TY - JOUR AB - Purpose No systematic models are being used in empirical research that provide assurance for the choice of proxies that are being used. The purpose of this paper is to examine the validity of the proxies being used in empirical research, and as a case study, it focuses on the area of financial derivatives.Design/methodology/approach First, the authors review results of proxies from the financial derivatives literature and follow with empirical tests to confirm the findings from the review.Findings The review shows that proxies provide mixed results. The findings are further supported by the results from empirical tests. It suggests that measures used in the studies related to financial derivatives theory may need to be refined and highlights that no solid bases or tests have been developed for the proxies used to measure the constructs.Research limitations/implications As individual proxies are examined across studies, a meta-regression analysis cannot be used, and there is no other available model to capture this type of examination. The approach adopted has some limitations but provides a basis for examining the reasonableness of proxies as measures of constructs.Originality/value This is the first study that attempts to examine the strength of proxies in capturing related constructs. The methodology is unique to a review of past studies in financial derivatives. It supports the need for developing more rigorous models/bases for the measures being used, and this is an area that has been ignored in empirical research. VL - 41 IS - 4 SN - 2040-8269 DO - 10.1108/MRR-06-2017-0174 UR - https://doi.org/10.1108/MRR-06-2017-0174 AU - Tashfeen Rubeena AU - Azhar Tashfeen Mahmood PY - 2018 Y1 - 2018/01/01 TI - The proxies conundrum T2 - Management Research Review PB - Emerald Publishing Limited SP - 453 EP - 486 Y2 - 2024/04/26 ER -