Corporate board network and information flows in the Italian Stock Exchange

In this work we investigate the governance models of listed companies in the Italian Stock Exchange. We use a network approach in order to investigate the interlinks among board of directors. A graph theoretical approach and the vertex centrality measures quantify the role of network and the intensity of the relationships, according to the assumption that the information conveyed by such interconnections could exert some impact on market prices. A weighted graph represent the listed companies (vertices) and their relationships (weighted edges) by using as centrality measure the flow-betweenness. It is expected that this centrality measure may give a representation of the intensity of the relationship between companies, capturing the volume of information flowing from a vertex to another one.