Answer:
FIRST QUESTION
A)Yes; CSI's CFO engaged in unethical conduct to manipulate the firm's short-term earnings and improve the likelihood of receiving his annual bonus.
SECOND QUESTION
A)Pay the manager a combination of salary and stock options (phased in over several years) that reward him or her for consistently increasing shareholder wealth.
LAST QUESTION
MORE likely
Explanation:
We are informed from the question about an investigative reporter for a major metropolitan newspaper discovery about the doctors conducting clinical trials of a new cancer treatment drug are also the principal shareholders in Cancer Solutions Inc. And how The CFO was concerned that CSI might not be able to meet its annual performance objectives and in turn pay his anticipated multimillion-dollar bonus.
In this case there is an agency conflict that exist between CSI's CFO and the company's shareholders, this is because the, CSI's CFO engaged in unethical conduct to manipulate the firm's short-term earnings and improve the likelihood of receiving his annual bonus.
Agency conflict in finance, is also regarded as conflict of interest, usually occur between the management and the shareholders of that company, it is conflict that usually emerge when those that are required for certain responsibility like interest of principal decide to divert the the authority for their own benefits. However,agency conflict can be minimized by allowing transparency and some ways.
It should be noted here that the CSI's CFO engaged in unethical conduct to manipulate the firm's short-term earnings and improve the likelihood of receiving his annual bonus which is the reason behind the conflict because he act on his own interest.
SECOND QUESTION,
Which of the following actions will help ease agency conflicts and better align managers' objectives with the firm's shareholder wealth?
From the explanation of Agency conflict from First question it should be noted that there are some actions that will help to ease agency conflicts and better align managers' objectives with the firm's shareholder wealth such as
Payment of the manager a combination of salary and stock options (phased in over several years) that reward him or her for consistently increasing shareholder wealth.
The payment of the stock options to the manager will allow selling of stock at agreed price as well as date.
LAST QUESTION
Amalgamated Metals Corporation's stockholders are mostly individual investors, and there is relatively little institutional ownership. If several pension and mutual funds were to take large positions in Amalgamated Metals Corporation's stock, direct shareholder intervention would be__MORE__ likely to motivate the firm's management.
