IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/empeco/v58y2020i3d10.1007_s00181-018-1594-5.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Politics and finance: a study on the impact of campaign donations on Brazilian firms

Author

Listed:
  • Mariana G. Davi

    (Banco Cooperativo Sicredi)

  • Marcelo S. Portugal

    (Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS))

Abstract

This paper aims to identify potential benefits obtained by companies for their contributions to political campaigns. We used an extensive database with information on donations to House, Senate, and Presidency candidates in the 2006 and 2010 elections. The variables of interest analyzed were the cumulative abnormal return by the time the results of each election became known and the return on equity in the year following the elections. Panel regressions were estimated as ordinary least squares, and fixed effects of year and industry were included. The results indicate that not only does the market anticipate future benefits for companies that contributed to campaigns—which is reflected in positive cumulative abnormal returns at the announcement of the election results—but these companies also have higher returns on equity than those that were not involved in the political process. In addition, donations to winning candidates generate higher returns than donations to losing candidates, which supports the return of favors hypothesis. Similarly, contributions to candidates affiliated with the president’s coalitions also had a higher impact when compared to donations to political opponents, as did donations to left-wing parties.

Suggested Citation

  • Mariana G. Davi & Marcelo S. Portugal, 2020. "Politics and finance: a study on the impact of campaign donations on Brazilian firms," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 58(3), pages 1057-1105, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:spr:empeco:v:58:y:2020:i:3:d:10.1007_s00181-018-1594-5
    DOI: 10.1007/s00181-018-1594-5
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s00181-018-1594-5
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s00181-018-1594-5?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. Thomas Ferguson & Hans-Joachim Voth, 2008. "Betting on Hitler—The Value of Political Connections in Nazi Germany," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 123(1), pages 101-137.
    2. Grier, Kevin B & Munger, Michael C, 1991. "Committee Assignments, Constituent Preferences, and Campaign Contributions," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 29(1), pages 24-43, January.
    3. Kroszner, Randall S & Stratmann, Thomas, 1998. "Interest-Group Competition and the Organization of Congress: Theory and Evidence from Financial Services' Political Action Committees," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(5), pages 1163-1187, December.
    4. Michael J. Cooper & Huseyin Gulen & Alexei V. Ovtchinnikov, 2010. "Corporate Political Contributions and Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 65(2), pages 687-724, April.
    5. Martínez, Juan & Santiso, Javier, 2003. "Financial Markets and Politics: The Confidence Game in Latin American Emerging Economies," MPRA Paper 12909, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Jayachandran, Seema, 2006. "The Jeffords Effect," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 49(2), pages 397-425, October.
    7. Gene M. Grossman & Elhanan Helpman, 1996. "Electoral Competition and Special Interest Politics," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 63(2), pages 265-286.
    8. Snyder, James M, Jr, 1992. "Long-Term Investing in Politicians; or, Give Early, Give Often," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 35(1), pages 15-43, April.
    9. Stephen Coate, 2004. "Pareto-Improving Campaign Finance Policy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(3), pages 628-655, June.
    10. Mara Faccio, 2006. "Politically Connected Firms," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(1), pages 369-386, March.
    11. John J. Shon, 2010. "Do Stock Returns Vary With Campaign Contributions? Bush Vs. Gore: The Florida Recount," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(3), pages 257-281, November.
    12. K. Arin & Alexander Molchanov & Otto Reich, 2013. "Politics, stock markets, and model uncertainty," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 45(1), pages 23-38, August.
    13. Claessens, Stijn & Feijen, Erik & Laeven, Luc, 2008. "Political connections and preferential access to finance: The role of campaign contributions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(3), pages 554-580, June.
    14. Faccio, Mara & Parsley, David C., 2009. "Sudden Deaths: Taking Stock of Geographic Ties," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 44(3), pages 683-718, June.
    15. A. Craig MacKinlay, 1997. "Event Studies in Economics and Finance," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 35(1), pages 13-39, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Zhang, Kaixia & Li, Weibing, 2024. "Understanding the puzzle of polluting companies' social responsibility," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).

    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. Coulomb, Renaud & Sangnier, Marc, 2014. "The impact of political majorities on firm value: Do electoral promises or friendship connections matter?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 158-170.
    2. Claessens, Stijn & Feijen, Erik & Laeven, Luc, 2008. "Political connections and preferential access to finance: The role of campaign contributions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(3), pages 554-580, June.
    3. Chen, Hui & Parsley, David & Yang, Ya-wen, 2010. "Corporate Lobbying and Financial Performance," MPRA Paper 21114, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Coulomb, Renaud & Sangnier, Marc, 2014. "The impact of political majorities on firm value: Do electoral promises or friendship connections matter?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 158-170.
    5. Luechinger, Simon & Moser, Christoph, 2014. "The value of the revolving door: Political appointees and the stock market," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 93-107.
    6. Barraza, Santiago & Rossi, Martín A & Ruzzier, Christian A, 2022. "Sleeping with the enemy: The perils of having the government on(the)board," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(3), pages 641-651.
    7. Correia, Maria M., 2014. "Political connections and SEC enforcement," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(2), pages 241-262.
    8. Ovtchinnikov, Alexei V. & Pantaleoni, Eva, 2012. "Individual political contributions and firm performance," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(2), pages 367-392.
    9. Wang, Fangjun & Xu, Luying & Zhang, Junrui & Shu, Wei, 2018. "Political connections, internal control and firm value: Evidence from China's anti-corruption campaign," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 53-67.
    10. Brown, Jeffrey R. & Huang, Jiekun, 2020. "All the president's friends: Political access and firm value," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 138(2), pages 415-431.
    11. Ilona Babenko & Viktar Fedaseyeu & Song Zhang, 2017. "Do CEOs affect employees' political choices?," BAFFI CAREFIN Working Papers 1750, BAFFI CAREFIN, Centre for Applied Research on International Markets Banking Finance and Regulation, Universita' Bocconi, Milano, Italy.
    12. Feng, Xunan & Johansson, Anders C. & Zhang, Tianyu, 2015. "Mixing business with politics: Political participation by entrepreneurs in China," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 220-235.
    13. Tahoun, Ahmed, 2014. "The role of stock ownership by US members of Congress on the market for political favors," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(1), pages 86-110.
    14. Thomas Bourveau & Renaud Coulomb & Marc Sangnier, 2021. "Political Connections and White-Collar Crime: Evidence from Insider Trading in France," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 19(5), pages 2543-2576.
    15. Anders C. Johansson, 2015. "On the challenge to competitive authoritarianism and political patronage in Malaysia," Asian-Pacific Economic Literature, The Crawford School, The Australian National University, vol. 29(2), pages 47-67, November.
    16. Thomas Stratmann & J.W. Verret, 2015. "How Does Corporate Political Activity Allowed by Citizens United v. FEC Affect Shareholder Wealth?," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 58(3).
    17. Elvira Sojli & Wing Wah Tham, 2017. "Foreign political connections," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 48(2), pages 244-266, February.
    18. Lehrer, Nimrod David, 2018. "The value of political connections in a multiparty parliamentary democracy: Evidence from the 2015 elections in Israel," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 13-58.
    19. David Schoenherr, 2019. "Political Connections and Allocative Distortions," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 74(2), pages 543-586, April.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Campaign contributions; Fixed effects; Cumulative abnormal return; Return on equity;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D7 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making
    • G1 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets
    • G3 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance

    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:spr:empeco:v:58:y:2020:i:3:d:10.1007_s00181-018-1594-5. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.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.