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Concentrated Corporate Ownership

Standard economic models assume that many small investors own firms. This is so in most large U.S. firms, but wealthy individuals or families generally hold controlling blocks in smaller U.S. firms and in all firms in most other countries. Given this, the lack of theoretical and empirical work on tightly held firms is surprising.

What corporate governance problems arise in tightly held firms? How do these differ from corporate governance problems in widely held firms? How do control blocks arise and how are they maintained? How does concentrated ownership affect economic growth? How should we regulate tightly held firms?
Drawing together leading scholars from law, economics, and finance, this volume examines the economic and legal issues of concentrated ownership and their impact on a shifting global economy.

394 pages | 13 line drawings, 47 tables | 6 x 9 | © 2000

National Bureau of Economic Research Conference Report

Economics and Business: Economics--International and Comparative

Table of Contents

Foreword, Ronald J. Daniels
Acknowledgments
Introduction, Randall K. Morck
I. The Origins of Ownership Structure
1. The Determinants of Corporate Venture Capital Success: Organizational Structure, Incentives, and Complementarities
Paul A. Gompers and Josh Lerner
Comment: Michael S. Weisbach
2. Ownership Structures and the Decision to Go Public: Private versus Social Optimality
Lucian Arye Bebchuk and Luigi Zingales
Comment: Merritt B. Fox
3. Some of the Causes and Consequences of Corporate Ownership Concentration in Canada
Ronald J. Daniels and Edward M. Iacobucci
Comment: George G. Triantis
4. Corporations and Taxation: A Largely Private Matter?
Robert D. Brown, Jack M. Mintz, and Thomas A. Wilson
Comment: Daniel Feenberg
II. The Law and Concentrated Corporate Ownership
5. Constraints on Large-Block Shareholders
Clifford G. Holderness and Dennis P. Sheehan
Comment: Mark R. Huson
6. Trust and Opportunism in Close Corporations
Paul G. Mahoney
Comment: Larry Y. Dann
7. Waiting for the Omelette to Set: Match-Specific Assets and Minority Oppression
Edward B. Rock and Michael L. Wachter
Comment: Vikas Mehrotra
8. The “Lemons Effect” in Corporate Freezeouts
Lucian Arye Bebchuk and Marcel Kahan
Comment: Paul G. Mahoney
III. Economic Effects of Concentrated Corporate Ownership
9. Emerging Market Business Groups, Foreign Intermediaries, and Corporate Governance
Tarun Khanna and Krishna Palepu
Comment: Bernard Yeung
10. Stock Pyramids, Cross-Ownership, and Dual Class Equity: The Mechanisms and Agency Costs of Separating Control from Cash-Flow Rights
Lucian Arye Bebchuk, Reinier Kraakman, and George G. Triantis
Comment: Dennis P. Sheehan
11. Inherited Wealth, Corporate Control, and Economic Growth: The Canadian Disease?
Randall K. Morck, David A. Stangeland, and Bernard Yeung
Comment: David M. Levy
Contributors
Author Index
Subject Index

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