Long term investing has been going on for centuries -- from the simplest form, loaning somebody money in order to see a return in the future, to the most complex, advanced investment strategies employed by the asset managers of today. While simple investments are still made today, complex investment strategies have become attractive to those wishing to put their money to work for a long period of time, and see a large financial gain at the end. Traditionally, asset management strategies have involved buying or selling stock -- going long or going short -- and hedging away risk using derivatives and other hedging methods. Since the 1980s, several other investment strategies have been used by those trying to find the best possible investment for their money. Naming a few, we find strategies including quantitative investment, investment in foreign exchange, and activist investing. Activist investors, those taking a large stake in a public company by owning its equity, look to encourage asset prices to move in a direction favorable to them so that they may realize a financial return higher than if the stock would have been left alone in the open market, free to move without outside influence. This paper will examine whether activist stakes in a company truly provide higher returns than traditional strategies.

Hedge Fund Activism begins with a brief outline of the research literature and describes datasets on hedge fund activism.

The book Finance for Executives: A Practical Guide for Managers meets the needs of global executives, both finance as well as non-financial managers. It is a practical and fundamental finance reference book for any manager, as it makes a perfect balance of financial management theory and practice. It focuses on corporate finance concepts from value creation to derivatives, including cost of capital (and WACC), valuation, financing policies, project evaluation, and many other essential finance definitions. Finance for Executives makes finance simple and intuitive, through the use of real world data (brief company case studies and empirical examples of concepts), Excel financial modelling tools, and practical short chapters. Target Audience This finance book is appropriate for business executives, from all backgrounds, seeking to Focus on the links between financial management and the strategy of their company, be it a private or publicly traded company Discover how to create value for their company and boost its financial performance Understand the key topics of corporate finance for non-financial managers Create a cost of capital culture within a company Refresh and broaden their understanding of the latest financial concepts and tools Learn about financial management for decision makers - including financing and dividend policies, company valuation, mergers and acquisitions (M&As), project evaluation, cost of capital (WACC) estimation, or risk management and derivatives Finance for Executives is suited as a finance textbook for corporate finance programs, executive education courses, as well as in MBA, master's, and executive MBA programs. Indeed, the book is based on many years of executive education and consulting with world-class corporations from all continents of the world. What Is This Book About? Finance should be fun, and practical as well. With this book at hand, you will have access to a set of tools that will help you develop your intuition for solving key financial problems, improve your business decisions, and formulate strategies. This finance for managers' reference book is based on Simplicity - The core concepts in corporate finance are simple, and will become intuitively clear after using this book Conciseness - The chapters are short and self-contained to appeal to busy executives who are keen on value-added activities Practical focus - The key concepts of financial management are explained (and linked to Excel modelling tools), while you learn to identify the problems and pitfalls of different managerial choices Application of theory to practice - It highlights key academic research results that are relevant for practitioners Real-world focus - The book includes empirical data on several companies and industries around the world. Working with real-world problems and real-world data is more fruitful than theoretical discussions on formulas Excel Templates An Excel spreadsheet containing all the financial models used in the different chapters is available for download from the book's website. Practitioners will find the file easy to customize to their own requirements. It is useful in a variety of situations: value creation and its decomposition into managerial drivers or key performance indicators (KPIs), cost of capital (WACC) estimation, project evaluation, mergers and acquisitions, company valuation, derivatives valuation, etc. Editorial Reviews An excellent teach-yourself finance primer for non-financial executives, and, I dare say, even for most finance executives. Ravi Kant, Vice Chairman, Tata Motors, India The finance reference book for the desk of ANY manager. Michel Demaré, Chairman of the Board, Syngenta, Switzerland The perfect balance of practice and theory. Geert Bekaert, Professor of Finance, Columbia Business School, USA A key tool to improve your business decisions. Thilo Mannhardt, CEO of Ultrapar, Brazil Finance for Executives is easy to follow, and makes a boring subject actually quite exciting. Severin Schwan, CEO, Roche Group, Switzerland A must-have for your list of favorites. José Manuel Campa, Professor of Finance, IESE Business School, Spain

Contemporary financial markets have been characterized by sociocultural phenomena such as "meme stocks", the Gamestop short squeeze, and "You Only Live Once (YOLO) trading". These are movements led by small-scale retail investors banding together to participate forcefully in financial markets through decentralized but coordinated actions. This book deploys many different subdisciplines to explore the recent ‘power grabbing’ of retail investors and the online environment that enables them to join the ranks of major financial players, and participate in contemporary capitalism. It offers multiple perspectives on the genesis, role, motivations, power, and future prospects of retail investors as a force in contemporary financial markets. Drawing upon the insights of authors hailing from many different countries, the book frames YOLO capitalism through numerous angles that help to explain the context and the importance of activist retail investors in modern financial markets, and thereby explore the possibilities of a transformed financial future with much wider small-scale participation. The book assesses the potential of online - and other - communities in enabling global coordination in impacting or even driving financial and crypto markets, and the challenges that come with it and weighs the competing narratives both positive and negative regarding YOLO capitalism. It strikes a balanced assessment of their legal, cultural, behavioural, economic, and political roles in modern finance. This book will be of interest to a multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary audience of scholars in financial markets, financial regulation, political economy, public administration, macroeconomics, corporate governance, and the philosophy and the sociology of finance.

Over the past century, shareholder activism has gone through a sea of change as the democratization of financial markets allowed for the fragmentation of business ownership. In todays financial markets, activist investors have branded themselves as the voice for minority shareholders and advocate for a number of financial and operational changes for their portfolio companies. Critics, instead, argue that activist investors focus merely on the short-term and do not make changes that are good for a businesss future. Over time shareholder activism passed through a period of stagnant change, with a large discrepancy between management and owners. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, companies that were complacent in their approach to managing capital increasingly saw their firm under potential assault from corporate raiders. These raiders that used junk bonds to help fuel their purchase of large companies were handsomely rewarded when management teams acceded to their requests or offered them a premium to the current market price to close their position.This thesis analyzes equity returns for prominent activist hedge funds to help determine the path of equity returns following the investors exit from the stock. It compares the stock returns over the five-year period that includes the beginning of 2012 to the end of 2017. First, the investments absolute returns over the period are analyzed to determine whether there was positive nominal returns. Next, these returns are compared to the S&P 500 on a relative basis over the respective investment period being analyzed. In addition, the average returns and returns over the one, three, five-year time period are compared to the activist hedge funds that are used in this study. These different return series and data are analyzed to determine whether the variables such as strategies implemented or assets under management are indicative of a hedge funds ability to deliver returns that are above that of the market.Overall, this study concludes that the return profile for activist investors across mid to large cap stocks is heavily dependent on the activist manager. The implications of this study suggest that long-term returns from activist fund managers may not be greater than that of the market. The one-year, three-year, and max return periods for a number of the firms that are analyzed in this study are negative on an absolute and relative basis. Only two of the activist funds that are studied have returns that are both nominal in nature and greater than the S&P 500 over each time frame being studied. At the same time, the average returns for each fund are also lower than that of the S&P 500 for five of the seven activist funds that are measured in this study. Since this study was only completed in regards to large cap stocks, further research should study the investment returns of activist investor in small cap stocks. Furthermore, looking at returns for activist funds with different investment strategies and objectives than the ones presented in this study could help determine which form of activism has a greater propensity to succeed in the long term.

Corporate law and governance are at the forefront of regulatory activities worldwide, and subject to increasing public attention in the wake of the Global Financial Crisis. Comprehensively referencing the key debates, the Handbook provides a much-needed framework for understanding the aims and methods of legal research in the field.

A sharp and illuminating history of one of capitalism’s longest running tensions—the conflicts of interest among public company directors, managers, and shareholders—told through entertaining case studies and original letters from some of our most legendary and controversial investors and activists. Recent disputes between shareholders and major corporations, including Apple and DuPont, have made headlines. But the struggle between management and those who own stock has been going on for nearly a century. Mixing never-before-published and rare, original letters from Wall Street icons—including Benjamin Graham, Warren Buffett, Ross Perot, Carl Icahn, and Daniel Loeb—with masterful scholarship and professional insight, Dear Chairman traces the rise in shareholder activism from the 1920s to today, and provides an invaluable and unprecedented perspective on what it means to be a public company, including how they work and who is really in control. Jeff Gramm analyzes different eras and pivotal boardroom battles from the last century to understand the factors that have caused shareholders and management to collide. Throughout, he uses the letters to show how investors interact with directors and managers, how they think about their target companies, and how they plan to profit. Each is a fascinating example of capitalism at work told through the voices of its most colorful, influential participants. A hedge fund manager and an adjunct professor at Columbia Business School, Gramm has spent as much time evaluating CEOs and directors as he has trying to understand and value businesses. He has seen public companies that are poorly run, and some that willfully disenfranchise their shareholders. While he pays tribute to the ingenuity of public company investors, Gramm also exposes examples of shareholder activism at its very worst, when hedge funds engineer stealthy land-grabs at the expense of a company’s long term prospects. Ultimately, he provides a thorough, much-needed understanding of the public company/shareholder relationship for investors, managers, and everyone concerned with the future of capitalism.