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Risk taking of executives under different incentive contracts: Experimental evidence

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  • Lefebvre, Mathieu
  • Vieider, Ferdinand M.

Abstract

Classic financial agency theory recommends compensation through stock options rather than shares to counteract excessive risk aversion in agents. In a setting where any kind of risk taking is suboptimal for shareholders, we show that excessive risk taking may occur for one of two reasons: risk preferences or incentives. Even when compensated through restricted company stock, experimental CEOs take large amounts of excessive risk. This contradicts classical financial theory, but can be explained through risk preferences that are not uniform over the probability and outcome spaces, and in particular, risk seeking for small probability gains and large probability losses. Compensation through options further increases risk taking as expected. We show that this effect is driven mainly by the personal asset position of the experimental CEO, thus having deleterious effects on company performance.

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  • Lefebvre, Mathieu & Vieider, Ferdinand M., 2014. "Risk taking of executives under different incentive contracts: Experimental evidence," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 97(C), pages 27-36.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:97:y:2014:i:c:p:27-36
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2013.10.008
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    2. Susana Alvarez-Diez & J. Samuel Baixauli-Soler & Maria Belda-Ruiz, 2016. "Early Exercise Behaviour in Performance-vested Stock Option Grants," Annals of Economics and Finance, Society for AEF, vol. 17(1), pages 55-78, May.
    3. Yang, Xiaojun & Carlsson, Fredrik, 2021. "Are People More Patient with Their Spouse's Money? An Experimental Study," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 94(C).
    4. Ola Andersson & Håkan J. Holm & Jean-Robert Tyran & Erik Wengström, 2016. "Deciding for Others Reduces Loss Aversion," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(1), pages 29-36, January.
    5. Glätzle-Rützler, Daniela & Sutter, Matthias & Zeileis, Achim, 2015. "No myopic loss aversion in adolescents? – An experimental note," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 169-176.
    6. Montinari, Natalia & Rancan, Michela, 2020. "A friend is a treasure: On the interplay of social distance and monetary incentives when risk is taken on behalf of others," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 86(C).
    7. Tyran, Jean-Robert & Andersson, Ola & Holm, Håkan J. & Wengström, Erik, 2013. "Risking Other People?s Money," CEPR Discussion Papers 9743, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    8. Mathieu Lefebvre & Ferdinand Vieider, 2013. "Reining in excessive risk-taking by executives: the effect of accountability," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 75(4), pages 497-517, October.
    9. Te Bao & Edward Halim & Charles N. Noussair & Yohanes E. Riyanto, 2021. "Managerial incentives and stock price dynamics: an experimental approach," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 24(2), pages 617-648, June.
    10. Andersson, Ola & Holm, Håkan J. & Tyran, Jean-Robert & Wengström, Erik, 2013. "Risking Other People’s Money: Experimental Evidence on Bonus Schemes, Competition, and Altruism," Working Paper Series 989, Research Institute of Industrial Economics.
    11. Robert M. Gillenkirch & Louis Velthuis, 2023. "Delegated risk-taking, accountability, and outcome bias," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 67(2), pages 137-161, October.
    12. Ola Andersson & Håkan J. Holm & Jean‐Robert Tyran & Erik Wengström, 2020. "Risking Other People's Money: Experimental Evidence on the Role of Incentives and Personality Traits," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 122(2), pages 648-674, April.
    13. Cui, Xuegang & Feltovich, Nick & Zhang, Kun, 2022. "Incentive schemes, framing, and market behaviour: Evidence from an asset-market experiment," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 197(C), pages 301-324.
    14. Jean-Francois Gajewski & Luc Meunier, 2020. "Risk preferences: are students a reasonable sample to make inferences about the decision-making of finance professionals?," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 40(4), pages 3000-3009.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Executive compensation; Risk preferences; Experimental finance; Prospect theory;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D03 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Behavioral Microeconomics: Underlying Principles
    • G28 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Government Policy and Regulation
    • G32 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Financing Policy; Financial Risk and Risk Management; Capital and Ownership Structure; Value of Firms; Goodwill
    • J33 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Compensation Packages; Payment Methods
    • L22 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Firm Organization and Market Structure

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