Gender differences in preferences for firm characteristics across different groups of investors

Mohammad Tariqul Islam Khan, Siow-Hooi Tan and Lee-Lee Chong

Qualitative Research in Financial Markets, 2016, vol. 8, issue 1, 2-15

Abstract: Purpose - – This paper aims to study gender differences in preferences for firm characteristics across various groups of investors in Malaysia. Design/methodology/approach - – Self-declared preferences are elicited through a survey of 520 investors comprising retail, financial professionals and institutional investors in the Malaysian stock market. Non-parametric (Mann-Whitney and Kruskal-Wallis) tests are computed to achieve the stated objective. Findings - – Results reveal that female investors display higher preferences for the liquidity of a firm, dividend payments, trading volume of a firm, stock price and firm’s age than male investors across investor’s groups. Research limitations/implications - – Findings imply that the gender gap in investing behaviour can be partly attributed to gender differences in preferences for firm characteristics. Practical/implications - – The findings suggest that the gender gap can be mitigated by giving more priority to the choices of female investors with respect to firm characteristics. In turn, this may reduce a part of the gender gap in investing. Moreover, the findings would assist companies to understand and know how their shareholder’s preferences vary with respect to gender and investor’s groups. Originality/value - – This paper provides evidence concerning the gender gap in investor’s self-declared preferences for firm characteristics across retail, financial professionals and institutional investors in Malaysia, which complements previous studies that used equity holdings data and only two groups of investors.

Keywords: Gender; Malaysia; Investor; Preference; Firm characteristics (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eme:qrfmpp:v:8:y:2016:i:1:p:2-15

DOI: 10.1108/QRFM-08-2014-0025

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