We provide a theoretical model to explain the procyclicality of hedge fund activism. In our model, hedge funds which compete to retain investor flows excessively increase the net leverage of target firms in order to deliver high short-term payouts and signal their ability. Such excessive...

How does the trading behaviour of institutional money managers affect stock prices? In this paper we document a robust relationship between the net trade patterns of institutional money managers and long term equity returns. Examining quarterly data on US institutional holdings from 1983 to...

What are the equilibrium features of a dynamic financial market where traders care about their reputation for ability? We modify a standard sequential trading model to study a financial market with career concerns. We show that this market cannot be informationally efficient: there is no...

This Paper shows that trade can occur in a market where all traders are rational and none of them is subject to exogenous shocks. We develop a model of delegated portfolio management that captures key features of the US mutual fund industry and we embed it into an asset-pricing set-up. Fund...

Do large investors increase the vulnerability of a country to speculative attacks in the foreign exchange markets? To address this issue, we build a model of currency crises where a single large investor and a continuum of small investors independently decide whether to attack a currency based...

In this paper we develop a simple theoretical model to analyze the impact of institutional herding on asset prices. A growing empirical literature has come to the intriguing conclusion that institutional herding positively predicts short-term returns but negatively predicts long-term returns. We...

Mutual funds are significant blockholders in many corporations. Concerns that funds vote in a pro-management manner to garner lucrative pensions contracts led the SEC to mandate the disclosure of proxy votes. We present a model of mutual fund voting in the presence of potential business ties. We...

This short paper analyses the tension between "widening" and "deepening" of organizations such as the European Union. Members have the same consumption benefit of reform but weak and strong members differ in their cost of exerting reform efforts. As decisions are taken by unanimity, the reform...

This paper analyses takeovers of companies owned by atomistic shareholders and by one minority blockholder, all of whom can only decide to tender or retain their shares. As private benefit extraction is inefficient, the post-takeover share value increases with the bidder's shareholdings. In a...

We propose that an active takeover market provides incentives by offering acquisition opportunities to successful managers. This allows firms to reduce performance-based compensation and can rationalize loss-making acquisitions. At the same time, takeovers remain a substitute for board dismissal...