IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/acctfi/v60y2020is1p827-876.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Changing board behaviour: The role of the ‘Two Strikes’ rule in improving the efficacy of Australian Say‐on‐Pay

Author

Listed:
  • James Borthwick
  • Aelee Jun
  • Shiguang Ma

Abstract

This article analyses whether the transition from the 2004 CLERP 9 advisory Say‐on‐Pay regime to the ‘Two Strikes’ rule in 2012 influenced CEO pay in Australian firms. Analysing a panel of 2,074 firm‐years (2005–2015), we find that (i) CEO pay is a positive predictor of shareholder dissent; (ii) firm performance has a reducing effect on shareholder dissent; (iii) excessive shareholder dissent moderated CEO pay under the ‘Two Strikes’ rule relative to the CLERP 9 regime, and (iv) the market responded favourably to the introduction of the ‘Two Strikes’ rule and negatively to ‘strike’ instances after its introduction.

Suggested Citation

  • James Borthwick & Aelee Jun & Shiguang Ma, 2020. "Changing board behaviour: The role of the ‘Two Strikes’ rule in improving the efficacy of Australian Say‐on‐Pay," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 60(S1), pages 827-876, April.
  • Handle: RePEc:bla:acctfi:v:60:y:2020:i:s1:p:827-876
    DOI: 10.1111/acfi.12381
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/acfi.12381
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/acfi.12381?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Murphy, Kevin J., 2013. "Executive Compensation: Where We Are, and How We Got There," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, in: G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Finance, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 211-356, Elsevier.
    2. Jiraporn, Pornsit & Singh, Manohar & Lee, Chun I., 2009. "Ineffective corporate governance: Director busyness and board committee memberships," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 33(5), pages 819-828, May.
    3. Martin Bugeja & Raymond da Silva Rosa & Lien Duong & H.Y Izan, 2012. "CEO Compensation from M&As in Australia," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 39(9-10), pages 1298-1329, November.
    4. Fama, Eugene F & Jensen, Michael C, 1983. "Separation of Ownership and Control," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 26(2), pages 301-325, June.
    5. Yermack, David, 1996. "Higher market valuation of companies with a small board of directors," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(2), pages 185-211, February.
    6. Christopher S. Armstrong & Ian D. Gow & David F. Larcker, 2013. "The Efficacy of Shareholder Voting: Evidence from Equity Compensation Plans," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 51(5), pages 909-950, December.
    7. Ertimur, Yonca & Ferri, Fabrizio & Stubben, Stephen R., 2010. "Board of directors' responsiveness to shareholders: Evidence from shareholder proposals," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 16(1), pages 53-72, February.
    8. J�rg-Markus Hitz & Stephanie M�ller-Bloch, 2015. "Market Reactions to the Regulation of Executive Compensation," European Accounting Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(4), pages 659-684, December.
    9. Kolari, James W. & Pynnonen, Seppo, 2011. "Nonparametric rank tests for event studies," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 18(5), pages 953-971.
    10. Peter Cziraki & Luc Renneboog & Peter G. Szilagyi, 2010. "Shareholder Activism through Proxy Proposals: The European Perspective," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 16(5), pages 738-777, November.
    11. Fabrizio Ferri & David A. Maber, 2013. "Say on Pay Votes and CEO Compensation: Evidence from the UK," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 17(2), pages 527-563.
    12. Bebchuk, Lucian A. & Cohen, Alma, 2005. "The costs of entrenched boards," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 78(2), pages 409-433, November.
    13. Bebchuk, Lucian A. & Fried, Jesse M., 2003. "Executive Compensation as an Agency Problem," Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics, Working Paper Series qt81q3136r, Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics.
    14. Yonca Ertimur & Fabrizio Ferri & Volkan Muslu, 2011. "Shareholder Activism and CEO Pay," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 24(2), pages 535-592.
    15. Cai, Jie & Walkling, Ralph A., 2011. "Shareholders’ Say on Pay: Does It Create Value?," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 46(2), pages 299-339, April.
    16. Rachel Merhebi & Kerry Pattenden & Peter L. Swan & Xianming Zhou, 2006. "Australian chief executive officer remuneration: pay and performance," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 46(3), pages 481-497, September.
    17. Lucian Arye Bebchuk & Jesse M. Fried, 2003. "Executive Compensation as an Agency Problem," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 17(3), pages 71-92, Summer.
    18. Guido W. Imbens, 2004. "Nonparametric Estimation of Average Treatment Effects Under Exogeneity: A Review," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 86(1), pages 4-29, February.
    19. Productivity Commission, 2009. "Executive Remuneration in Australia," Inquiry Reports, Productivity Commission, Government of Australia, number 49.
    20. Matthew Grosse & Stephen Kean & Tom Scott & Tom Smith, 2017. "Shareholder say on pay and CEO compensation: three strikes and the board is out," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 57(3), pages 701-725, September.
    21. Ian Gregory‐Smith & Steve Thompson & Peter W. Wright, 2014. "CEO Pay and Voting Dissent Before and After the Crisis," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 124(574), pages 22-39, February.
    22. Core, John E. & Holthausen, Robert W. & Larcker, David F., 1999. "Corporate governance, chief executive officer compensation, and firm performance," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(3), pages 371-406, March.
    23. Zoltan Matolcsy & Anna Wright, 2011. "CEO compensation structure and firm performance," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 51(3), pages 745-763, September.
    24. Maria Goranova & Rahi Abouk & Paul C. Nystrom & Ehsan S. Soofi, 2017. "Corporate governance antecedents to shareholder activism: A zero-inflated process," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(2), pages 415-435, February.
    25. Alberto Abadie & Guido W. Imbens, 2016. "Matching on the Estimated Propensity Score," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 84, pages 781-807, March.
    26. Ho, Daniel E. & Imai, Kosuke & King, Gary & Stuart, Elizabeth A., 2007. "Matching as Nonparametric Preprocessing for Reducing Model Dependence in Parametric Causal Inference," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 15(3), pages 199-236, July.
    27. Tod Perry & Urs Peyer, 2005. "Board Seat Accumulation by Executives: A Shareholder's Perspective," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(4), pages 2083-2123, August.
    28. Eliezer M. Fich & Anil Shivdasani, 2006. "Are Busy Boards Effective Monitors?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(2), pages 689-724, April.
    29. Marianne Bertrand & Sendhil Mullainathan, 2001. "Are CEOs Rewarded for Luck? The Ones Without Principals Are," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 116(3), pages 901-932.
    30. Larcker, David F. & Ormazabal, Gaizka & Taylor, Daniel J., 2011. "The market reaction to corporate governance regulation," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 101(2), pages 431-448, August.
    31. Correa, Ricardo & Lel, Ugur, 2016. "Say on pay laws, executive compensation, pay slice, and firm valuation around the world," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(3), pages 500-520.
    32. Zoltan Matolcsy & Anna Wright, 2007. "Australian CEO Compensation: The Descriptive Evidence," Australian Accounting Review, CPA Australia, vol. 17(43), pages 47-59, November.
    33. Main, Brian G M & O'Reilly, Charles A, III & Wade, James, 1995. "The CEO, the Board of Directors and Executive Compensation: Economic and Psychological Perspectives," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 4(2), pages 293-332.
    34. Walid Alissa, 2015. "Boards' Response to Shareholders' Dissatisfaction: The Case of Shareholders' Say on Pay in the UK," European Accounting Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(4), pages 727-752, December.
    35. Monem, Reza M., 2013. "Determinants of board structure: Evidence from Australia," Journal of Contemporary Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 9(1), pages 33-49.
    36. Steve Thompson, 2005. "The Impact of Corporate Governance Reforms on the Remuneration of Executives in the UK," Corporate Governance: An International Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(1), pages 19-25, January.
    37. G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), 2013. "Handbook of the Economics of Finance," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, Elsevier, volume 2, number 2-b.
    38. Roberta Romano, 2004. "The Sarbanes-Oxley Act and the Making of Quack Corporate Governance," Yale School of Management Working Papers amz2653, Yale School of Management, revised 01 Jul 2005.
    39. Bebchuk, Lucian A. & Cremers, K.J. Martijn & Peyer, Urs C., 2011. "The CEO pay slice," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 102(1), pages 199-221, October.
    40. Bushman, Robert & Dai, Zhonglan & Wang, Xue, 2010. "Risk and CEO turnover," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(3), pages 381-398, June.
    41. Smith, Michael P, 1996. "Shareholder Activism by Institutional Investors: Evidence for CalPERS," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 51(1), pages 227-252, March.
    42. Duong, Lien & Evans, John, 2015. "CFO compensation: Evidence from Australia," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 35(PA), pages 425-443.
    43. Alessandra Capezio & John Shields & Michael O'Donnell, 2011. "Too Good to be True: Board Structural Independence as a Moderator of CEO Pay‐for‐Firm‐Performance," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48(3), pages 487-513, May.
    44. O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), 1999. "Handbook of Labor Economics," Handbook of Labor Economics, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 3, number 3.
    45. G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), 2013. "Handbook of the Economics of Finance," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, Elsevier, volume 2, number 2-a.
    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. Tongxia Li & Tze Chuan ‘Chewie’ Ang, 2022. "Corporate vote trading in Australia," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 62(S1), pages 1065-1105, April.

    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. Correa, Ricardo & Lel, Ugur, 2016. "Say on pay laws, executive compensation, pay slice, and firm valuation around the world," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(3), pages 500-520.
    2. Ricardo Correa & Ugur Lel, 2013. "Say on pay laws, executive compensation, CEO pay slice, and firm value around the world," International Finance Discussion Papers 1084, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    3. Pamela Kent & Kim Kercher & James Routledge, 2018. "Remuneration committees, shareholder dissent on CEO pay and the CEO pay–performance link," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 58(2), pages 445-475, June.
    4. Peter Iliev & Svetla Vitanova, 2019. "The Effect of the Say-on-Pay Vote in the United States," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 65(10), pages 4505-4521, October.
    5. Nicola Cucari, 2019. "Determinants of say on pay vote: a configurational analysis," International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, Springer, vol. 15(3), pages 837-856, September.
    6. Feito-Ruiz, Isabel & Renneboog, Luc, 2017. "Takeovers and (excess) CEO compensation," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 156-181.
    7. Yaowen Shan & Terry Walter, 2016. "Towards a Set of Design Principles for Executive Compensation Contracts," Abacus, Accounting Foundation, University of Sydney, vol. 52(4), pages 619-684, December.
    8. Daniel Beck & Gunther Friedl & Peter Schäfer, 2020. "Executive compensation in Germany," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 90(5), pages 787-824, June.
    9. Vo, Thi Thanh Nha & Canil, Jean Milva, 2019. "CEO pay disparity: Efficient contracting or managerial power?," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 168-190.
    10. Schmid, Stefan & Altfeld, Frederic & Dauth, Tobias, 2018. "Americanization as a driver of CEO pay in Europe: The moderating role of CEO power," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 53(4), pages 433-451.
    11. Lozano-Reina, Gabriel & Sánchez-Marín, Gregorio & Baixauli-Soler, J. Samuel, 2022. "Say-on-Pay voting dispersion in listed family and non-family firms: A panel data analysis," Journal of Family Business Strategy, Elsevier, vol. 13(1).
    12. Balsmeier, Benjamin & Buchwald, Achim & Peters, Heiko, 2011. "Outside board memberships of CEOs: Expertise or entrenchment?," DICE Discussion Papers 26, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE).
    13. Balsmeier, Benjamin & Buchwald, Achim & Peters, Heiko, 2009. "Auswirkungen von Mehrfachmandaten deutscher Vorstands- und Aufsichtsratsvorsitzender auf den Unternehmenserfolg," Working Papers 01/2009, German Council of Economic Experts / Sachverständigenrat zur Begutachtung der gesamtwirtschaftlichen Entwicklung.
    14. Atif, Muhammad & Huang, Allen & Liu, Benjamin, 2020. "The effect of say on pay on CEO compensation and spill-over effect on corporate cash holdings: Evidence from Australia," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    15. Renneboog, Luc & Szilagyi, Peter G., 2011. "The role of shareholder proposals in corporate governance," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 17(1), pages 167-188, February.
    16. Balachandran, Balasingham & Williams, Barry, 2018. "Effective governance, financial markets, financial institutions & crises," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 1-15.
    17. Le, Quyen & Vafaei, Alireza & Ahmed, Kamran & Kutubi, Shawgat, 2022. "Independent directors' reputation incentives and firm performance – an Australian perspective," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    18. Gregorio Sánchez‐Marín & María Encarnación Lucas‐Pérez & Samuel Baixauli‐Soler & Brian G.M. Main & Antonio Mínguez‐Vera, 2022. "Excess executive compensation and corporate governance in the United Kingdom and Spain: A comparative analysis," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 43(7), pages 2817-2837, October.
    19. Matthew Grosse & Stephen Kean & Tom Scott & Tom Smith, 2017. "Shareholder say on pay and CEO compensation: three strikes and the board is out," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 57(3), pages 701-725, September.
    20. Thi Bui & Andrew Ferguson & Peter Lam, 2021. "CEO compensation in early‐stage firms: Rewards for prospectivity and survival," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48(5-6), pages 895-928, May.

    More about this item

    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:bla:acctfi:v:60:y:2020:i:s1:p:827-876. 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: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/aaanzea.html .

    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.