Abstract

This paper analyzes the impact of four attributes of the board of directors on the performance of 101 non-financial companies from Brazil, Chile, and Mexico, during the period 2011-2017. In addition, this research innovates by exploring the lagged effect of the above attributes in order to address the inverse causation that has been highlighted in the literature. The estimation of static and dynamic panel-data models reveals a positive effect of board independence on the accounting performance of the Brazilian and Chilean firms. The evidence reported is mixed in terms of the CEO duality, whereas a positive, quadratic, and concave relationship was found for board size. Finally, no supporting evidence that gender diversity results in a higher current and future performance of Latin American companies was found.