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The corporate governance literature has shown that firms with better governance exhibit higher abnormal returns. In this paper, we examine the effect of cash flow concentration and excess control on equity pricing in France, a country with relatively weak protection for investors. Using hand-collected data on publicly-listed French firms over the period from 2002 to 2011, we find that firms, in which controlling shareholders hold a major proportion of cash flow rights, have higher market performance. Cash flow concentration is a useful monitoring tool for firms to address agency problems. In contrast, a higher level of discrepancy between the control and cash-flow rights of the ultimate controlling shareholders is associated with lower market performance. Control-ownership wedge increases the incentive of the controlling shareholders to act corruptly or unethically. These findings support both incentives hypothesis arising from the cash flow concentration and the expropriation effects arising from the excess control rights. These findings have strong implications for market participants and portfolio investment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article empirically examines the relationship between insider (entrepreneurs and venture capitalists) trading and underpricing and long-run performance in a sample of 120 initial public offerings (IPOs) that took place on the Nouveau Marche in France during the high-tech bubble. We hypothesize that insiders were better informed than the market about the future prospect of the firms, particularly during the high-tech bubble characterized by strong information asymmetry. Trading activity was measured at the IPO date and over a three-year period after this date. We find no evidence suggesting that entrepreneurs and venture capitalists knowingly issue overvalued equity at the IPO date. However, there is weak, but statistically significant, evidence that suggests that entrepreneurs and venture capitalists acquire private information during the first years of flotation and have the ability to take advantage of it by selling overvalued equity. Both these types of insider seem to be the best informed on the future value of the firm. However, changes in ownership of banks and other shareholders are not followed by significant change in the firm's long term value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the state of public relations in France. Initially, public relations were looked upon as a new, self-contained business philosophy, the intellectual phase of the new look in French industry. Yet, it had to develop in a climate that historically and psychologically contains some elements highly unfavorable to its growth. Business and industry have never enjoyed, in France, the prestige that they have generally gained in the Anglo-Saxon countries. An important sector of France's intellectuals-and some of them are in key government posts-contribute to the wide gap of misunderstanding because they are resentful of some of big business's methods. Capital ownership of large enterprises, although more widely distributed now than 20 or 40 years ago, is still closely held. If the need for relations with stockholders and the financial community must be regarded as one of the main factors in influencing the growth of public relations in the Anglo-Saxon countries, the lack of such relations would be held responsible for discouraging a similar development in France. Banks play a traditional role as safe keepers of shares held by individuals and represent the shareholders at company meetings. There is little sense of participation on the part of the small shareholder.