The concentration of ownership of enterprises varies significantly among countries. In this paper we investigate the role that differences in legal systems play in molding founders' ownership preferences with respect to the ownership structure of their startups. We develop an economic framework...

This paper finds that the number of CEOs born in June and July is disproportionately small relative to the number of CEOs born in other months. Our evidence is consistent with the “relative-age effect” due to school admissions grouping together children with age differences up to one year,...

This paper examines the impact of government-sponsored venture capitalists (GVCs) on the success of enterprises. Using international enterprise-level data, we identify a surprising non-monotonicity in the effect of GVC on the likelihood of exit via initial public offerings (IPOs) or third party...

This paper shows that the time of year of a person's birth is an important factor in the likelihood they become a CEO, and conditional on becoming a CEO, on the performance of the firms they manage. Based on a sample of 321 CEOs of Samp;P 500 companies from 1992 to 2006 we find that (1) the...

This paper examines venture capitalists' preferences for syndication partners. Do venture capital firms prefer partners that are similar to or different from them? How do venture capitalists' preferences for partners affect the performance of the syndicated investments? Will the choice of...