The recent increase in the share of zero-leverage firms is most pronounced in the Software and Services, Hardware Equipment, and Pharmaceutical and Biotechnical industries. The reasons for these industries’ conservative debt policies are not fully disclosed. How companies in technological sectors manage to perform well attracting no debt and loosing debt tax shield benefits is a mystery. This study aims to determine why high-tech firms are less likely to have debt in the capital structure. On the basis of a sample of US-based firms from the RUSSELL 3000 index for 12 years, we show the factors leading to a zero-debt structure. After dividing the sample into high-tech and non-high-tech subsamples, we demonstrate the gap between zero-debt motives for technological and traditional sectors. We show that the common determinants of corporate structure cannot fully explain why high-tech firms choose a zero-debt policy. Testing the possible motives of debt financing avoidance, we find that high-tech firms are more financially constrained than non-high-tech firms. We further show that unconstrained high-tech firms may avoid debt to maintain their financial flexibility. On top of that, managerial entrenchment also adds to the zero-leverage choice of high-tech companies. The study results are helpful for executive management teams and investors since they shed light on the specific style of financing choice for technological firms.

Agency theory predicts that the default premium on debt is determined by the intensity of agency conflicts since they affect the risk of debtholders. This effect is especially important in emerging countries with high ownership concentration and low protection of minority owners. This paper presents an empirical analysis of the influence of ownership structure and board independence on the cost of debt in BRIC countries over the period 2007–2020. The main finding of the study is the presence of significant country-specific effects of ownership structure on the cost of debt measured with the G-spread on corporate bonds, as well as the absence of effects of board independence. According to our results, concentrated ownership and state ownership increase the cost of debt in Brazil and Russia, while decreasing it in China. We reveal that institutional investors help mitigate the risks of debtholders in China, while insider ownership decreases the default risk in Brazil.

Concentration of corporate ownership has increased worldwide during recent years, especially in the holdings of the largest investors. The paper examines this trend in order to understand how changes in the stakes of the largest shareholders affect corporate governance and performance. In order to take into account the different goals and motives among institutional investors, the effects on corporate governance and performance attributable to the largest ownership stakes by traditional investment managers and by hedge funds are studied separately. A sample of non-financial companies from the Russell 3000 index indicates that the influence of the largest shareholders on corporate governance and performance depends on shareholders' motives and strategies. The authors employ regression analysis of panel data to construct an index of the quality of corporate governance, which then shows that traditional investment managers prefer to invest in companies that already have superior corporate governance and that these investors bring about further improvements in governance, which also benefit performance. The influence of hedge funds as the largest owners is the opposite. Hedge funds with large holdings tend to degrade corporate governance and have no effect on performance. This paper concludes that the different motives of large investors in a company become quite significant as ownership becomes increasingly concentrated.

The article analyzes the annual observation data of the Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring (RosHydroMet) from 2010-2019. RosHydroMet constantly monitors and selects reliable information from various systems: national network stations, as well as foreign terrain and satellite stations, by which data of total ozone content have a high degree of reliability, accuracy and detail. Quantitative indicators of total ozone content over the territory of the Russian Federation are considered, the values of which are expressed by the reduced thickness of the ozone layer. Deviations of the average annual total ozone content from the norm for this period in percentage are also presented in graphic form and corresponding conclusions are made based on the analysis results.

The indigenous population of North Africa was represented by various Berber tribes, most of which belonged to three large genealogical confederations - Ṣanhāja, Zenāta and Maṣmūda. The question, which the author of the present research examines, is the origin of the Ṣanhāja tribe, its ethnicity and possible ties with Arab tribes that migrated from territories of modern Yemen in the early Islamic period. This work reveals a range of problems associated with the authenticity of sources, the availability of copies, authors, translations. The medieval history of the Maghreb and Berber tribes is a promising, however, still insufficiently studied field for research. Understanding a recon- struction of the historical process, its features, ambiguity, and methodology in the light of the undertaken research appears to provide a necessary basis for formation of a correct approach to the study of sources. This article discusses the issue of historical authenticity and the genealogy of Ṣanhāja confederation as well as the origin of this ethnonym.

During two decades the Russian government has invested heavily in support of high-tech startups. However, considering high level of information opacity of startups, we focus on equity as the primary source of their financing, and on owners as the main source of support for such firms. This paper examines how ownership characteristics affect the performance of high-tech performance of startups in nuclear and space industries. We focus on how different types of owners (founders, state, and venture capital) contribute to performance of startups in nuclear and space industries. Using an unbalanced panel of startups from Skolkovo, the largest Russian innovation cluster, from 2010 to 2016, we found evidence of a negative relationship between a support from government-related organizations and chosen indicators of startup performance. Our findings confirmed the significant impact of private venture capital on startup performance, however the effect is industry-specific. While family equity contributions were not found to have a significant impact on startup performance, we identified a positive relationship between owner or CEO change and future startup performance. We discuss potential interpretations of the findings and provide strategic management insights for startup owners and investors.

Innovations are a major driver of the global economy. Recently, the typical major owner become an institutional investor. Moreover, the stakes of institutional owners have increased, which lead to the ownership concentration among types. Traditional investment managers, banks, insurance companies and hedge funds have different goals and strategies, so their roles in firms differ significantly. In this article we analyze the influence of different types of investors on the innovation input and output of Russell 3000 index US companies. This research uses a GLS models to suggest on 17346 firm-year observations for period 2004–11 that different types of investors have different effects on the innovative performance of US companies. By focusing on the ownership concentration, we demonstrate first, that grey investors decrease innovative output; second, that passive independent institutions enhance innovation input and output in virtue of their active monitoring and long-term investment horizons; third, that the concentration of the industry, size and financial constraints play an important role in the innovative performance.

Bank risk-taking behavior is of significant interest for researches and policy makers because financial failures due to excessive risk in this sector can have severe consequences for the bank’s numerous stakeholders and for the macroeconomic system overall. A growing literature investigates the main factors contributing to “well above average” risk. In particular, this study explains risk strategies in firms taking into account the bounded rationality of corporate governance agents. On a panel dataset of 110 listed US banks in the period of 2011-2016 empirical evidence is provided that excessive risk-taking in banks arises from the cognitive bias of the overconfidence of CEO decision-making. The study also presents how the impact of an overconfident CEO on risk-taking is affected considering the interaction of CEO overconfidence with the board of directors. It was revealed that the CEO's positive influence on risk is moderated if the board is an effective monitoring mechanism with the presence of independent directors who are experts in the financial sphere

For years we believed in the sectoral structure of the economy. We believe in similar business models, decision-making processes, risk preferences, and performance for firms in one sector. However, now we observe the structural changes in the global economy. New leaders have different business models, stakeholders, and risk preferences. Today it is more about people, we believe. Decision-makers (investors, CEOs, directors) develop the firm financial design based on their risk preferences, goals, and behavioral biases. We reexamine the links between the financial decisions in the corporates and governance mechanisms. We apply cluster analysis to determine the typical patterns of firm design. We show that there are 9 sustainable patterns of firm design in US market nowadays, and describe the portraits of typical firms in each cluster. We show that performance and risk differ significantly through clusters. Finally, we state that industry factors do not play a crucial role in the firm’s risk preferences and performance anymore. JEL Classification: G32, G34.

In recent decades, innovative companies became one of the major drivers of economy worldwide. According to surveys, nearly 70% of the world’s most innovative companies in 2019 are U.S. firms. However, academic studies mostly focused on the influence of the top management team and the board of director’s on the firm performance, on the relationship between innovations and CEO`s preferences. However, we suppose CEO can exert a significant influence on performance of innovative companies. We strive to show which CEO characteristics could lead to higher firm value. Does highly educated CEO contribute more to innovations in hi-tech sphere? Does CEO power matter? Are founders better CEOs than newcomers or professionals for technological companies with their longer horizons and higher risks? This research uses Generalized Least Square model on a sample of 12565 firm-year observations during 2004-2015 period. For this research we used data for three innovative industries: Pharmaceuticals, Biotechnology & Life Sciences, Software & Services and Technology Hardware & Equipment industries. We have hand-collected data from the CVs in CIQ database. Overall, the empirical results reveal that educational background, tenure, duality play crucial roles in explaining firm value. This study contributes to the existing literature in two aspects. First, our findings indicate that CEO characteristics play crucial roles in explaining technology firm value and performance. We demonstrated that founding CEO contributes to technology firm performance as well as the CEO with better education. Second, CEOs should be smart and powerful in order to sustain firm performance. We found that CEOs characteristics could mitigate the conflicts between different types of investors and their influence on firm performance. More specifically, CEOfounder was found to add greatly to the firm performance of Software and Pharmaceutical companies. Furthermore, the influence of CEO seems to mitigate the conflict of interest with independent active institutional investors in Hardware industry. We provided examples to prove the validity of our tests.

In this paper, the authors focus on two primary governance mechanisms which can be considered as sources of sup-port for startup companies: the company’s ownership contingent and the company’s management personnel. Based on descriptive statistics from a sample of 416 Skolkovo start-ups from the ‘Nuclear’ and ‘Space’ clusters, and a Start-up-Ba-rometer survey of 300 IT-entrepreneurs, this work provides new insights into ownership and management characteristics of Russian startups and the interplay between these dynamics. The Russian venture market presents an interesting case of an emerging market with a number of successful startups in a challenging economic environment. The supply of venture capital for Russian startups is restricted by the presence of sanctions and legal restrictions on the investments of financial institutions such as pension funds and banks. Therefore, similar to other developed and developing markets, the most significant source of investments for Russian startups is bootstrapping. In this paper we show that startups with different characteristics attract different kinds of investors, which is reflected in the companies ownership structures. In particular, government development institutes are more interested in investing in nuclear-focused startups, while corporate investors tend to keep a higher level of control over startups compared to other investors. We also confirmed the presence of correlations between different types of owners: government develop-ment institutions, corporate investors, venture funds, and family members. Additionally, the size of equity share for all types of owners (except family members) was found to be negatively correlated with the CEO’s share in the ownership structure. Although the purpose of the article is descriptive, it motivates further research on the sources of support of startup growth, including relative importance of such sources and their effects on startup performance.

This paper contributes to the literature on management and corporate governance in microfinance institutions. The microfinance market is one of the rare markets with a large representation of women in management and governance roles. The objective of our paper is to reveal the effects of women’s presence on the financial and social performance of microfinance institutions. To achieve this, we develop a model that allows for capturing the influence of gender diversity in the microfinance field whilst controlling for risks. We focus on the role of women as loan officers, on boards of directors, and involved in managing the creation of microfinance institutions. Our model utilises two sets of panel data regressions, one for social performance and one for financial performance, and is tested on data from 193 microfinance institutions across Eastern Europe and Central Asia for the financial years 2010 through 2014. The results of our investigation indicate that the activity of female members of management, CEOs, and boards of directors could increase performance indicators for riskier microfinance institutions. This is illustrated particularly in the case of projects with greater stakes in portfolios that are more than 90 days in arrears. We also provide evidence that women on boards tend more towards promoting a strategy utilising large quantities of small loans with greater interest. The social performance of microfinance institutions is crucially determined by the microfinance institutions’ size. For the largest microfinance institutions, questions of social performance lie in the field of boards of directors, while smaller institutions’ social performance is mostly driven by CEOs and staff, with significant evidence of a positive female influence on performance indicators. The novelty of this study is demonstrated the scope of our research. We combine several contemporary issues of peculiar cross-disciplinary interest, and offer succinct and compelling results which will be of immediate applicability in a wide range of academic and professional fields. Our results will be of interest to scholars of gender, social studies, psychology, business, corporate structure, and more. More specifically, we add to the evolving sub-field of study of microfinance institutions, which has the potential to develop rapidly in the near future. This paper represents a cross-section of commercial and business research across a wide territory, with a large sample size, and provides compelling conclusions, which add to these fields of study by both validating existing research, and highlighting new areas for future analysis.

Innovative companies are a major driver of the global economy. The typical major owner is an institutional investor. In recent years the stakes of institutional owners have increased, which should increase the role of institutional investors. Institutional investors, however, differ. Traditional investment managers, banks, insurance companies and hedge funds have different goals and strategies, so their roles in firms differ significantly. In this article we analyze the difference between technology and non-technology companies to find out the reason for the success of fast-growing corporations. This research uses a Generalized Least Square model on a sample of 12,565 firm-year observations 2004–15, to justify the assumption that different types of investors have different effects on the performance of innovative companies. The research reveals a distinction between the type of investor and the investor strategy. By focusing on the concentration of ownership, we demonstrate the performance effect on different blockholders. Our findings suggest, first, that grey investors decrease firm value; second, that passive independent institutions enhance firm performance in virtue of their active monitoring and long-term investment horizons; third, that innovative firms have different ownership patterns to traditional ones.

This article examines the presence of the reference price effect in mergers and acquisitions in Russia, which can act as a distortion in investor perception of the influence a deal has on a company. In this study we use the Russian market as a laboratory for the investigation of behavioral effects in a relatively inefficient market. We find a relationship between the acquirer’s announcement period return and the proximity of its pre-announcement share price to the 52-week high. The 52-week high serves as a salient anchor even though it is economically irrelevant for valuation purposes. This effect appears to be stronger for deals associated with higher levels of uncertainty. The findings confirm the presence of the anchoring bias in evaluating the effect of a merger or acquisition announcement by Russian investors. We demonstrate a significant anchoring effect even for deals with a blocking (>10%) or a controlling stake (>25%) in an emerging market with a highly concentrated ownership.

Categories such as "the Berbers" and "the Arabs" are historical. Their production, maintenance, and reproduction occur under particular circumstances. As circumstances change, so do these categories. The role of Arabs in the Medieval History of Maghreb is usually exaggerated. A number of Berber powerful dynasties emerged during Middle Ages in Maghreb and al-Andalus. This report is motivated by the desire to trace the process of the conquest of al-Andalus at the beginning of the 8th c. As we speak about al-Andalus it worth noting that the Muslims who entered Iberia in 711 were mainly Berbers, and were led again by a Berber, Tariq ibn Ziyad. May we claim that Berbers formed approximately 65-70% or at least the major part of the Islamic population in Iberia that time? That was the question that had pushed me to the research. I argue that it's true, considering the analysis of the military structure of Arab-Berber army, the comparison that would be made on basis of the sources related to the topic, from the point of view of Berbers position in the power hierarchy in Iberia, and through the description of the cultural and historical background. This study provides an important opportunity to advance the understanding of the role of the Berbers in the conquest of the Iberian Peninsula, who may be were the ones who tipped the scales in the favor of Arabs' tribes.

This paper deals with an issue relevant for Russia’s energy policy, namely, the need to attract private investment, including foreign direct investment, in renovation and upgrading of energy infrastructure. Based on the survey that involved private investors from several countries, the paper addresses the question of how investors perceive private investment risks existing in Russia. Further, the conclusions are made about how these perceptions might affect private investment in energy systems projects in Russia. The results demonstrate that improvements in policy and institutional frameworks are needed in order to attract private investment, especially, in such projects with medium and long-term planning horizon and return of investment as deployment and upgrading of energy generation and transmission infrastructure in Russia.

The prior work reports conflicting evidence on the relationship between owners, corporate governance, and capital structure of public nonfinancial companies as well as on the industry specific drivers of firm performance. We reexamine the links between the financial decisions in the companies and governance mechanisms by applying the inductive approach to the pool of public companies in Russell 3000. We apply the cluster analysis, which accounts for capital structure and governance mechanisms simultaneously, for determination of patterns of firm financial architecture. As a result, we show that these patterns do not strongly depend on the industry, and finally industry factors do not play the crucial role for the firm’s risk preferences and performance.

Anastasia N. Stepanova - National Research University The Higher School of Economics E-mail: anstepanova@hse.ru Ivantsova Olga Mikhailovna - expert: Faculty of Economics, Research and Training Laboratory of Corporate Finance, HSE. E-mail: oivantsova@hse.ru This paper aims to investigate the effect that internal corporate governance mechanisms have on the performance of commercial banks, how it differs for developed and emerging European markets, and whether it has changed as a result of the financial crisis. The key statistical tool used in the paper is the panel data analysis of the sample of 150 banks from 27 countries, over the period 2004-2011. We document the evidence partially supporting the effectiveness of smaller boards of directors, while the board independence seems to be negatively associated with the strategic performance of banks, especially in emerging markets and in times of a crisis. In emerging markets, state-owned banks appear to be more market-efficient, while high ownership concentration is considered by market players to be a negative signal. Studying the 2008 financial crisis period provides the evidence for structural movements in nonfinancial performance drivers.