Institutional Investor Activism and Employee Safety: The Role of Activist and Board Political Ideology

Although prior research on shareholder activism has highlighted how such activism can economically benefit the shareholders of targeted firms, recent studies also suggest that shareholder activism can economically disadvantage nonshareholder stakeholders, notably employees. Our study extends this research by exploring whether shareholder activism by institutional investors (i.e., institutional investor activism) can adversely affect employee health and safety through increased workplace injury and illness. Furthermore, deviating from the assumption that financially motivated institutional investor activists are homogeneous in their goals and preferences, we investigate whether the influence of institutional investor activism on employee health and safety hinges on the political ideology of the shareholder activist and of the board of the targeted firm. Using establishment-level data, we find that institutional investor activism adversely influences workplace injury and illness at targeted firms and that this influence is stronger for nonliberal shareholder activists and for firms with a nonliberal board. Our study contributes to shareholder activism research by highlighting how the political ideology of shareholder activists and boards affects the impact of shareholder activism on stakeholders and how shareholder activism can adversely affect the health and safety of employees. Furthermore, our paper also contributes to research on workplace safety and the management of employee relations and human capital resources by highlighting the detrimental effect of a firm’s ownership by investor activists on its employees and how the board’s political ideology may enable a firm to reduce this risk.

Institutional investor management of Australian healthcare property assets as a pandemic-proof asset class

PurposeAs the prolonged effect of the COVID-19 pandemic has materially impacted investment returns significantly, it is more crucial than ever for institutional investors to redefine their property portfolios using assets with better investment management potential and meaningful diversification benefits. The “alternative asset revolution” is gaining traction in the property investment space internationally among institutional investors due to the shifting investment attitudes towards the alternative property sectors. Australia's $205bn healthcare property sector is at the forefront of this revolution due to its societal significance, as well as its attractive investment qualities. This paper investigates the institutional investor management of the Australian healthcare property sector via both the direct and listed channels and empirically analyses its investment attributes.Design/methodology/approachUsing the unique Morgan Stanley Capital International/Property Council of Australia quarterly data set for Australian direct healthcare property over 2006–2020, the risk-adjusted performance and portfolio diversification potential direct healthcare property and listed healthcare were assessed. A constrained mean-variance portfolio optimisation framework was used to develop a six-asset portfolio scenario to analyse the portfolio added-value benefits of both direct healthcare property and listed healthcare in a mixed-asset investment strategy. A similar set of analysis was performed using the post-global financial crisis (GFC) quarterly time series of 2009–2020 to investigate the healthcare asset class' performance dynamics in the post-GFC investment timeframe.FindingsThe results indicate that direct healthcare property and listed healthcare offer two key advantages for institutional investors in managing their property portfolios: (1) a stable yet superior risk-adjusted performance and (2) significant portfolio diversification potential in managing their property portfolios. Importantly, both direct healthcare property and listed healthcare provided valuable contributions in strengthening an investment portfolio's performance. The post-GFC sub-period analysis revealed a consistent conclusion regarding the healthcare asset class's performance attributes.Originality/valueThis is the first research that provides an independent empirical examination of the strategic importance of Australian healthcare property as a maturing alternative property sector that can serve both investment and environmental, social and governance goals of investors. This research presents a positive investment prognosis for the Australian healthcare property sector to achieve its institutionalised status as a mainstream asset class of the future.

Search-Based Peer Groups and Commonality in Liquidity

We examine search-based peer (SBP) groups proposed by Lee, Ma, and Wang (2015) and their relationship with commonality in liquidity. Our results confirm that SBP affiliation is a significant determinant of commonality in liquidity and, unlike market- and industry-commonality, SBP-commonality has been increasing over the past 15 years. We separate retail from institutional investor queries by tracing the IP locations of EDGAR searches. Our results show that retail investors are responsible for roughly 85% of the EDGAR searches that generate SBP groups. Overall, our study provides new evidence of a significant demand-side commonality associated with SBP affiliations.

Institutional investor company social responsibility report and company performance

In the Chinese stock market, the rate of institutional holder and the company social responsibility report level are comparatively lower than those in the Western market. Historical research studies showed that there exist some connections between these two factors and company performance. This article uses the method of empirical analysis based on data during 3 years to try to find out the result.

Impact of Corporate Governance on Research & Development Investment in The Pharmaceutical Industry in Indonesia

Deciding the investment scale of a company's Research & Development is a strategic investment decision related to creating long-term value of the company and it is a very important decision because it has a certain level of risk and the cost is not small. Corporate governance of a company differs according to the ownership structure of each company, and corporate governance will affect the company's decision-making. The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of corporate governance structure, namely major shareholder, institutional investor, and outside directors to investment research & development at a pharmaceutical company listed in Indonesian Stock Exchange period 2010 to 2017. The population of this study is a pharmaceutical company listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange. The number of pharmaceutical companies listed during the period 2010 to 2017 is as many as 11 companies. By using purposive sampling, obtained a sample of 5 companies. The data analysis technique used in this research is multiple linear regression analysis. The results of this study indicate that major shareholders have a positive significant influence on research & development investment. Meanwhile, the institutional investor has a positively significant influence on research & development investment. And the outside directors have an insignificant negative effect on investment & development investment.