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To link to full-text access for this article, visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jbankfin.2008.09.020 Byline: Pornsit Jiraporn (a), Manohar Singh (b), Chun I. Lee (c) Keywords: Multiple directorships; Board committees; Corporate governance; Sarbanes-Oxley act Abstract: Our paper examines whether holding multiple outside board seats compromises a director's ability to effectively perform monitoring duties. Analyzing over 1400 firms, we report that individuals who hold more outside directorships serve on fewer board committees. The relation, however, appears non-linear, U-shaped, and in support for both the busyness and the reputation hypotheses. In addition, we find that holding more outside board seats decreases the likelihood of membership on compensation and audit committees. The findings substantiate evidence [Akhigbe, A., Martin, A.D., 2006. Valuation impact of Sarbanes-Oxley: Evidence from disclosure and governance within the financial services industry. Journal of Banking and Finance 30 (3), 989-1006] of value relevance of board committee structures. Additional analysis of committee memberships suggests that women and ethnic minorities are placed on more board committees. Also, directors on smaller and independent boards serve on more committees. Finally, it appears that the Sarbanes-Oxley act had a material impact on the association between the number of multiple board seats and committee memberships. Author Affiliation: (a) Pennsylvania State University, United States (b) Willamette University, Atkinson Graduate School of Management, 900 State Street, Salem, OR 97301, United States (c) Loyola Marymount University, United States Article History: Received 28 February 2008; Accepted 10 September 2008

A study on night trading market and stock price movements on the following day is presented. Institutional liquidity providers are not very active during night trading sessions.

On 23 October 2000, the U.S. SEC put Regulation Fair Disclosure into effect. It requires companies to disseminate releases of material information to all investors, not selectively. Proponents of Regulation FD argued that the flow of information would improve; critics of the regulation asserted that Regulation FD would increase volatility and reduce the quantity of information being released into the market, resulting in an increase in asymmetric information. We examined components of the bid-ask spread surrounding news releases and trading activity by retail versus institutional investors before and after the institution of Regulation FD. Our results indicate no significant increase in volatility after Regulation FD, and we found little or no increase in the adverse-selection component of bid-ask spreads. Overall, our results do not support critics of Regulation FD.

Currency spot cross-rates are transparent enough to eliminate moving average (MA) trading rule profits. This was gleaned from the results of an application of the MA trading rule to six European spot cross-rates to find out if there are opportunities for profitable trading. Results showed that MA trading rules are marginally profitable for two cross-rates and not profitable at all for the four others. Similar results were derived from bootstrapping and out-of-sample tests, as well as examination of subsamples characterized by central bank intervention.

* The role of the board of directors (BOD) in the corporate governance process had received considerable research attention in recent years. Although the board is legally authorized to ratify [...]

The efficiency of four financial contracts traded on the French derivatives market is examined.

A comprehensive analysis of the existence of the compass rose pattern on 118 commodity futures contracts that are traded on 31 commodity futures exchanges located in 15 different countries reveals that the pattern is not universal. However, the pattern does appear prominently in some market sectors. This elusiveness, which is seen on the cash Standard and Poor's 500-Stock Price Index only on returns within a limit of 1%, suggests the need for further studies on the subject.

The impact of information arrival on the market microstructure of stick index futures markets was examined. In particular, the Chicago Board of Trade Major Market Index futures (MMI), the Chicago Mercantile Exchange Standard and Poor's 500 futures (S&P 500) and the New York Futures Exchange New York Stock Exchange Composite Index futures (NYSE) were studied from Jan 1986-Jul 1991. Among other findings, trading in the MMI consistently dropped after the spot market's close. By way of contrast, however, the NYSE and S&P 500 continue to trade and reach a peak at the close of the futures markets. A surge in volatility and trading near the closing of the MMI and the spill over to the NYSE and S&P 500 indicated the presence of expiration effects.

The Spanish futures markets, which are part of the the firm called MEFF Sociedad Holding de Productos Financieros Derivados, were investigated because of their increasing significance for both foreign and domestic investors. Findings from serial correlations, unit root tests and variance ratio tests indicated that the random walk hypothesis cannot be repudiated. Therefore, the MEFF markets are efficient.