Contracts, Human Rights and Taxation: How a Company Exploits a Country, the Case of Glencore in the Drc

Deals with the exploitation of resourcesin DR

CEO Centrality

We investigate the relationship between CEO centrality -- the relative importance of the CEO within the top executive team in terms of ability, contribution, or power -- and the value and behavior of public firms. Our proxy for CEO centrality is the fraction of the top-five compensation captured by the CEO. We find that CEO centrality is negatively associated with firm value (as measured by industry-adjusted Tobin's Q). Greater CEO centrality is also correlated with (i) lower (industry-adjusted) accounting profitability, (ii) lower stock returns accompanying acquisitions announced by the firm and higher likelihood of a negative stock return accompanying such announcements, (iii) higher odds of the CEO’s receiving a “lucky” option grant at the lowest price of the month, (iv) greater tendency to reward the CEO for luck in the form of positive industry-wide shocks, (v) lower likelihood of CEO turnover controlling for performance, and (vi) lower firm-specific variability of stock returns over time. Overall, our results indicate that differences in CEO centrality are an aspect of firm management and governance that deserves the attention of researchers.

Myths and Untold Stories - Private Antitrust Enforcement in Germany

The paper offers an empirical analysis of private antitrust enforcement in Germany based on cases that were decided by courts between 2005 and 2007. The study presents information about the magnitude and nature of civil antitrust actions in Germany. The data includes inter alia, information about the courts involved in litigation, the relationship of the parties, affected industries, the remedies sought, the outcome of the claim, the alleged anticompetitive conduct, the proportion of stand-alone and follow-on litigation, and the length of proceedings before a given court. The study shows that a large number of private cases were concluded even when compared with public investigations in Germany. It seems that private antitrust actions complement rather than duplicate public enforcement efforts because of the overwhelming proportion of stand-alone claims and the amount of actions based on the abuse of market power. Only a small number of litigants asked for the compensation of loss suffered from anticompetitive conduct. Interpreting the results from the study cautiously, the paper suggests that the European Commission and other stakeholders may have misunderstood the nature of private actions in Germany (and maybe Europe) and, consequently, asked the wrong question, focusing on compensation. Expensive damages actions for the breach of the antitrust rules might not be as important as commonly assumed

Lucky CEOs

We study the relation between corporate governance and opportunistic timing of CEO option grants via backdating or otherwise. Our methodology focuses on how grant date prices rank within the price distribution of the grant month. During 1996-2005, about 12% of firms provided one or more lucky grant -- defined as grants given at the lowest price of the month -- due to opportunistic timing. Lucky grants were more likely when the board did not have a majority of independent directors and/or the CEO had longer tenure -- factors associated with increased influence of the CEO on pay-setting. We find no evidence that gains from manipulated grants served as a substitute for compensation paid through other sources; total reported compensation from such sources was higher in firms providing lucky grants. Finally, opportunistic timing has been widespread throughout the economy, with a significant presence in each of the economy's twelve (Fama-French) industries.

Private antitrust enforcement in England and Wales after the EU Damages Directives: Where are we heading?

The framework for private antitrust actions in the England and Wales has undergone a number of changes in recent years. The Consumer Rights Act 2015 introduced measures to facilitate access to justice for victims of anticompetitive conduct. It created a fast track procedure in the Competition Appeal Tribunal and granted the Tribunal the powers to permit opt-out representative actions. More changes were brought on with the implementation of the EU Damages Directive in March 2017. In this chapter, I will take stock of those recent developments and offer an insight into the functioning of private enforcement of competition law in England and Wales. I will document key developments and issues regarding access to documents (disclosure), joint and several liability of co-infringers, and claim aggregation (opt-out representative actions). The recent legislative measures seem to pull private enforcement of competition law in different directions facilitating both small claims and large compensation actions. The Consumer Rights Act implemented a number of measures to encourage private litigation but the impact of the changes following the Damages Directive are not clear yet

Compensation and the Damages Directive

The EU Damages Directive came into force in December 2014. One of its objectives is to ensure that anyone who has suffered harm caused by infringements of competition law can effectively exercise the right to claim full compensation in the courts of the EU Member States. This paper looks closely at the Directive’s compensation goal and the key arrangements that are to encourage victims to seek redress in the national courts. The paper uses a simple framework to demonstrate that the legal measures in the Damages Directive are unlikely to foster compensation because they fail to create incentives for harmed individuals to seek redress. If Member States seek to encourage full compensation, they should devise a framework for private antitrust actions that goes beyond the Directive’s remit by, for example, allowing class actions

Lucky Directors

While prior empirical work and much public attention have focused on the opportunistic timing of executives' grants, we provide in this paper evidence that outside directors' option grants have also been favorably timed to an extent that cannot be fully explained by sheer luck. Examining events in which public firms granted options to outside directors during 1996-2005, we find that 9% were "lucky grant events" falling on days with a stock price equal to a monthly low. We estimate that about 800 lucky grant events owed their status to opportunistic timing, and that about 460 firms and 1400 outside directors were associated with grant events produced by such timing. There is evidence that the opportunistic timing of director grant events has been to a substantial extent the product of backdating and not merely spring-loading based on private information. We find that directors' luck has been correlated with executives' luck. Furthermore, grant events were more likely to be lucky when the firm had more entrenching provisions protecting insiders from the risk of removal, as well as when the board did not have a majority of independent directors.

Longitudinal validity of the FNPA screening tool to predict changes in weight status in children

The increasing prevalence of overweight and obesity and the accompanying comorbidities among children and adolescents in recent decades is cause for public health concern. Many factors influence weight status and obesity risk, but little research has examined the influence of the home environment on weight status across different age groups, particularly in longitudinal designs. The Family Nutrition and Physical Activity (FNPA) screening tool is a validated measure of the home environment, but further testing of the tool is needed. The purposes of this dissertation were to 1) compare various versions of the FNPA to evaluate user perceptions and test reliability, 2) to determine the efficacy of the FNPA and influence of socio-demographic variables on weight status in children and adolescents and, 3) to examine the influences of home environment and economic factors on long-term growth trajectories among youth. The first study provided support for the continued use of the subjective (Almost Never/Sometimes/Often/Almost Always) response scale based on superior test-retest reliability and inter-item reliability when compared to a proposed objective (days per week) response scale. Parent users provided feedback as to re-wording of many FNPA items. The second study evaluated the utility of this revised FNPA in 1st grade students and 10th grade students and showed that 1st grade children with FNPA scores in the lowest tertile were significantly more likely to be overweight/obese than 1st grade children with FNPA scores in the highest tertile. This relationship was not present in 10th grade students, although school-level socioeconomic status (SES) did influence weight in older youth. The third study demonstrated that parent weight status, race, family income, and school SES influence growth trajectories from 1st to 10th grade. A unique finding of this study was that change in FNPA score from 1st to 10th grade was a significant predictor of BMI percentile and BMI50, an alternative measure of weight status, in 10th grade. This dissertation adds to the existing literature regarding factors that influence obesity risk during childhood and adolescence. The results provide further support for the continued use of the FNPA, utilizing the subjective response scale. Additionally, these studies highlight the influence parent weight status, race, family income, and school-level SES on weight status throughout childhood. Future research is needed to examine the FNPA in additional populations and to further examine the influence of these family- and community-level factors of obesity risk