Controlling shareholders, performance and risk taking of Tunisian listed firms

Abstract

We investigate the effects of ownership structure, as an internal control mechanism of agency problem, on corporate governance. We focused specially on the impact of the size, number and type of blockholders on the performance and the risk-taking of the Tunisian listed companies during the period 2001-2004. The descriptive analysis highlights, absence of ownership-control discrepancy, high ownership concentration, low management stock-ownership and the presence of two or three large blockholders with significant difference of the block share size between the first and the other controlling shareholders. The main result of our study indicates that the presence of controlling shareholders affect performance and risk-taking and play an important role in corporate governance. However, we assume that the control contest of the leading shareholder is not conclusive but indicate a form of coalition and agreement effect to share private benefits.