laux (2007) to link the equity performance, market of corporate control and corporate governance. We find that firms which are the least vulnerable to takeover threat (the least idiosyncratic risk) outperform the others. We also find that market information of takeover vulnerability is negatively related to future merger and acquisition shocks. All these effects are mitigated by the Sarbanes-Oxley Act 2002.Chapter 3 examines the decision to list abroad by Chinese companies in the form of ADRs and foreign IPOs from 1993 to 2005. Subsequent to the listing events, the issuers experience a significant drop in profitability, tangible assets ratio, and asset turnover. There is no significant change in capital expenditure. Stock returns after the listing events are generally negative for ADR and foreign IPO stocks. More significantly, these stocks under-perform the market in the post-event window ranging from three days to three years.
