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Corporate Governance In An Emerging Market: The Case Of Israel

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  • Asher Blass
  • Yishay Yafeh
  • Oved Yosha

Abstract

Despite significant capital‐market reforms in the mid‐1980s, the Israeli government and banks continue to play an unusually dominant role in Israeli financial markets. Israeli banks operate as merchant banks and, through pyramid structures of ownership, control large segments of manufacturing, construction, insurance, and services. In addition, the banks dominate all facets of the capital market, including underwriting, brokerage, investment advice, and the management of mutual and provident funds. Because of this dominance by the banks, several important mechanisms of corporate governance are missing. There is no effective market for corporate control; institutional investors have little incentive to monitor corporate managers; and those managers in turn have little incentive to improve firm performance and increase shareholder value. To be sure, there has been an impressive wave of IPOs on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE) in the 1990s. But those firms' stocks have substantially underperformed the market since going public, and many “higher‐quality” Israeli firms have chosen in recent years to list their securities on the NASDAQ and not at home. The main reason the most promising Israeli firms go public in the U.S. is because that is where U.S. and other foreign investors want to buy them; such investors want the assurances that come with the U.S. corporate governance system.

Suggested Citation

  • Asher Blass & Yishay Yafeh & Oved Yosha, 1998. "Corporate Governance In An Emerging Market: The Case Of Israel," Journal of Applied Corporate Finance, Morgan Stanley, vol. 10(4), pages 79-89, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jacrfn:v:10:y:1998:i:4:p:79-89
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1745-6622.1998.tb00311.x
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    1. Ber, Y. & Yafeh, Y. & Yosha, O., 1997. "Conflict of Interest in Universal Banking: Evidence from the Post-Issue performance of IPO Firms," Papers 18-97, Tel Aviv.
    2. La Porta, Rafael & Florencio Lopez-de-Silanes & Andrei Shleifer & Robert W. Vishny, 1997. "Legal Determinants of External Finance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(3), pages 1131-1150, July.
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    1. Ber, Hedva & Yafeh, Yishay & Yosha, Oved, 2001. "Conflict of interest in universal banking: Bank lending, stock underwriting, and fund management," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 189-218, February.
    2. Asher Blass & Oved Yosha, 2003. "Financing R&D in mature companies: An empirical analysis," Economics of Innovation and New Technology, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 12(5), pages 425-447.
    3. Mitra, Sovan & Karathanasopoulos, Andreas & Sermpinis, Georgios & Dunis, Christian & Hood, John, 2015. "Operational risk: Emerging markets, sectors and measurement," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 241(1), pages 122-132.
    4. Feng, Xunan & Hu, Na & Johansson, Anders C., 2016. "Ownership, analyst coverage, and stock synchronicity in China," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 79-96.
    5. Hyejun Kim & Jaeyong Song, 2017. "Filling institutional voids in emerging economies: The impact of capital market development and business groups on M&A deal abandonment," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 48(3), pages 308-323, April.
    6. Blass, Asher & Yafeh, Yishay, 2001. "Vagabond shoes longing to stray: Why foreign firms list in the United States," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 25(3), pages 555-572, March.

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