The Journal of Finance publishes leading research across all the major fields of finance. It is one of the most widely cited journals in academic finance, and in all of economics. Each of the six issues per year reaches over 8,000 academics, finance professionals, libraries, and government and financial institutions around the world. The journal is the official publication of The American Finance Association, the premier academic organization devoted to the study and promotion of knowledge about financial economics.
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Moral Hazard and the Portfolio Management Problem
Published: 12/01/1993 | DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-6261.1993.tb05140.x
NEAL M. STOUGHTON
This paper investigates the significance of nonlinear contracts on the incentive for portfolio managers to collect information. In addition, the manager must be motivated to disclose this information truthfully. We analyze three contracting regimes: (1) first‐best where effort is observable, (2) linear with unobservable effort, and (3) the optimal contract within the Bhattacharya‐Pfleiderer quadratic class. We find that the linear contract leads to a serious lack of effort expenditure by the manager. This underinvestment problem can be successfully overcome through the use of quadratic contracts. These contracts are shown to be asymptotically optimal for very risk‐tolerant principals.
Intermediated Investment Management
Published: 05/23/2011 | DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-6261.2011.01656.x
NEAL M. STOUGHTON, YOUCHANG WU, JOSEF ZECHNER
Intermediaries such as financial advisers serve as an interface between portfolio managers and investors. A large fraction of their compensation is often provided through kickbacks from the portfolio manager. We provide an explanation for the widespread use of intermediaries and kickbacks. Depending on the degree of investor sophistication, kickbacks are used either for price discrimination or aggressive marketing. We explore the effects of these arrangements on fund size, flows, performance, and investor welfare. Kickbacks allow higher management fees to be charged, thereby lowering net returns. Competition among active portfolio managers reduces kickbacks and increases the independence of advisory services.
Moral Hazard and Adverse Selection: The Question of Financial Structure
Published: 06/01/1986 | DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-6261.1986.tb05051.x
MASAKO N. DARROUGH, NEAL M. STOUGHTON
This paper looks at the moral hazard and adverse selection problems confronting an entrepreneur offering securities to an uninformed, but competitive financial market. The adverse selection aspect of the problem is generated by the unobservable entrepreneur's ability to transform effort into value. Moral hazard arises because the investment decision is made subsequent to financing. We consider the joint use of both debt and equity, and characterize the equilibrium relation between capital structure and unobservable attributes. It is shown that: (1) investment and financing are not separable; (2) there is an underinvestment problem for “better” firms; and (3) simultaneous use of both debt and equity can resolve this difficulty. We also establish a connection between expected terminal firm value and debt‐promised payment level and between share retention and standard deviation.