IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jjrfmx/v17y2024i7p291-d1431718.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Friendly Boards and the Cost of Debt

Author

Listed:
  • Hoontaek Seo

    (Holzschuh College of Business Administration, Niagara University, NY 14109, USA)

  • Sangho Yi

    (Sogang Business School, Sogang University, Seoul 04107, Republic of Korea)

  • William McCumber

    (College of Business, Lousiana Tech University, Ruston, LA 71272, USA)

Abstract

For a sample of public bond issues by U.S. firms between 2000 and 2019, sourced from the Securities Data Corporation (SDC) New Issues database, we examine the relationship between CEO-friendly boards and the cost of debt. To explore this relationship, we construct proxies for board friendliness based on social connections sourced from the BoardEx database, classifying a board as friendly if it includes at least one outside director who has a social connection with the CEO. Our regression analysis reveals a negative association between CEO-friendly boards and yield spreads and a positive association between CEO-friendly boards and credit ratings. These effects exist after controlling for firm and bond characteristics based on prior literature. The results are robust to an alternative measure of board friendliness and potential endogeneity. These findings imply that firms with a CEO-friendly board experience a lower cost of bond financing. This supports the argument that effective communication between CEOs and directors contributes to the enhancement of creditor interests. Our results carry a practical implication that firms heavily reliant on debt should actively employ CEO-friendly boards. Despite the burgeoning literature on CEO-friendly boards, there is a lack of research on the relationship between CEO-friendly boards and the cost of debt. Our results fill this gap in the extant literature on CEO-friendly boards.

Suggested Citation

  • Hoontaek Seo & Sangho Yi & William McCumber, 2024. "Friendly Boards and the Cost of Debt," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 17(7), pages 1-17, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jjrfmx:v:17:y:2024:i:7:p:291-:d:1431718
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1911-8074/17/7/291/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1911-8074/17/7/291/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Williamson, Oliver E, 1979. "Transaction-Cost Economics: The Governance of Contractural Relations," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 22(2), pages 233-261, October.
    2. Shleifer, Andrei & Vishny, Robert W, 1997. "A Survey of Corporate Governance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(2), pages 737-783, June.
    3. Field, Laura Casares & Lowry, Michelle, 2022. "Bucking the trend: Why do IPOs choose controversial governance structures and why do investors let them?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 146(1), pages 27-54.
    4. Diane K Denis, 2001. "Twenty‐five years of corporate governance research … and counting," Review of Financial Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 10(3), pages 191-212.
    5. Ran Duchin & Denis Sosyura, 2013. "Divisional Managers and Internal Capital Markets," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 68(2), pages 387-429, April.
    6. Fama, Eugene F, 1980. "Agency Problems and the Theory of the Firm," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 88(2), pages 288-307, April.
    7. Benjamin E. Hermalin & Michael S. Weisbach, 2003. "Boards of directors as an endogenously determined institution: a survey of the economic literature," Economic Policy Review, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, vol. 9(Apr), pages 7-26.
    8. Bengt Holmström, 1999. "Managerial Incentive Problems: A Dynamic Perspective," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 66(1), pages 169-182.
    9. Cesare Fracassi & Geoffrey Tate, 2012. "External Networking and Internal Firm Governance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 67(1), pages 153-194, February.
    10. Jensen, Michael C. & Meckling, William H., 1976. "Theory of the firm: Managerial behavior, agency costs and ownership structure," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 3(4), pages 305-360, October.
    11. Yermack, David, 1997. "Good Timing: CEO Stock Option Awards and Company News Announcements," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(2), pages 449-476, June.
    12. Renée B. Adams & Daniel Ferreira, 2007. "A Theory of Friendly Boards," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(1), pages 217-250, February.
    13. Khedmati, Mehdi & Sualihu, Mohammed Aminu & Yawson, Alfred, 2020. "CEO-director ties and labor investment efficiency," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    14. Silvia Dominguez‐Martinez & Otto H. Swank & Bauke Visser, 2008. "In Defense of Boards," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 17(3), pages 667-682, September.
    15. Schmidt, Breno, 2015. "Costs and benefits of friendly boards during mergers and acquisitions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(2), pages 424-447.
    16. Hoontaek Seo & Sangho Yi & Qing Yang & William McCumber, 2024. "The Relation between CEO-Friendly Boards and the Value of Cash Holdings," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 17(3), pages 1-19, March.
    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. Bhuyan, Md Nazmul Hasan & Subedi, Meena & Akter, Maimuna, 2022. "CEO-friendly boards and seasoned equity offerings," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(C).
    2. Lin, Zhijun & Song, Byron Y. & Tian, Zhimin, 2016. "Does director-level reputation matter? Evidence from bank loan contracting," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 160-176.
    3. Frisell, Lars & Roszbach, Kasper & spagnolo, giancarlo, 2008. "Governing the Governors: A Clinical Study of Central Banks," Working Paper Series 221, Sveriges Riksbank (Central Bank of Sweden).
    4. Fan, Yaoyao & Jiang, Yuxiang & Jin, Pengcheng & Mai, Yong, 2023. "CEO network centrality and bank risk: Evidence from US Bank holding companies," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    5. Nguyen, Thi Tuyet Mai, 2017. "An examination of independent directors in Vietnam," OSF Preprints ay6dv, Center for Open Science.
    6. Naeem Tabassum & Satwinder Singh, 2020. "Corporate Governance and Organisational Performance," Springer Books, Springer, number 978-3-030-48527-6, October.
    7. Etienne Redor, 2016. "Board attributes and shareholder wealth in mergers and acquisitions: a survey of the literature," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 20(4), pages 789-821, December.
    8. Jiao Ji & Oleksandr Talavera & Shuxing Yin, 2020. "Frequencies of board meetings on various topics and corporate governance: evidence from China," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 54(1), pages 69-110, January.
    9. Drobetz, Wolfgang & von Meyerinck, Felix & Oesch, David & Schmid, Markus, 2014. "Board Industry Experience, Firm Value, and Investment Behavior," Working Papers on Finance 1401, University of St. Gallen, School of Finance, revised Dec 2015.
    10. Ahmed Bouteska, 2020. "Do Board Characteristics Affect Bank Performance? Evidence from the Eurozone," Journal of Asset Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 21(6), pages 535-548, October.
    11. Shkendije Himaj, 2014. "Corporate Governance in Banks and its Impact on Risk and Performance: Review of Literature on the Selected Governance Mechanisms," Journal of Central Banking Theory and Practice, Central bank of Montenegro, vol. 3(3), pages 53-85.
    12. Eugenio Zubeltzu-Jaka & Eduardo Ortas & Igor Álvarez-Etxeberria, 2019. "Independent Directors and Organizational Performance: New Evidence from A Meta-Analytic Regression Analysis," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(24), pages 1-25, December.
    13. Sandvik, Jason, 2020. "Board monitoring, director connections, and credit quality☆," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    14. Vagliasindi, Maria, 2008. "The effectiveness of boards of directors of state owned enterprises in developing countries," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4579, The World Bank.
    15. Phillip C. James, 2020. "Understanding the Impact of Board Structure on Firm Performance: AComprehensive Literature Review," International Journal of Business and Social Research, LAR Center Press, vol. 10(1), pages 1-12, January.
    16. Phillip C. James, 2020. "Understanding the Impact of Board Structure on Firm Performance: AComprehensive Literature Review," International Journal of Business and Social Research, MIR Center for Socio-Economic Research, vol. 10(1), pages 1-12, January.
    17. Chenglong Zheng & Roy Kouwenberg, 2019. "A Bibliometric Review of Global Research on Corporate Governance and Board Attributes," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(12), pages 1-25, June.
    18. Zaman, Rashid & Atawnah, Nader & Baghdadi, Ghasan A. & Liu, Jia, 2021. "Fiduciary duty or loyalty? Evidence from co-opted boards and corporate misconduct," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    19. Etienne Redor & Magnus Blomkvist, 2021. "Do all inside and affiliated directors hold the same value for shareholders?," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 41(3), pages 882-895.
    20. Marco Allegrini & Giulio Greco, 2013. "Corporate boards, audit committees and voluntary disclosure: evidence from Italian Listed Companies," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 17(1), pages 187-216, February.

    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:gam:jjrfmx:v:17:y:2024:i:7:p:291-:d:1431718. 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: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    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.