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Corporate Actions as Moral Issues

Author

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  • Zwetelina Iliewa
  • Elisabeth Kempf
  • Oliver Spalt

Abstract

We examine nonpecuniary preferences across a broad set of corporate actions using a representative sample of the U.S. population. Our core findings, based on largescale online surveys, are that (i) self-reported nonpecuniary concerns are large both for stock market investors and non-investors; (ii) concerns about the treatment of workers and CEO pay rank highest—higher than concerns about workforce diversity and fossil energy usage; (iii) moral universalism emerges as an important driver of nonpecuniary preferences. Combined, our findings provide new evidence on the importance of moral concerns as a key determinant of nonpecuniary preferences over corporate actions.

Suggested Citation

  • Zwetelina Iliewa & Elisabeth Kempf & Oliver Spalt, 2025. "Corporate Actions as Moral Issues," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2025_649v2, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany, revised Apr 2025.
    • Handle: RePEc:bon:boncrc:crctr224_2025_649v2
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    corporate actions; non-pecuniary preferences; social responsibility;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G30 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - General
    • G40 - Financial Economics - - Behavioral Finance - - - General
    • D3 - Microeconomics - - Distribution

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