Newswise — The Business Roundtable's new statement on the "purpose of a corporation" is nothing more than a PR move in anticipation of a looming recession, says Binghamton University financial expert Daniel McKeever.
"I am highly skeptical that there is any real weight behind this new assertion that the purpose of a corporation is anything other than maximizing shareholder value," said McKeever. "I don't think the CEOs of most of the country's large public companies have had some sudden ideological awakening when it comes to corporate social responsibility. Indicators of an impending recession have been piling up, and to me, this looks a lot more like CEOs 'foaming the runway' with a PR initiative in anticipation of a period of negative stock returns."
McKeever is an assistant professor of finance at Binghamton University, State University of New York. He is a former research economist at the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission. He conducts research on bank failures, CEO behavior, and executive compensation.
He can be reached via email at [email protected].
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