Director Histories and the Pattern of Acquisitions

Peter Rousseau and Caleb Stroup

No 1124, Vanderbilt University Department of Economics Working Papers from Vanderbilt University Department of Economics

Abstract: We trace directors through time and across firms to study whether acquirers' exposure to non-public information about potential targets through board service histories affects the market for corporate control. In a sample of publicly-traded U.S. firms from 1996 through 2006, we find that acquirers are about five times more likely to buy firms at which their directors once served. These effects are stronger when the acquirer has better corporate governance, the director has a larger ownership stake at the acquirer, or the director played an important role during past service at the target. The findings are robust to endogeneity of board composition and to controls for network connectivity and conventional inter-firm interlocks.

Keywords: Interlocking directorates; board networks; mergers; social networks; corporate governance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: G34 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-bec, nep-his and nep-hme
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http://www.accessecon.com/pubs/VUECON/vu11-w24.pdf First version, October 2011 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Director Histories and the Pattern of Acquisitions (2015)
Working Paper: Director Histories and the Pattern of Acquisitions (2013)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:van:wpaper:1124

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