We examine warrant agreements and identify three provisions of these contracts that allow managers to time the raising of capital: the right to call the warrants, to extend the life of the warrants, and to lower the exercise price of the warrants. We argue that these provisions are costly yet...

Managers can decide to reduce a warrant's exercise price. A reduction in exercise price can induce exercise (a conversion-forcing reduction) or not (a long-term reduction). Conversion-forcing firms show an abnormal return of -1.53% on the announcement day but they perform well over the three...

Previous research attributes long-run reversals to investor over-reaction or tax-motivated trading; we offer an alternative explanation based on aggregate funding conditions. Our evidence shows that prices rebound for stocks that have performed poorly over the past several years (Losers);...

This paper analyzes security-market returns relative to the political party of the president, the Federal Reserve's monetary policy, the year of the president's term, and the state of political gridlock. Contrary to prior studies, which evaluated the influences separately, we jointly evaluate...

We show that over a long study period (1963-2010), the existence and trading efficacy of the well-known low-volatility stock anomaly are more limited than widely believed. For example, we find that the anomalous returns are not found within equal weighted long-short (low minus high risk)...

The personal traits of chief executive officers (CEOs) have been found to influence corporate policy decisions. We examine the impact of past professional distress experiences on payout policy. We hypothesize that CEOs experiencing a distress event in their past career, before becoming CEO,...

Recent theoretical models (e.g., Carlson, Fisher and Giammarino, 2004) predict an association between the book-to-market (BE/ME) ratio and operating leverage in the cross-section. Consistent with these models, we find a strong positive association between BE/ME and the degree of operating...

Calling firms experience increases in systematic business risk following conversion-forcing calls of convertible debt. The increases in business risk are sufficiently large to offset the reductions in financial risk coming from the reduction in financial leverage following the call. As a result,...

In 2019, MIT hosted a 75th birthday symposium in honor of Robert C. Merton. The event included presentations by students and colleagues explaining the influence Merton has had on the profession and on their ideas. Each presenter focused on a specific aspect of Merton's life and contributions so...