CEO overconfidence and future firm risk in China: the moderating role of institutional investors

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to determine how CEO overconfidence influences firm's future risk in a sample of Chinese listed firms. It further examines the moderating effect of institutional investors on the association between CEO overconfidence and future firm risk. Design/methodology/approach The initial sample consists of Chinese A-share issuing firms listed on Shanghai and Shenzhen Stock Exchanges during the period starting from 2000 to 2017. This study classifies a CEO as overconfident if the forecasted profits of the firm are greater than the actual profits for majority of the time during the tenure of the CEO. Ordinary least squares regression is used as the primary estimation method for generating the results, however, firm fixed effects and two-stage least squares regressions have also been used for verifying the robustness of the results. Findings The results demonstrate that CEO overconfidence leads to an escalation in firm's risk level over the subsequent years. However, the intensity of this positive association is weaker in state-owned firms. Analysis of the moderating effect of institutional investors reveals that only active institutional investors, specifically mutual funds and foreign institutional investors, play their governance role in reducing the effect of CEO overconfidence on firm's risk level. Furthermore, the moderating effect of active institutional investors is weaker in state-owned firms. Research limitations/implications The empirical evidence obtained by this study suggests that CEOs should exercise extreme diligence in decision-making. They must analyze a situation based on realistic facts and figures, rather than having misperception about their excessive abilities in controlling the outcomes of a situation. The findings also imply that regulators and policymakers should formulate strategies for motivating mutual funds and foreign investors to increase their shareholding in Chinese firms. Originality/value To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first study that examines the impact of CEO overconfidence on future firm risk, not the current firm risk. Besides, literature regarding the role of external governance mechanisms in the context of behavioral biases is extremely scant. This study contributes to the literature by analyzing how the association between CEO overconfidence and firm's future risk is influenced by the institutional investors' ownership.