Monitoring by the Financial Press and Forced CEO Turnover

This paper examines Wall Street Journal news stories about 79 firms that forced CEO turnover and a matched sample of firms that did not force CEO turnover. In the two years prior to turnover, firms in the forced-turnover sample were the subjects of 76% more news stories about poor firm performance despite being from the same industry, of similar size, and similar performance as a sample of matched firms. Overall, the evidence suggests that scrutiny of poor firm performance by the financial press increases the likelihood of forced CEO turnover