We study the movement of assets from private to public ownership through two alternative means: the acquisition of private companies by firms that are public (sellouts) or by initial public share offerings (IPOs). We consider firm-specific characteristics for 1,074 IPOs and 735 sellouts from...

This article has two related tasks. First, we review the articles published in this Special Issue on Corporate Control, Mergers, and Acquisitions. These articles provide new evidence on several aspects of corporate control and governance including the value and performance effects of various...

We show that acquirer returns are significantly higher in stock-swap acquisitions of difficult-to-value targets, as measured by Ramp;D intensity and idiosyncratic return volatility. This finding contributes to an explanation of the determinants of, and value gains from, using stock as a method...

Although the SEC's main charge is to ensure the disclosure of material information, it has not always consistently defined materiality. We show that acquisitions of privately-held targets classified as “insignificant” by the SEC appreciably affect market prices, and therefore are material by...

We examine the IPOs of and acquisitions made by all-cash firms. This unique sample of firms provides a perspective unencumbered by much of the confounding information typically surrounding these corporate events. We find IPO gross spreads of 7% -- similar to the spreads in more complex IPO...

This Article tells the story of a new type of business — the special purpose acquisition corporation (SPAC). The promoters of a SPAC begin by forming a shell corporation with no assets. They then take the company public on little more than a promise that they will strive to complete the...

We analyze the characteristics of transactions in a comprehensive set of mergers and acquisitions based on SDC data from 1992 through 2009. We do not impose restrictions found in previous empirical work such as excluding private bidders, small targets or those deals with no target value...

We examine relationships between firms and their investment banks (IBs), both within and across different IB functions. For all transaction types, we find an increase in the number of relationships and a decrease in relationship exclusivity over time. We identify significant transaction-type...

Privately held companies make-up the vast majority of targets in corporate takeovers. When disclosure is not required, acquiring firms usually provide little to no information about either the deal or the target in these transactions. The absence of such information may be innocuous if investors...

We examine the impact of the Global Settlement on affiliation bias in analyst recommendations. Using a broad measure of investment bank-firm relationships, we find a substantial reduction in analyst affiliation bias following the settlement for sanctioned banks. In contrast, we find strong...