ES Risk and Shareholder Voice

Seminar abstract

Over the 2004 to 2016 period over 20% of all shareholder proposals relate to Environmental and Social (ES) issues, and slightly more than half are sponsored by asset management companies.

Support for these proposals has increased substantially over the period, but it remains the case that virtually none received the minimum threshold support rate to pass.

This study finds that failed ES proposals with higher investor support significantly predicts future firm risk, measured in extreme negative stock returns and real events such as negative ES incidents.

Examining the retailed records of mutual fund votes, the results uncover that myopia within investors and management contributes to these proposals not receiving greater support.

Booking

This seminar is free to attend and there is no need to book in advance. Come along and feel to bring your friends, colleagues and classmates.

Speaker bio

Bige Kahraman Alper is an Associate Professor of Finance at the Said Business School and is a Fellow of Kellogg College at the University of Oxford.

She holds a PhD in Economic from Yale University with specialisations in financial economics and econometrics.

She is a Research Affiliate in the Financial Economic programme of the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) and an Economic Adviser to the Financial Conduct Authority. 

Bige's research focuses on analysing the sources of market frictions giving rises to market inefficiency and systematic liquidity crises. He recent studies quantify the importance of various frictions - for instance, arising from capital constraints, organisational structures in asset management intermediaries and asymmetric information - and examine the role of financial innovation that can help markets overcome these frictions.

He papers appear in top journals such as academic journals such as Journal of Finance and Review of Financial Studies.