As seen in Table 5, proxy Q was found to be a significant determinant of INST for both
the OLS and 2SLS results. Firm performance, as measured by proxy Q in this study, is
considered a significant factor while institutional investors make their buy/sell decisions
on firm stocks. Surprisingly, the coefficient of proxy Q is negative, which means that
institutions sell their stocks when performance is improved. One possible explanation for
this result is that other firm performance measures may be more appropriate for the firms
of our sample and thus may project a better picture of firm performance. For example, firm
performance measures like stock market return, operating margin, net profit margin,
return on capital or return on net worth, can be used (Malatesta and Walkling, 1988; and
Bojanic and Officer, 1994).