Family-firm risk-taking: Does religion matter?

Fuxiu Jiang, Zhan Jiang, Kenneth Kim and Min Zhang

Journal of Corporate Finance, 2015, vol. 33, issue C, 260-278

Abstract: We propose that family firms with religious founders have less risk than other family firms. Using a sample of 4159 family firms in China, we find that firms founded by religious entrepreneurs have lower leverage and less investment in fixed and intangible assets compared to firms founded by nonreligious entrepreneurs. These findings are consistent with our proposition. However, these findings primarily hold for entrepreneurs who adhere to Western religions but not to Eastern religions. As such, our paper makes important contributions to the literature on family-firms and their risk-taking and the literature on the relation between religion and risk aversion.

Keywords: Religion; Family firms; Founder; Entrepreneur; Risk-taking; China (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: G31 G32 Z12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (85)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:corfin:v:33:y:2015:i:c:p:260-278

DOI: 10.1016/j.jcorpfin.2015.01.007

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