Family CEO and information disclosure: Evidence from China

This study investigates the relationship between family firms' CEO type and the amount of firm-specific information incorporated into stock prices. Using manually collected data from Chinese Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) Board, we find that stock price synchronicity is about 25% lower if the CEO is a member of the owning family, implying that more information is disclosed in these firms. This CEO impact is much stronger when firms have indirect shareholding structures and when the firm's founder does not serve as the chairman or CEO. These results suggest that family CEOs tend to mitigate the expropriation concerns of outside shareholders by disclosing more information to the market in China.