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We examine changes in stock price informativeness following the European Union's Transparency Directive (TPD). The TPD, implemented by country between 2007 and 2009, enhanced corporate transparency through mandating regular firm financial disclosures and facilitating the dissemination of financial reports. Using stock return synchronicity as a proxy for stock price informativeness, we find that price informativeness improved following implementation of the TPD. This improvement was more pronounced in countries with strong regulatory environments than those with weak regulatory environments. We additionally examine a later amendment to the TPD that eliminated the requirement of quarterly financial disclosures and document an increase in stock return synchronicity following the amendment. Our findings support prior research suggesting that transparency regulations improve financial information. JEL Classifications: F30; G15; G30; M4. Data Availability: Data are available from the sources cited in the text.

a b s t r a c tWe employ a natural experiment from the 1980s, predating the ubiquitous clamor for independence influenced corporate governance structures, to examine which governance mechanisms are associated with firm survival and failure. We find that thrifts were more likely to survive the thrift crisis when their CEO also chaired the firm's board of directors. On average, chair-holding CEOs undertook less aggressive lending policies than their counterparts who did not chair their boards. Consequently, taxpayer interests were protected by thrifts that bestowed both leadership posts to one person. This is an important policy issue, because taxpayers become the residual claimants for depository institutions that fail as a result of managers adopting risky strategies to exploit underpriced deposit insurance. Our findings corroborate recent evidence that manager-dominated firms resist shareholder pressure to adopt riskier investment strategies to exploit underpriced deposit insurance.

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received his PhD in Finance from Texas A & M University and he is an assistant professor of fi nance at Wichita State University where he teaches upper level undergraduate courses and graduate level fi nance courses. His research focuses on capital structure, insider trading, corporate governance and market effi ciency. Dr Tartaroglu has published two papers on corporate governance and capital structure at the Journal of Banking and Finance. Dr Tartaroglu has worked in fi nancial sector before his doctoral studies and he is a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA).ABSTRACT Financial reporting scandals earlier in the decade and the recent fi nancial crises have led to various market participants calling for regulatory refi nement and stronger enforcement. This article empirically examines the capital market effects of the disclosure that the SEC had issued Wells Notice to a fi rm. Statistically signifi cant price reaction of − 3.3 per cent is found in a short window around the Wells Notice disclosure. The price reaction is signifi cantly more negative for fi rms that used higher accruals at the time of alleged violation. The price reaction is more negative when the CEO is also issued a Wells Notice , but is less negative if the settlement is announced with the Wells Notice. Despite the materiality of Wells Notice , we estimate that only one out of every three fi rms that received Wells Notice discloses this fact to public. These fi ndings contribute to the policy debate regarding disclosure requirements on Wells Notice.