Short selling, managerial alignment and corporate misconduct

This article investigates the causal relationship between the potential short selling and corporate misconduct in China. We document that short selling can significantly reduce corporate misconduct, such disciplining effect of short selling is more pronounced in non-state-owned enterprises. Shareholders are better disciplined to reduce misbehaviors and incentivize managers to mitigate the adverse effects of short selling when firms face high financial constraints or have stock rights pledged, particularly in non-SOEs. In SOEs where the primary objective is social welfare maximization, shareholders are better incentivized to mitigate the adverse effect of short selling when the CSR performance is lower, whereas managers are less disciplined either when CSR is higher or lower. Managers could be better incentivized to reduce misbehaviors when facing the threat of short selling if their compensation is highly marked to market performance.