We provide evidence that U.S. firms have a significantly higher probability of acquiring targets in countries where their CEOs have studied or worked. This finding is robust to alternative measures of CEO country-specific experience, samples or model specifications, and to controlling for endogeneity and target country industry specialization. Moreover, deal-level evidence suggests a reassurance effect. CEO experience has no effect on announcement returns or long-run operating performance on average but is associated with significantly better performance in risky environments. We also provide additional evidence to disentangle alternative hypotheses and explore the role of corporate governance in determining deal outcomes.

我们提供的证据表明，美国公司在其 CEO 曾学习或工作过的国家/地区收购目标的可能性要高得多。这一发现对于 CEO 国家特定经验、样本或模型规范的替代措施以及控制内生性和目标国家行业专业化是稳健的。此外，交易层面的证据表明了一种保证效应。CEO 经验对公告回报或平均长期经营业绩没有影响，但与风险环境中的显着更好业绩相关。我们还提供了额外的证据来解开替代假设，并探讨公司治理在决定交易结果中的作用。