Official URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/jfir.12238

We analyze the role of firm‐level corporate governancein determining the precommitment payout policy ofemerging market firms and investigate whether there is aprecommitment life‐cycle effect. Unlike previous studiesof U.S. firms, we find evidence of precommitment onlyamong relatively well‐governed firms, which combinegood governance with large dividend payouts to share-holders and large debt‐related repayments to creditors.We also document a strong precommitment life‐cycleeffect. Firms in the growth and mature stages of their lifecycle tend to use both debt and dividends to precommit toinvestors, with an increasing proportion of dividends intotal payout measures. Our results are robust to an arrayof control variables, alternate payout proxies, marketsetting, and firm‐level corporate governance, and itaddresses potential endogeneity concerns in the sample.