We develop and test a theory explaining the equilibrium matching of issuers and underwriters. We assume that issuers and underwriters associate by mutual choice, and that underwriter ability and issuer quality are complementary. Our model implies that matching is positive assortative, and that...

We study the mutual relationships between institutional ownership, analyst following and share prices. We show that the pressure on firms to set lower share prices to attract analysts is attenuated by institutional monitoring. Our theory refutes the assumed causal relation between share price...

Clustering of IPO underwriting spreads at 7% poses two important puzzles: Is the market for U.S. equity underwriting services anti-competitive and why do equity underwriters invest in reputation-building? This study resolves both puzzles. Modeling endogeneity of firm-underwriter choice using a...

Whereas Poterba and Summers (1995) find that firms use hurdle rates that are unrelated to their CAPM betas, Graham and Harvey (2001) find that 74% of their survey firms use the CAPM for capital budgeting. We provide an explanation for these two apparently contradictory conclusions. We find that...

We develop a dynamic multi-equation model where firms make financing and investment decisions jointly subject to the constraint that sources must equal uses of cash. We argue that static models of financial decisions produce inconsistent coefficient estimates and that models that do not...

Empirical studies of firms' financing, investment, and payout policies routinely examine these policies in isolation. In this paper we develop a dynamic multi-equation model where firms make financing and investment decisions jointly subject to the constraint that sources of cash must equal uses...

We provide evidence of a link between firm dividend policy and stock market liquidity. In the cross-section, owners of less (more) liquid common stock are more (less) likely to receive cash dividends. Predictions of the proportion of dividend payers based on 1963-1977 cross-sectional estimates...