Prior empirical work examined the relationship between dominant shareholders, whose voting rights exceed cash flow rights, and firm value. In this study, we adopt a different perspective and argue that because of the risk imposed on minority shareholders and debtors, such excess control likely...

The theory of law and finance proposed by La Porta et al. (1998) predicts that minority controlled ownership structures, i.e. the structures that allow voting rights to exceed cash-flow rights, are more frequent in legal contexts where investors are not well protected against the expropriation...