Gli effetti dell'Interlocking Directorate sulla vita d'impresa

Our research analyzes the phenomenon of Interlocking Directorate (ID) and its effects on firms' behavior, with focus on capital structure and firm's performance. We consider two extensive and innovative datasets (1998-2007 and 2003-2010) which include all companies listed at the Milan Stock Exchange. Our first analysis (with '98-'07 database), shows no relation between capital structure and "banking" ID (the link between a bank and an industrial firm). On the other hand, we found a positive relation between banking ID and the amount of bank debt with respect to the total amount of issued debt. Using the same database, we analyze the relation between ID and firm's performance; what we discover is a negative and delayed effect (1 delay) of ID on firm's performance. The last research was run with the second database (2003-2010) shows a negative effect of female ID on firm's performance. This result may be due to the fact that in Italy a relevant percentage of female IDs is about women that are expression of industrial families and therefore not strictly related to gender effect. In addition, we show that in Italy the ID phenomenon is decreasing, while female ID is growing up (as well as female directorships).