2023 Working Paper Prizes

BRUSSELS – 4 AUGUST 2023. The European Corporate Governance Institute (ECGI) is delighted to announce the winners of the best papers in the Working Paper Finance and Law Series’ published in 2022.

The 2023 Intesa Sanpaolo Finance Prize of EUR 5,000 has been awarded to Professors José Azar (IESE Business School and ECGI) and Xavier Vives (IESE Business School and ECGI) for their paper on: “Revisiting the Anticompetitive Effects of Common Ownership” (ECGI Finance Working Paper 827/2022).

The traditional partial equilibrium literature argues that common ownership within an industry results in anti-competitive behaviour. The authors argue that in addition there is a general equilibrium effect that operates in the opposite direction. The paper analyses inter and intra industry common ownership and the overall effect on airline prices. It distinguishes the implications of common ownership by large institutional investors (the large index funds) and by more industry-focused investors, and finds different results for prices.

The 2023 ECGI Law Prize for the Best Paper in the ECGI Law Working Paper Series has been awarded to Dan W. Puchniak (Singapore Management University and ECGI) for his paper: “No Need for Asia to be Woke: Contextualizing Anglo-America’s “Discovery” of Corporate Purpose” (ECGI Law Working Paper 646/2022).

The paper does not venture that a move away from shareholder primacy is good or bad. It makes the point that context matters, with the case in Asia demonstrating that different jurisdictions have separate understandings of the purpose that corporations should serve and that at any given time each jurisdiction will be at a different point along the shareholder-primacy / stakeholderism continuum.

Referring to the awards, Professor Marco Becht, ECGI Executive Director said:

“The winning papers are selected by juries of scholars on the basis of their relevance and interest. It is notable that the two selected papers contribute to live debates on much discussed issues of global interest. Crucially, they both demonstrate that details matter. This is why academic research is so important to inform public discourse and policy”.

The prizes will be awarded at the 'ECGI Annual Conference' in Copenhagen, Denmark on 22 September 2023. Details here: https://www.ecgi.global/content/2023-ecgi-annual-meeting#!event-programme