Abstract This paper investigates whether firms with more effective boards have lower firm risk. We show a strong negative relationship between board effectiveness (BSCI ratings) and firm risk. Furthermore, we show that several individual components of board effectiveness are negative and statistically related to firm risk. In particular, board independence, board structure, board system and board decision-making lead to lower firm risk. Our findings have implications for firms’ costs of capital that is, effective boards are likely to result in a reduction of agency costs due to the separation of ownership and control and in turn, a reduction in the overall cost of capital for firms.

中文翻译：

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董事会有效性：来自公司风险的证据

摘要本文研究了具有更有效董事会的企业是否具有较低的企业风险。我们显示出董事会效力（BSCI评级）与公司风险之间存在强烈的负相关关系。此外，我们表明，董事会有效性的几个单独组成部分均为负数，并且与公司风险在统计上相关。特别是董事会的独立性，董事会的结构，董事会的制度和董事会的决策可以降低公司风险。我们的发现对公司的资本成本有影响，即有效的董事会可能会由于所有权和控制权的分离而降低代理成本，进而降低公司的总体资本成本。