It is well known that historically a larger number of firms issue common stock and the proportion of external financing accounted for by equity is substantially higher in expansionary phases of the business cycle. We show that this phenomenon is consistent with firms selling seasoned equity when...

We develop a model of trading by an informed fund manager compensated on the basis of her fund's Net Asset Value (NAV) and show that she has an incentive to pump her portfolio by buying securities already held by her fund. Such portfolio pumping leads to excessive trading and diminished...

In the 1990s, many load funds introduced additional share classes that give investors the choice of paying back-end loads and/or annual fees instead of front-end loads. The transition to a multiple-class structure provides a well-controlled setting for research with regard to investor clienteles...

Prior literature argues that stock-for-stock mergers are often financed by overvalued stock. How do a target's institutional owners trade when faced with a stock-financed bid, particularly one from an acquirer more likely to be overvalued? If institutional owners perceive the acquirer's stock as...

Prior literature argues that stock-for-stock mergers are often financed by overvalued stock. How do a target's institutional owners trade when faced with a stock-financed bid, particularly one from an acquirer more likely to be overvalued? If institutional owners perceive the acquirer's stock as...

We argue that powerful CEOs induce their boards to shift the weight on performance measures towards the better performing measures, thereby rigging the incentive part of their pay. The intuition is developed in a simple model in which some powerful CEOs exploit superior information and lack of...

To estimate the grant-date expense of their employee stock options (ESOs), as required under the new accounting rules (FAS 123R), companies have typically had to choose among various theoretical valuation models because there is no secondary market for ESOs. Different models, all permissible...

It is widely believed that contrary to standard asset allocation theory, employees irrationally hold concentrated investments in company stock in their 401(k) plans thus bearing firm-specific risk that could otherwise have been diversified away [See for example, Benartzi (2001)]. However, in...

This paper develops a theory of organization based on the benefits and costs of internal capital markets. A central assumption is that the transaction cost of raising external funds is greater than the cost of internal funds. The benefit of internal resource allocation is that it gives the firm...

Successful private equity managers have funds that are often oversubscribed and provide persistent abnormal returns. Why don't successful managers increase fund size or fees? We argue that managers want to attract high quality entrepreneurs, while entrepreneurs want to match with high ability...