Voluntary disclosure, excess executive compensation, and firm value

This study refines' and extends Anglo-American research exploring excess executive compensation and its effects on firm value using data from Taiwan, a country in which the board members and executives of a firm often have friendly relations with one another. We find that excess executive compensation is negatively related to firm value but that voluntary disclosure practices moderate this relationship. Specifically, our results indicate that excess executive compensation has a positive effect on firm value when firms disclose comprehensive information voluntarily and that this effect is more pronounced in group-affiliated firms. Moreover, firms that provide comprehensive voluntary disclosure appear to alleviate agency problems more efficiently when their controlling shareholders have higher private benefit incentives or when these firms have higher quality corporate governance. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.