Corporate Shareholding Structure and Dividend Payout Ratio of Listed Chemical and Paints Companies in Nigeria

This paper is an empirical analysis of influence of Corporate Shareholdings Structure on Dividend payout ratio of listed Chemical and Paints Companies in Nigeria. The study is for the period of 2008-2013. The listed Chemical and Paints Companies are Eight (8) in number as provided by Nigerian stock exchange factbook for 2013. All the eight firms were used for the study. Corporate Shareholdings Structure was proxy with managerial shareholding, institutional shareholding, block shareholding and foreign shareholdings, while dividend payout ratio was proxy with dividends to net income for the same period. The data were collected from secondary source through the annual reports and accounts of the firm. The study adopted multiple regression technique. The findings revealed that managerial shareholdings has negatively, strongly and significantly impacted on dividend payout ratio of listed Chemical and Paints Companies in Nigeria, while Institutional shareholdings, Foreign shareholdings have positive, strong and significant influence on dividend payout ratio. But block shareholding shows no significant contribution to dividend payout ratio. It is recommended amongst others that the listed Chemical and Paints Companies should increase the number of shares allotted to institutional shareholders and foreign shareholders where investors are only interested in dividend payment as it may serve as a sure means of having increase in payment of dividend to shareholders. But where shareholders are only interested in capital gain rather than dividend payment, the shares held by management should be increased as this will discourage payment of high dividend in favour of capital gain.

Top Executive Appointments: Firm Size And Managerial Holdings

This paper analyzes top executive appointments according to internal promotions and external hirings. It is found that the market response is significantly positive for external hirings and is insignificant for internal hirings. A logistic regression shows that smaller firms are more likely to hire from outside and as firm size increases, the frequency of outside hiring decreases. Higher managerial shareholdings increase the probability of external hirings.

Corporate governance in banking: A survey of the literature

The aim of this paper is to explain the particular characteristics of the corporate governance of banks and its role for good bank performance. In order to do that, it reviews the existing literature on this issue trying to answer three main questions: (i) Why are banks different? Existing research points at diverse features, such as, regulation, supervision, capital structure, risk, fiduciary relationships, ownership, and deposit insurance, that would make banks special and thereby influence their corporate governance. (ii) What is different about bank governance? According to past studies, banks’ boards of directors are larger, more independent, have a superior number of committees and meet more often, but seem to play a weaker disciplinary role. Executive compensation would be higher in banking, but pay-performance sensitivity appears lower. (iii) What works for banks? Larger boards, more concentrated ownership structures and certain levels of managerial shareholdings are the principal factors suggested by the empirical evidence to date that seem to lead banks to higher performance.

Board leadership: Antecedents and performance outcomes

In this paper several theories, which make different predictions about the effect of board leadership structure on firm performance, are tested. The results indicate that, for Australian listed companies, there is no strong relationship between leadership structure and subsequent performance. It is reported that companies with higher blockholder ownership or lower managerial shareholdings tend to have an affiliated chairman; firm with higher managerial shareholdings tend to have an executive chairman. The evidence suggests that there is no one optimal leadership structure; each structure, which could be an outcome of a rational choice process influenced by other governance characteristics of individual firms, may have associated costs and benefits.