Marc Deloof full professor

Research Marc Deloof

Research team

Expertise

* Corporate finance * Corporate governance * Entrepeneurial and small business finance * Company valuation * Financial history

Are family firms more resilient than non-family ones? Ex-ante and ex-post perspectives. 06/01/2025 - 05/07/2025

Abstract

As economic activity has become more global and interconnected, it has experienced a higher exposure to different types of risk (e.g., sanitary crises, wars, inflation). These disruptive events present significant challenges for companies, which has led to a growing interest in the study of business resilience. In most empirical studies, organizational resilience is operationalized through performance indicators, which results in a narrow and result-oriented understanding of the concept. Therefore, this project presents an inclusive conceptualization of organizational resilience under two perspectives: exante and ex-post; Resilience as an ex-ante process is a precursor to resilience outcomes (Sutcliffe & Vogus, 2003) that encompasses a set of resources, routines, and behaviors that are transformed and deployed to develop capabilities to reduce and overcome the impact of crises. Ex-post resilience refers to the capacity to survive a crisis (Marshall & Schrank, 2014). Performance levels may range from low to similar or even superior to pre-disruption performance (Weick & Sutcliffe, 2015). The resilience outcomes of a business are influenced by its characteristics and behavior before and during a crisis (Hillmann & Guenther, 2020). The project's objective is to present the ex-ante resilience conceptualized as a set of strategies and capabilities and examine how the family nature of the firm affects the degree of their development compared to non-family firms (papers 1 and 2). In addition, the third paper is dedicated to linking the ex-ante and ex-post resilience investigating whether there is a positive association between them, and also testing how this relationship changes among family and non-family firms. A cross-sectional survey was employed to collect data via online questionnaires, in alignment with the research objectives focused on higher-level managers. The context of the study of the first paper was the global pandemic caused by the novel coronavirus (COVID-19). The first survey was completed in 2020. The second and third studies are based on the second survey, which was completed in January 2024. The context of these studies is the recent disruptive events that have affected companies over the past five years, including the global pandemic caused by COVID-19, the war in Ukraine, and rising prices. This project contributes to the existing body of literature in several ways. Firstly, it adds to the growing corpus of literature on organizational resilience by providing a classification of the different conceptualizations of resilience. This will help to advance the limited understanding of the concept. In addition, the classification includes, on the one hand, the strategies and capabilities that must be developed and activated to face disruptive events. Conversely, we propose a link between these exante attributes (i.e., resilience strategies and capabilities) and ex-post resilience (i.e., organizational performance) to demonstrate which strategies and capabilities are more relevant to achieving desired outcomes. Secondly, the project contributes to the existing literature on family business resilience; While the majority of studies on the topic of resilience are primarily outcome-based, this project takes an a priori approach to compare resilience between family and non-family businesses by examining the degree to which resilience strategies and capabilities are applied. This provides an explanatory power, complementing the existing research on ex-post resilience, and helps explain the antecedents of positive family firm outcomes during crises.

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  • Research Project

Navigating Big Data: Essential Infrastructure for Business and Economics Fields. 01/05/2024 - 30/04/2028

Abstract

There has been a growing emphasis on the significance of big data and business analytics. Academic institutions use large volumes of data to effectively address research questions that generate and capture value for individuals, businesses, communities, and governments. The Orbis Global and Belfirst data warehouses, encompassing financial, accounting, social balance and governance data, allow scholars to explore the promise and opportunities for new theories and practices resulting in topnotch research. The Orbis Global and Bel-first databases are used as the primary data in our field. When investigating firm behaviors and actions, scholars always need basic knowledge about their financial figures (profitability, growth, assets, liabilities, etc.). Therefore, these Orbis Global and Belfirst databases are always used as the primary data source to which scholars add more specific data (survey-based data, data collected from more specific databases such as investors data). The funding proposal seeks to address an urgent issue: the significant price hikes of these data warehouses. The requested funding would serve as a bridging budget, providing a temporary solution while a more sustainable long-term financing strategy is being developed. Several research groups in the field of business and economics cannot continue doing the research they are currently doing if they no longer have access to these databases. These databases function as essential tools and instruments.

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  • Research Project

BelHisFirm: long-term firm-level data for the social sciences. 01/05/2024 - 30/04/2028

Abstract

Long-term digital economic data are mainly available at the macro level for Flanders and Belgium. However, new research questions require microdata that are only available in printed form. To make microdata on firms available in computer-readable form, research groups from the universities of Antwerp and Ghent are joining forces. Belgium has a long tradition of publishing essential data on companies in the Appendices to the Belgian Official Gazette since 1873. In addition, excellent reference works were compiled at the time for the benefit of investors. These sources contain a wealth of information on companies: date of incorporation, (successive) company names, addresses, names (and addresses) of directors and shareholders, balance sheets and profit and loss accounts, securities portfolios, information on capital increases, dividend and interest payments, relations between companies (participation in cartels, (de)mergers, spin-offs, ...). The research infrastructure "BelHisFirm: long-term business data for the social sciences" will bring all these microdata together in a database and make tools for the visualisation and analysis of the data available to researchers. BelHisFirm will thus enable, among other things, pioneering research on long-term trends in corporate finance, wealth inequality and the economic and financial impact of (de)colonisation.

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  • Research Project

Mapping the Market. The Credit Transactions of Antwerp's Business Community in the 19th Century. 01/12/2022 - 30/11/2024

Abstract

The financing of business in the nineteenth century did not necessarily require bank credit. Loans also flowed through alternative channels from lenders to borrowers. This pilot project investigates for Antwerp the size of the market for bank credit and non-bank credit throughout the 19th century. We place these credit transactions in the city's geography to examine how supply and demand found each other.

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  • Research Project

Do You want to Bond? Pricing and Use of Corporate Bonds: Lessons from the Past. 01/11/2019 - 31/10/2023

Abstract

The most important financing sources for a firm are equity and debt. Equity consists of stocks that pay a variable dividend, while debt consists of loans that pay a predetermined interest. Many loans are bonds sold by the firm to outside investors and traded on a financial market. Despite the economic importance of corporate bonds, we still know little about (a) what determines the return of bonds for investors, and (b) when and why firms use bonds as a source of financing. In my dissertation, I will use a unique, newly constructed dataset of Belgian corporate bonds that spans the period 1873-1940 to investigate corporate bond returns and corporate bond financing. There is currently only limited evidence on the determinants of corporate bond returns, and all of this evidence is mostly based on one recent dataset, for the U.S. This raises the question whether the results found for this dataset hold in other environments. The highly-developed Belgian bond market in the period considered and the high quality of data enables me to test this in a unique way. By studying a period in which financial markets were almost completely unregulated by the state, I can also investigate how firms convince investors to buy bonds when there are no specific laws to protect them and how firms used debt contracts to protect investors and how this affected bond pricing. Additionally, I investigate how the voluntary disclosure of information to investors influenced bond pricing and riskiness.

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  • Research Project

The rise and fall of multiple voting shares during the Interbellum. 01/10/2019 - 30/09/2020

Abstract

One share, one vote is a basic principle that guarantees good protection of investors. However, the use multiple voting shares (MVS) increases all over the world. In this paper, we investigate the rise and fall of MVS in Belgium during the Interbellum. As from the 1920s, MVS became increasingly popular and in 1934 they are legally abolished. In order to enhance our understanding of MVS, we will investigate which kind of firms adopt MVS, how the adoption of MVS affects stock performance and how shareholder reacted to the 1934 abolishment act.

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  • Research Project

Historical high-quality company-level data for Europe (EURHISFIRM). 01/04/2018 - 30/06/2021

Abstract

EURHISFIRM designs a world-class research infrastructure (RI) to connect, collect, collate, align, and share detailed, reliable, and standardized long-term financial, governance, and geographical data on European companies. EURHISFIRM enables researchers, policymakers, and other stakeholders to develop and evaluate effective strategies to promote investment, economic growth and job creation. The RI provides the tools for long-term analysis highlighting the dynamics of the past and the way those dynamics structure our present and future. A few large stand-alone long-term databases have been built in Europe so far, while important resources have been invested into scattered and dispersed historical datasets. EURHISFIRM develops innovative models and technologies to spark a "Big data" revolution in historical social sciences and valorize Europe's cultural heritage. These technologies match and collate historical data, and connect them to recent ones. They bring the next generation of data extraction and enrichment systems from digitized historical sources and web-based resources. The scaling up in the variety, quantity and quality of long-term data changes the way of conducting scientific enquiry in the historical social sciences. EURHISFIRM constitutes a vibrant and large users' community around the innovative data and services provided. The 2016 ESFRI Roadmap identifies Big Data, interdisciplinarity and innovative ways to disseminate research products as the main science drivers for RIs in the Social Sciences and Humanities. It recognizes the need and the opportunity for RIs providing access to the European Cultural Heritage and innovative methods to analyze and integrate information extracted to broad communities. EURHISFIRM fulfills this mission in close cooperation with ESFRI Landmark CESSDA and other existing RIs in the field of Arts and Humanities, like DARIAH, within the Research Data Alliance.

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  • Research Project

Fostering learner-centered education in the field of taxation. 01/09/2017 - 29/02/2020

Abstract

This project analyses the impact of the Base-Erosion and Profit-Shifting (BEPS) Initiative and the Anti-Tax-Avoidance-Directive (ATAD) against the background of the partner countries' respective national tax systems. Beyond this, the project will address the question, how tax policies can foster innovation and growth. In this project, the University of Antwerp will focus on a theoretical and empirical exploration of the impact of taxation on entrepreneurial risk taking. A model will be developed covering the main elements of the tax systems of the partner countries, including an Allowance for Corporate Equity (ACE) (like in BEL, ITA, LIE) and an interest ceiling rule (GER). This model serves as a theoretical workhorse which allows for an analysis of the economic impact of the BEPS initiative and the ATAD within the context of the respective national tax systems. The focus will be on how an ACE affects risk behavior of entrepreneurs. These behavioral responses can be used to model the behavioral responses to other policy measures that affect the risk-return trade-off for entrepreneurs.

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  • Education Project
  • Research Project

Dividend policy: a long term investigation. 01/10/2016 - 30/09/2019

Abstract

In this project, I will describe the dividend policy of Belgian firms during the period 1832-2012. I will focus on firms listed on the Brussels Stock Exchange during this period. Data is available from the SCOB-database. In a first part, I investigate the evolution of dividend policy over the period 1832-2012, which was characterized by major institutional, regulatory and tax changes, such as the introduction of taxes on dividends, the abolishment of multiple voting shares, the split-up of universal banks etc. My long-term perspective allows investigating how such changes affect dividend policy. Next, I investigate the evolution of cross-sectional determinants of dividend policy.

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  • Research Project

The predictability of returns and dividend growth rates: long-run evidence. 01/10/2015 - 30/09/2019

Abstract

We use a unique Belgian stock and bond return dataset covering almost two centuries to investigate the predictability of stock returns and dividend growth, taking into account economic and institutional factors. We will first investigate whether the dividend yield predicts stock market returns and/or dividend growth and whether the strength of these relations are linked to the institutional and economic environment. Secondly, we will focus on the monetary and interest rate environment to study their impact on the predictability of stock and bond returns.

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  • Research Project

Dividend policy: a long term investigation. 01/10/2014 - 13/01/2017

Abstract

In this project, I will describe the dividend policy of Belgian firms during the period 1832-2012. I will focus on firms listed on the Brussels Stock Exchange during this period. Data is available from the SCOB-database. In a first part, I investigate the evolution of dividend policy over the period 1832-2012, which was characterized by major institutional, regulatory and tax changes, such as the introduction of taxes on dividends, the abolishment of multiple voting shares, the split-up of universal banks etc. My long-term perspective allows investigating how such changes affect dividend policy. Next, I investigate the evolution of cross-sectional determinants of dividend policy.

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  • Research Project

Long-run evidence on dividend policy. 01/11/2013 - 30/09/2014

Abstract

The empirical literature finds that dividend policy differs greatly across firms and changes slowly through time. Dividends seem to contain information about average stock returns, and aggregate dividend yields predict future market returns. However, there is no consensus about the explanation for these empirical regularities, nor even about their universal existence. In the literature it has been conjectured that slowly changing institutional factors are at least partly responsible for the relations and their strength. By using an unique, available dataset covering the full Belgian stock market since 1832, we are able to investigate the patterns described above over a 180 years period. Moreover, we can relate them to the underlying institutional setting. We can also test the impact of changing dividend policy on the relation between dividends and stock returns, as well as on the value of the aggregate dividend yield as a predictor for stock market returns. Firstly, we document patterns in dividend policy through time and relate them to changes in dividend taxes and institutional changes. Secondly, we study determinants of dividend policy across firms including measures of taxes, agency-conflicts, asymmetric information and liquidity. Thirdly, we link dividend yields to returns across firms, taking into account the changing patterns in dividend policy and its determinants. Finally, we relate the predictive strength of the dividend yield for market returns to these factors.

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  • Research Project

Investment Returns in the Long Run: Evidence from Belgium 1838-2010. 01/01/2011 - 31/12/2013

Abstract

We investigate long run investment returns for stocks, government bonds and cash. Our analysis is based on a (worldwide) unique database which covers all securities ever listed on the Brussels Exchange / Euronext Brussels in the period 1838-2010. We construct new, value weighted return indices for government bonds and analyze the equity risk premium and term premium.

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  • Research Project

Tunneling and private investments in public equity in China. 20/08/2010 - 19/06/2011

Abstract

This project represents a formal research agreement between UA and on the other hand EU. UA provides EU research results mentioned in the title of the project under the conditions as stipulated in this contract.

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  • Research Project

Effective Governance in private organisations: the influence of multiple stakeholders' incentives on organizational outcome and the mediating role of governance. 01/10/2009 - 31/01/2014

Abstract

The aim of this research project is to study governance practices from a holistic perspective, in contrast to the piecemeal approach of the extant literature and to develop a contingency model of governance. Taking into account that universal remedies are counterproductive (Ostrom, 2007), we develop a contingency perspective that diagnoses the specific conditions needed to make specific governance practices contribute to organizational outcome (e.g. success or failure measured by multi-attributes). The specific conditions relate to actor characteristics (owners, directors, managers and employees), to the institutional environment, to the organizational form and to other intervening variables (e.g. life cycle of the company, industry antecedents, etcetera). Besides the development of the contingency model for governance, individual research themes in the individual workpackages will be addressed too. (e.g. changes in governance practices over the life cycle of an organization, the introduction of family heterogeneity in family governance research, the impact of works council's demographic variables on organizational outcome).

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  • Research Project

The 'value' of bank relationships during a financial crisis: Evidence from Belgium in the 1930s. 01/02/2009 - 31/12/2010

Abstract

We investigate the impact of bank affiliations on the performance of Belgian listed companies in the first half of the 1930s. This period was characterized by a large economic crisis and major problems in the financial sector which led to profound institutional reforms. We consider different dimensions of company performance.

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  • Research Project

Effective Governance in private organizations: the influence of multiple stakeholders' incentives on organizational success and the mediating role of governance. 01/10/2008 - 30/09/2009

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  • Research Project

Business groups, political connections and institutions: a long-term analysis. 01/01/2007 - 31/12/2010

Abstract

This project takes a long-term perspective on the role of business groups. Using a unique database of Belgium listed companies over the 19th and 20th century, and taking into account the evolution of institutions, we study how business groups affect company performance, and how business groups use political connections to pursue the interests of their owners.

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  • Research Project

Construction of a "Bell-20 index" for all stock quoted shares on the Brussel Stock Exchange during the period 1832-2005. Comparison with the returns on the Belgian Banking sector, the risk free rate and the all share index and other portfolios. 01/10/2006 - 31/12/2008

Abstract

The project has practical objectives and aims at calculating a "BEL-20 index" (capital gain as well as total return index) for the period 1832-2005 for the Brussels Stock Exchange. These indices will be compared with returns calculated for the risk free rate, for the banking sector, for the all share index and other portfolios of the Brussels Stock Exchange for the same period. By doing so a brand new benchmark will be available for a long historical period.

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    • Research Project

    Taxes and income shifting in multinational corporations. 01/03/2006 - 31/12/2007

    Abstract

    In this project we investigate to what extent and how multinational corporations (MNCs) shift income between subsidiaries in different countries, in order to minimize global tax payments. For a sample of European, Japanese and US MNCs, we examine how tax differences between parent country and host country affect income reporting and financing- and dividend policies.

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    • Research Project

    Causes and Consequences of Interlocking Directorships and Seat Accumulation in Belgian Companies. 01/01/2004 - 31/12/2007

    Abstract

    In this research project we investigate the causes and consequences of interlocking directorships and seat accumulation in Belgian companies. First, we investigate the determinants of interlocking directorships. Second, we investigate how interlocking directorships on firm value. To what extent do interlocking directorships destroy or create value? We analyze the impact on both stock market value and accounting profitability, taking into account other firm characteristics. In a first part of the study, we investigate interlocking directorships of listed Belgian companies in the period 1893-1935.

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    • Research Project

    Interlocking directorships and seat accumulation in Belgian companies. 01/03/2003 - 31/12/2005

    Abstract

    In this project research is done into the causes and consequences of interlocking directorships and seat accumulation in Belgian companies during the 20th century. First, I will investigate the determinants of interlocking directorships. Second, I will analyse the impact of interlocking directorships on firm value. To what extent do interlocking directorships destroy or create value. I investigate the impact on both stock market value and accounting profitability, taking into account other firm characteristics. The empirical analysis will be based on appropriate and up-to-date econometric techniques.

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    • Research Project

    The financing policies of belgian listed companies: a long term perspective. 01/01/2002 - 31/12/2005

    Abstract

    What determines the financing and dividend policies of firms? To what extent do these policies affect firm value? Over de past decaded, these research questions have been studied intensively. Studies so far, howevr, have largely analyzed corporate financing and dividend policies over very short time periods, and in a single country context, mainly focussing on the United States.

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    • Research Project