Abstract

This thesis consists of two essays focusing on long-term perspective in management.
The first essay (chapter 2) studies how family firms’ valuations are affected by the presence of free cash flow and anti-takeover provisions. Both free cash flow and anti-takeover provisions are believed to increase the severity of agency conflicts. However, we found that in family firms, the existence of free cash flow and anti-takeover provisions are not perceived as damaging. Our findings indicate that higher levels of free cash flow and higher levels of anti-takeover provisions in family firms are associated with higher valuations as measured by the firms’ Tobin’s Q. Moreover, we find that an increase in strength of anti-takeover provisions or level of free cash flow in family firms positively affects family firms’ valuation.
The second essay (chapter 3) uses a unique data set of natural disasters that occurred around the world during the period 1970 to 2015 and study their impact on the price and price volatility of globally traded agricultural commodities. Our results show that natural disasters affect most of the commodities examined in this study by causing an increase in their price volatility whereas prices are only marginally affected. In addition to this, we find that the total damage caused by a natural disaster affects the magnitude of price and price volatility changes of a given commodity. Finally, natural disasters affecting countries with a higher share of the global production of a commodity have a more significant impact on the price and price volatility of that commodity.