We examine the determinants of and investor responses to corporate environmental, social, and governance (ESG) bond issuance in Korea. We find that ESG bond issuance is positively associated with firm size and foreign ownership stakes. We also find that firms that establish ESG committees at the...

This paper examines environmental, social, and governance (ESG) performance around seasoned equity offerings (SEOs). A firm may improve ESG performance prior to SEOs to the extent that it believes that investors will be more favorable to firms with better ESG performance (window-dressing...

CEOs' pay-performance sensitivity (delta) is higher in the first year after being hired than in the following years. I explain this finding with reference to CEO prior uncertainty: due to information asymmetry and/or uncertainty about the quality of the match between a CEO and a firm, first-year...

I show that firms use credit lines to fund investment opportunities that are created by R&D success. Using patent filings as a proxy for R&D success, I find an increase in capital expenditures following R&D success, supporting the proposition that R&D success creates investment opportunities. In...

We examine the capital structure of firms that are newly added to the S&P 500 index. Leverage gradually decreases during the two-year pre-addition period and then increases during the two-year post-addition period, resulting in a U-shaped trend. This trend is more pronounced in financially weak...

In Korea, firms can recognize some research and development (R&D) expenditures as assets if they satisfy capitalization criteria and expense the rest. We show that each of the expensed and capitalized components conveys differential information that helps explain corporate financing policies and...