IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/aea/aecrev/v103y2013i1p277-304.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Innovation and Institutional Ownership

Author

Listed:
  • Philippe Aghion
  • John Van Reenen
  • Luigi Zingales

Abstract

We find that greater institutional ownership is associated with more innovation. To explore the mechanism, we contrast the "lazy manager" hypothesis with a model where institutional owners increase innovation incentives through reducing career risks. The evidence favors career concerns. First, we find complementarity between institutional ownership and product market competition, whereas the lazy manager hypothesis predicts substitution. Second, CEOs are less likely to be fired in the face of profit downturns when institutional ownership is higher. Finally, using instrumental variables, policy changes, and disaggregating by type of institutional owner, we argue that the effect of institutions on innovation is causal. (JEL G23, G32, L25, M10, O31, O34)

Suggested Citation

  • Philippe Aghion & John Van Reenen & Luigi Zingales, 2013. "Innovation and Institutional Ownership," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(1), pages 277-304, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:aea:aecrev:v:103:y:2013:i:1:p:277-304
    Note: DOI: 10.1257/aer.103.1.277
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/aer.103.1.277
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/aer/data/feb2013/20100973_data.zip
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/aer/data/feb2013/20100973_app.pdf
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to AEA members and institutional subscribers.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bronwyn Hall, 2004. "The financing of research and development," Chapters, in: Anthony Bartzokas & Sunil Mani (ed.), Financial Systems, Corporate Investment in Innovation, and Venture Capital, chapter 2, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    2. Jean Tirole, 2006. "The Theory of Corporate Finance," Post-Print hal-00173191, HAL.
    3. Pruitt, Stephen W & Wei, K C John, 1989. " Institutional Ownership and Changes in the S&P 500," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 44(2), pages 509-513, June.
    4. Renée B. Adams & Daniel Ferreira, 2007. "A Theory of Friendly Boards," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(1), pages 217-250, February.
    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. Mike Burkart & Konrad Raff, 2015. "Performance Pay, CEO Dismissal, and the Dual Role of Takeovers," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 19(4), pages 1383-1414.
    2. Andrea Bellucci & Luca Pennacchio & Alberto Zazzaro, 2019. "R&D Subsidies and Firms’ Debt Financing," CSEF Working Papers 527, Centre for Studies in Economics and Finance (CSEF), University of Naples, Italy.
    3. Peter Egger & Christian Keuschnigg, 2015. "Innovation, Trade, and Finance," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(2), pages 121-157, May.
    4. Patricia Crifo & Elena Escrig-Olmedo & Nicolas Mottis, 2019. "Corporate Governance as a Key Driver of Corporate Sustainability in France: The Role of Board Members and Investor Relations," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 159(4), pages 1127-1146, November.
    5. An, Jiafu & Duan, Tinghua & Hou, Wenxuan & Liu, Xianda, 2020. "The legacy of wars around the world: Evidence from military directors," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    6. Ciaran Driver & Maria João Coelho Guedes, 2017. "R&D and CEO departure date: do financial incentives make CEOs more opportunistic?," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press, vol. 26(5), pages 801-820.
    7. Meg Sato, 2009. "Insular decision-making in the board room: why boards retain and hire sub-standard ceos," Asia Pacific Economic Papers 384, Australia-Japan Research Centre, Crawford School of Public Policy, The Australian National University.
    8. Peter H. Egger & Christian Keuschnigg, 2017. "Access to credit and comparative advantage," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 50(2), pages 481-505, May.
    9. Peter Egger & Christian Keuschnigg, 2009. "Corporate Finance and Comparative Advantage," University of St. Gallen Department of Economics working paper series 2009 2009-04, Department of Economics, University of St. Gallen.
    10. Christian Keuschnigg & Evelyn Ribi, 2010. "Business Taxation, Corporate Finance and Economic Performance," University of St. Gallen Department of Economics working paper series 2010 2010-04, Department of Economics, University of St. Gallen.
    11. Ojo, Marianne, 2016. "E commerce as a tool for resource expansion: postal partnerships, data protection legislation and the mitigation of implementation gaps," MPRA Paper 70175, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. Peter Egger & Christian Keuschnigg, 2011. "Innovation, Trade, and Finance," CESifo Working Paper Series 3529, CESifo.
    13. Konrad Adler & JaeBin Ahn & Mai Chi Dao, 2019. "Innovation and Corporate Cash Holdings in the Era of Globalization," IMF Working Papers 2019/017, International Monetary Fund.
    14. Li, Yuanyuan & Wigniolle, Bertrand, 2017. "Endogenous information revelation in a competitive credit market and credit crunch," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 127-141.
    15. Theodore E. Christensen & Hang Pei & Spencer R. Pierce & Liang Tan, 2019. "Non-GAAP reporting following debt covenant violations," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 24(2), pages 629-664, June.
    16. Michael P. Devereux & Christian Keuschnigg, 2009. "The Distorting Arm’s Length Principle," Working Papers 0910, Oxford University Centre for Business Taxation.
    17. Shaikh, Ibrahim A. & O'Brien, Jonathan Paul & Peters, Lois, 2018. "Inside directors and the underinvestment of financial slack towards R&D-intensity in high-technology firms," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 192-201.
    18. Martinsson, Gustav, 2010. "Equity financing and innovation: Is Europe different from the United States?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(6), pages 1215-1224, June.
    19. Bedayo, Mikel & Jiménez, Gabriel & Peydró, José-Luis & Vegas, Raquel, 2020. "Screening and Loan Origination Time: Lending Standards, Loan Defaults and Bank Failures," EconStor Preprints 225986, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    20. L. C. Baran & T. H. D. King, 2014. "S&P 500 Index reconstitutions and information asymmetry," Applied Financial Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(11), pages 777-791, June.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • G23 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Non-bank Financial Institutions; Financial Instruments; Institutional Investors
    • G32 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Financing Policy; Financial Risk and Risk Management; Capital and Ownership Structure; Value of Firms; Goodwill
    • L25 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Firm Performance
    • M10 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Administration - - - General
    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives
    • O34 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Intellectual Property and Intellectual Capital

    Lists

    This item is featured on the following reading lists, Wikipedia, or ReplicationWiki pages:
    1. Innovation and Institutional Ownership (AER 2013) in ReplicationWiki

    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:aea:aecrev:v:103:y:2013:i:1:p:277-304. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Michael P. Albert). General contact details of provider: http://edirc.repec.org/data/aeaaaea.html .

    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 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.

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.