We examine the association between “busyness” of the board of directors (serving on multiple boards) and bank holding company (BHC) performance and risk. We estimate several simultaneous-equations models employing the 3SLS technique and instrumental variables to account for endogeneity. We obtain four main results. First, BHC performance measures (return on equity, Tobin’s Q and EBIT over total assets) are positively associated with busyness of directors. Second, BHC risk measures (total, market, idiosyncratic, credit and default risks) are inversely related to busyness of directors. Third, performance (risk) benefits of having busy directors strengthened (weakened) during the financial crisis of 2007–2009. Fourth, busy directors are not more likely to become problem directors (fail the 75% attendance standard), and if sitting on boards of both BHC and non-financial firms, they attend more of the BHC board meetings, than those of the non-financials. Our findings partially alleviate concerns that over-boarded directors shirk their responsibilities.

CEO entrenchment distorts firms’ liquidity policy because entrenched CEOs and shareholders have conflicting preferences for liquidity. We investigate the association between firms’ liquidity level/mix and entrenchment within a system model accounting for endogeneity. Several results are obtained. Entrenched CEOs (i) hold more liquidity because it helps reduce their firm’s risks, provides them with job and wealth security, and gives them discretion in pursuing personal objectives; (ii) prefer cash over lines of credit (LCs) because the latter are accompanied by bank monitoring; and (iii) use more LCs, despite their associated monitoring, because they provide extra liquidity. Sample disaggregation shows that increased liquidity due to CEO entrenchment can be attributed to smaller and more opaque firms – large and transparent firms maintain their liquidity levels but increase their shares of cash. These findings imply that firms should align the interests of entrenched CEOs with those of shareholders to reduce the undesirable effects of entrenchment on liquidity management.

This study examines how algorithmic trading (AT) affects forward‐looking disclosures in Management Discussion and Analysis (MD&A) of annual reports. We predict and find evidence that AT relates negatively to modifications in year‐over‐year forward‐looking MD&A disclosures. This evidence is consistent with AT reducing investors’ demand for fundamental information, which reduces managers’ incentives to supply costly forward‐looking disclosures. Cross‐sectional tests provide additional evidence that this negative relation is more pronounced for firms with larger earnings surprises and those with losses. We further validate our conclusion by demonstrating that investors’ fundamental information searches are a channel through which AT affects forward‐looking disclosures. The conclusion is robust to using the SEC's Tick Size Pilot Program as an exogenous shock to AT and to using alternative disclosure measures (e.g., tone revisions and number of sentences in forward‐looking MD&A disclosures). Overall, our study demonstrates that AT is a contributing factor to regulators’ concerns over the diminishing usefulness of forward‐looking information in MD&A disclosures.