This paper examines the relation between a company's performance and its top executives' service on other boards of directors. Using dividend cuts to measure performance, we find that top executives of companies that reduce their dividends are approximately 50% less likely to receive additional outside directorships than are top executives of companies that do not reduce their dividends (significant at 1% level). The probability that top executives will resign from or lose outside directorships they already hold is negatively, but not significantly, related to the performance of their own firms.

This paper estimates the systematic risk of the debt in public leveraged recapitalizations. We calculate this risk as a function of the difference in systematic equity risk before and after the recapitalization. The increase in equity risk is surprisingly small after a recapitalization, ranging from 37% to 57%, depending on the estimation method. If total company risk is unchanged, the implied systematic risk of the post-recapitalization debt in twelve transactions averages 0.65. Alternatively, if the entire market-adjusted premium in the leveraged recapitalization represents a reduction in fixed costs, the implied systematic risk of this debt averages 0.40.