Board governance and corporate performance
研究了英国上市公司董事会监督能力与公司绩效的关系，发现遵循公司治理准则能提升监督能力、缓解代理问题，但投资者并未相应估值；企业有时会利用准则灵活性降低监督能力，导致后续业绩不佳，质疑了自愿性治理监管的有效性。
Abstract We examine the link between the monitoring capacity of the board and corporate performance of UK listed firms. We also investigate how firms use the flexibility offered by the voluntary governance regime to make governance choices. We find a strong positive association between the board governance index we construct and firm operating performance. Our results imply that adherence to the board‐related recommendations of the UK Corporate Governance Code strengthens the board's monitoring capacity, potentially helping mitigate agency problems, but that investors do not value it correspondingly. Moreover, in contrast to prior UK findings suggesting efficient adoption of Code recommendations, we find that firms at times use the Code flexibility opportunistically, aiming to decrease the monitoring capacity of the board, which is followed by subsequent underperformance. This finding questions the effectiveness of the voluntary approach to governance regulation followed in the UK and in many countries around the world.