We study the impact of board reforms implemented in 40 countries worldwide on corporate dividend policy. Using a difference-in-differences analysis, we find that firms pay higher dividends following the reforms. The increase in dividend payouts is more pronounced for firms with weak board...

Using newly collected data on the ultimate ownership structure of publicly traded firms in nine East Asian economies, we find that family control is negatively related to the dividend payout ratio. Family firms are less (more) likely to increase (omit) dividends than non-family firms. These...

We provide the first international evidence on the impact of economic policy uncertainty (EPU) on dividend policy. Using data from 19 countries, we find that a high level of EPU is positively associated with dividend payout. This evidence is robust to using alternative dividend payout measures,...

We address the mixed empirical findings on how corporate governance affects dividend payout policy by analyzing a large sample of firms from 30 countries. Our results indicate that firms with better firm-level governance pay more dividends, even when we control for country-level governance....

We study how corporate payout policy responds to changing investor tastes for non-dividend over dividend paying stocks following an increase in housing prices. Exploiting the crossregional dispersion in housing prices within the U.S. market, we find a significant negative effect of growth in...