International Economics Commons^™

Ceo Turnover And Foreign Market Participation, Bruce A. Blonigen, Rossitza B. Wooster

Economics Faculty Publications and Presentations

Anecdotal evidence suggests that new CEOs with foreign backgrounds direct their firms to become more international in their operations. We examine this hypothesis formally using data on U.S. S&P-500 manufacturing firms from1992 through 1997 and biographical information on CEOs’ birth and education locations that allow us to identify changes from U.S.- to foreign-connected CEOs. Robust to a variety of specifications, we find that a U.S. firm’s switch from a U.S. to a foreign CEO leads to substantial increases in the firm’s proportion of its foreign assets and foreign affiliate sales. In fact, our preferred specification indicates that foreign asset and …