Lawyer CEOs

M. Todd Henderson; Irena Hutton; Danling Jiang; Matthew Pierson

doi:10.1017/S0022109023001333

Lawyer CEOs

M. Todd Henderson
, Irena Hutton
, Danling Jiang
, Matthew Pierson

Dean's Office, College of Business

The University of Chicago
Florida State University
University of Pennsylvania

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

5 Scopus citations

Abstract

We study when CEOs with legal expertise are valuable for firms. In general, lawyer CEOs are negatively associated with frequency and severity in employment civil rights, contract, labor, personal injury, and securities litigation. This effect is partly induced by the CEO's management of litigation risk and reduction in other risky policies. Lawyer CEOs are further associated with an increase in gatekeepers providing additional legal oversight and a decrease in innovative activities with high litigation risk. Lawyer CEOs are more valuable during periods of enhanced compliance requirements and regulatory pressure and in industries with high litigation risk or better growth opportunities.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	580-616
Number of pages	37
Journal	Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis
Volume	60
Issue number	2
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022109023001333
State	Published - Mar 1 2025

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Lawyer CEOs

Abstract

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