CEO OWNERSHIP AND STOCK RETURNS: EVIDENCE FROM NASDAQ STOCKHOLM LARGE CAP

Sammanfattning

This thesis asks whether CEO equity ownership is associated with excess stock returns amongfirms listed on Nasdaq Stockholm Large Cap during Q1 2020–Q4 2025. Using a quarterly panelof 166 firms and 2,899 firm-quarter observations, we sort firms into four CEO-ownershipquartiles each quarter based on their CEO's active ownership share and compare returns in thehighest (Q4) and lowest (Q1) quartiles using equal-weighted spreads, SIXRX-adjusted returns,value-weighted portfolios, and sector-controlled specifications.The highest-ownership quartile outperforms the lowest by 1.53 pp per quarter in equal-weightedportfolios, but the spread is not statistically significant. The positive spread remains after sectoradjustment, still insignificant, but reverses under both total-market-capitalisation and free-floatweighting, suggesting that the equal-weighted result is not representative of a value-weightedinvestor's experience and is concentrated in smaller firms within the Large Cap segment. Thepattern is non-uniform and regime-dependent. The spread is strongly positive in 2020–2021,coinciding with the strong performance of real-estate firms (which are disproportionatelyrepresented in the high-ownership quartile), but reverses in 2022–2025. Overall, the evidencedoes not provide statistically reliable support for a positive ownership-return association. Thehighest-ownership quartile is significant in a pooled panel, but not after a firm-size control.