In our sample of 1,937 US mergers (1995 to 2011), 8.4 percent of all targets received oers with negative premiums where the initial bid undercuts the pre-announcement market price. We theoretically show that target overvaluation, market liquidity and `hidden earnouts', where target shareholders...

In this paper we analyze incentives for a potential entrant to get into an oligopolistic Cournot-like market by taking over one of the incumbents and we derive the conditions under which the hostile merger is possible and profitable. The key-feature is that the target of the takeover is...

We consider a takeover in which risk neutral bidders must incur participation costs and study their optimal strategy. We found that bidders decision of participation is endogenous. There is a threshold of private participation cost above that a potential bidder will stay out of takeover process....

Imagine that you have reached the pinnacle of your career, and you are sitting in the driver’s seat of a multi-billion dollar enterprise. Business is good, sales are up, and the stock market responds to your company’s performance. In such circumstances, a chief executive officer (CEO) may...