Minority shareholder activism (MSA) on online interactive platforms is a new form of corporate governance in China. This paper investigates whether and how dividend-related MSA affects corporate dividend policies. We find listed firms are more likely to pay dividends and raise payout ratios with MSA. Our baseline findings are robust to a variety of robustness checks. We establish a causal relationship between MSA and future dividend payouts, with both instrumental variable approach and PSM-DID approach, and we provide evidence to show the increasing effect of MSA can be explained by exit threat and voting attendance. Our focused MSA complements the formal voting rights of minority shareholders and overcomes the absence of institutional investor monitoring. Overall, our findings suggest that minority shareholders can effectively monitor management when they are empowered with voice in the age of information.

This study investigates the nexus between investor protection and dividend policy for 517 listed non-financial firms operating in Asian countries between the 2008- 2017 period. The dynamic panel data model (System-GMM) reveals that stronger investor protection is associated with higher dividend payouts, and firms increase dividends, specifically in response to the rise of the extent of disclosure and director liability and also ease of shareholder suits. Besides, the results highlight that firms pay out fewer dividends in cases of growth opportunity particularly in environments with stronger investor protection, more developed financial market, and common-law system. Results are robust when alternative specifications are implemented.

This study investigates the relationship between gender diversity on the board and dividend payouts in China using a large sample over the period 2003–2017. Our results provide robust and strong evidence showing that gender diversity on the board is positively associated with cash payments of dividends. The empirical outcomes confirm that gender diversity on the board facilitates corporate governance and subsequently promotes dividend payouts. We demonstrate that gender diversity on the board has the greatest effect when the board has critical mass participation (three or more female directors) compared with only their token participation. However, independent female directors increase dividend payouts, while female executive directors do not have a significant impact. Furthermore, we extend the literature on the relationship between dividend payments and government ownership by providing evidence that gender diversity has a higher impact on dividend payouts for state-owned enterprises than non-state-owned enterprises. After controlling the endogeneity problems, our findings are reliable and robust.