The Interrelationships Between Information Technology Spending, CEO Equity Incentives, and Firm Value

We examine the interrelationships between information technology spending, CEO equity compensation incentives, and firm value. We present two related pieces of evidence. First, we find that CEO equity incentives are associated with IT spending, suggesting that CEOs with higher incentives are more likely to invest in a risky asset such as IT. Second, we find that the association between IT spending and business value is stronger for firms that grant CEOs higher equity incentives. Our study contributes to the CEO compensation and IT governance literatures.