Assassination On The NYSE

Freakonomics asks, why don't more companies hire assassins to kill their competitors' CEOs? It's a delicious question, impetuous and brilliantly amoral.

After all, when the CEO of a company dies, the stock tends to decline in value rapidly. Thinking about a CEO of a company whose personality is strongly identified with the corporate brand (Apple and Steve Jobs come to mind) this could be a good way to render a company more vulnerable to economic shenanigans. And of course, we know that corporations make decisions in a decidedly sociopathic way in the pursuit of maximizing shareholder value (note that this is not always congruent with maximizing earnings). The law all but requires them to do so. This means that we can dispense with the argument that murdering people is morally wrong -- a corporation does not have morals and therefore its actions will not be governed by morality but rather only by a desire to enrich its shareholders.

The answer, I think, is glossed over in the comments. The real reason why this doesn't happen is that the risk/reward ratio is decidedly unfavorable. If you get caught, the downside risk is tremendous -- the corporation could be dissolved and its principal officers who authorized the hit would be imprisoned. In the meantime, what exactly do you gain by taking out the competition's CEO? The competition is put in disarray for a period of time and its stock price falls. Chances are good, though, that the company will recover and rebound. It could even improve as new blood keeps things fresh and innovative (before it, too, gets bumped off).

I think the time a CEO should really be on his guard for a nine-millimeter stock depressant would not be when the competition is looking to make its mark in the market. It's when there is a hostile takeover bid that looks like it's going to fall just short of succeeding. Knocking off the CEO who is successfully defending the company from a raid will depress the price of the stock -- and thus strengthen the takeover bid. Motive would be rather obvious but if your assassin was good enough, it would look like a genuine accident.