Finance Series
The Voting Premium
Working Paper Author/Authors
University of Washington
Boston College
University of Mannheim Business School
Abstract
This paper develops a unified theory of blockholder governance and the voting premium, in a setting without takeovers and controlling shareholders. A voting premium emerges when a minority blockholder tries to influence the composition of the shareholder base by accumulating votes and buying shares from dissenting shareholders. Empirical measures of the voting premium do not reflect the value of voting rights or voting power. A negative voting premium results from free-riding by dispersed shareholders on the blockholder's trades. Conflicts between dispersed shareholders and the blockholder endogenously increase the liquidity of voting shares, but do not necessarily increase the voting premium.
