IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/quaeco/v95y2024icp152-159.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Does soft shareholder activism hold hard consequences?

Author

Listed:
  • Kallis, Linda
  • Corbet, Shaen

Abstract

This study investigates the impact of soft shareholder activism, as reported in media narratives, on stock market performance using an EGARCH methodology. Focusing on US-listed firms, we analyse how news articles discussing shareholder activism, ranging from formal proposals to informal expressions of investor concern, affect stock market returns and volatility. Our findings reveal that approximately one-fourth of the companies highlighted in these reports experience significant stock market fluctuations coinciding with media coverage. These effects are notably pronounced in firms with higher market capitalisation and robust financial metrics (ROE and ROA) but lower ESG scores and negative leverage. The study also establishes a strong correlation between firm performance metrics, particularly ROE and ROA, and market reactions around news publication dates. This pattern suggests that the market responds more intensely to companies with higher performance levels. The research contributes to understanding shareholder activism’s indirect influence on market dynamics through media, offering insights for companies, investors, and policymakers in the evolving landscape of shareholder activism and the media’s role therein.

Suggested Citation

  • Kallis, Linda & Corbet, Shaen, 2024. "Does soft shareholder activism hold hard consequences?," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 152-159.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:quaeco:v:95:y:2024:i:c:p:152-159
    DOI: 10.1016/j.qref.2024.03.009
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1062976924000486
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.qref.2024.03.009?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Xu, Shen & Yin, Bichao & Lou, Chunjie, 2022. "Minority shareholder activism and corporate social responsibility," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).
    2. Laeven, Luc & Levine, Ross, 2009. "Bank governance, regulation and risk taking," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(2), pages 259-275, August.
    3. Suzette Viviers & Lee-Ann Steenkamp, 2023. "Shareholder-initiated environmental and energy resolutions: too little too late?," Sustainability Accounting, Management and Policy Journal, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 14(5), pages 1022-1051, January.
    4. Douglas W. Diamond & Raghuram G. Rajan, 2009. "The Credit Crisis: Conjectures about Causes and Remedies," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(2), pages 606-610, May.
    5. Cioroianu, Iulia & Corbet, Shaen & Larkin, Charles, 2021. "The differential impact of corporate blockchain-development as conditioned by sentiment and financial desperation," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 66(C).
    6. Le Lin & Ke Liao & Deren Xie, 2023. "When Investors Speak, Do Firms Listen? The Role of Investors' Dividend‐related Complaints from Online Earnings Communication Conferences," Abacus, Accounting Foundation, University of Sydney, vol. 59(1), pages 32-75, March.
    7. Abhijith G. Acharya & David Gras & Ryan Krause, 2022. "Socially Oriented Shareholder Activism Targets: Explaining Activists’ Corporate Target Selection Using Corporate Opportunity Structures," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 178(2), pages 307-323, June.
    8. Mark R. DesJardine & Rodolphe Durand, 2020. "Disentangling the effects of hedge fund activism on firm financial and social performance," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(6), pages 1054-1082, June.
    9. Doron Levit, 2019. "Soft Shareholder Activism," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 32(7), pages 2775-2808.
    10. Jörn Obermann & Patrick Velte, 2018. "Determinants and consequences of executive compensation-related shareholder activism and say-on-pay votes: A literature review and research agenda," Journal of Accounting Literature, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 40(1), pages 116-151, February.
    11. Cioroianu, Iulia & Corbet, Shaen & Larkin, Charles, 2021. "Guilt through association: Reputational contagion and the Boeing 737-MAX disasters," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 198(C).
    12. Swanson, Edward P. & Young, Glen M. & Yust, Christopher G., 2022. "Are all activists created equal? The effect of interventions by hedge funds and other private activists on long-term shareholder value," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    13. Sudam Shingade & Shailesh Rastogi & Venkata Mrudula Bhimavarapu & Abhijit Chirputkar, 2022. "Shareholder Activism and Its Impact on Profitability, Return, and Valuation of the Firms in India," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 15(4), pages 1-20, March.
    14. Albuquerque, Rui & Fos, Vyacheslav & Schroth, Enrique, 2022. "Value creation in shareholder activism," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 145(2), pages 153-178.
    15. Denes, Matthew R. & Karpoff, Jonathan M. & McWilliams, Victoria B., 2017. "Thirty years of shareholder activism: A survey of empirical research," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 405-424.
    16. Maffett, Mark & Nakhmurina, Anya & Skinner, Douglas J., 2022. "Importing activists: Determinants and consequences of increased cross-border shareholder activism," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(2).
    17. repec:eme:jal000:j.acclit.2018.02.001 is not listed on IDEAS
    18. Chen, Shen & Chen, Yuran & Zhang, Di & Wang, Jinmei, 2023. "Can minority investor activism promote corporate risk-taking? Evidence from a quasi-natural experiment in China," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    19. Maria Goranova & Rahi Abouk & Paul C. Nystrom & Ehsan S. Soofi, 2017. "Corporate governance antecedents to shareholder activism: A zero-inflated process," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(2), pages 415-435, February.
    20. Tim Loughran & Bill Mcdonald, 2011. "When Is a Liability Not a Liability? Textual Analysis, Dictionaries, and 10‐Ks," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 66(1), pages 35-65, February.
    21. Nickolay Gantchev & Mariassunta Giannetti, 2021. "The Costs and Benefits of Shareholder Democracy: Gadflies and Low-Cost Activism [How close are shareholder votes?]," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 34(12), pages 5629-5675.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Barros, Victor & Guedes, Maria João & Santos, Joana & Sarmento, Joaquim Miranda, 2023. "Shareholder activism and firms’ performance," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    2. Christof Beuselinck & Luc Desrousseaux, 2024. "Hedge fund activism and corporate intangible capital investments," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 63(1), pages 37-61, July.
    3. Bajzík, Josef & Havranek, Tomas & Irsova, Zuzana & Novak, Jiri, 2023. "Does Shareholder Activism Create Value? A Meta-Analysis," CEPR Discussion Papers 18233, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    4. Simon Rafaqat & Sana Rafaqat & Sahil Rafaqat & Saoul Rafaqat & Dawood Rafaqat, 2023. "Shareholder Activism and Firm Performance: A Review," Journal of Economics and Behavioral Studies, AMH International, vol. 14(4), pages 31-41.
    5. Barros, Victor & Verga Matos, Pedro & Miranda Sarmento, Joaquim & Rino Vieira, Pedro, 2021. "Do activist shareholders influence a manager’s decisions on a firm’s dividend policy: A mixed-method study," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 122(C), pages 387-397.
    6. Sudam Shingade & Shailesh Rastogi & Venkata Mrudula Bhimavarapu & Abhijit Chirputkar, 2022. "Shareholder Activism and Its Impact on Profitability, Return, and Valuation of the Firms in India," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 15(4), pages 1-20, March.
    7. Vittoria Cerasi & Tommaso Oliviero, 2014. "Managerial compensation, regulation and risk in banks: theory and evidence from the financial crisis," Working Papers 279, University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Economics, revised Jul 2014.
    8. Dasgupta, Amil & Fos, Vyacheslav & Sautner, Zacharias, 2021. "Institutional investors and corporate governance," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 112114, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    9. Loureiro, Gilberto & Mendonça, Cesar, 2024. "Do large registered investment funds undermine shareholder activism? Evidence from hedge fund proposals," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 162(C).
    10. Bhagat, Sanjai & Bolton, Brian, 2014. "Financial crisis and bank executive incentive compensation," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 25(C), pages 313-341.
    11. Oehler, Andreas & Schmitz, Jonas Tobias, 2021. "Does intensified communication of hedge funds with letters affect abnormal returns?," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 127-142.
    12. Strong, John S., 2022. "The evolution of activist investors in the U.S. railroad industry," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(C).
    13. Collings, David & Corbet, Shaen & Hou, Yang (Greg) & Hu, Yang & Larkin, Charles & Oxley, Les, 2022. "The effects of negative reputational contagion on international airlines: The case of the Boeing 737-MAX disasters," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    14. Xiao, Shuhua & Zhu, Shushang & Wu, Ying, 2023. "Asset securitization, cross holdings, and systemic risk in banking," Journal of Financial Stability, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    15. Liu, Yan & Zhao, Xueqing, 2023. "On the factors driving bank lending standards: Global evidence from bank lending surveys," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 233(C).
    16. Beltratti, Andrea & Stulz, René M., 2012. "The credit crisis around the globe: Why did some banks perform better?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(1), pages 1-17.
    17. Stephen J. Smulowitz & Didier Cossin & Hongze Lu, 2023. "Managerial Short-Termism and Corporate Social Performance: The Moderating Role of External Monitoring," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 188(4), pages 759-778, December.
    18. Christina Bui, 2018. "Bank Regulation and Financial Stability," PhD Thesis, Finance Discipline Group, UTS Business School, University of Technology, Sydney, number 5-2018, January-A.
    19. Jochen Hartmann & Matthias Pelster & Soenke Sievers, 2022. "Can the market identify prosperous activist engagements? Evidence from announcement and long-term buy-and-hold returns," Working Papers Dissertations 100, Paderborn University, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics.
    20. Cornand, Camille & Gimet, Céline, 2012. "The 2007–2008 financial crisis: Is there evidence of disaster myopia?," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 13(3), pages 301-315.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Shareholder activism; Signalling theory; Information asymmetry; EGARCH; ESG;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G10 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)
    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading
    • G30 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:quaeco:v:95:y:2024:i:c:p:152-159. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/620167 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.