Foreign shareholders and executive compensation stickiness: Evidence from China

This research examines the impact of foreign shareholders on executive compensation stickiness by analyzing China's listed companies from 2007 to 2022. The analysis finds that foreign shareholder ownership leads to an increase in executive pay stickiness by increasing upward pay sensitivity. The individualistic cultural imprint and supervision costs play a crucial role in this mechanism. Additionally, the positive impact of foreign ownership on executive compensation stickiness is more significant in the sample where foreign shareholders are the actual controllers and the internal and external monitoring is weak. Furthermore, the hypothesis regarding the positive effect of executive compensation stickiness is validated by identifying the increasing of firm innovation and value.