We posit that IPOs of local companies will lead to increased stock market participation. First, local IPOs attract attention to the market, through both increased information production and publicity. Second, local IPOs generate wealth, not just for people associated with the heretofore private...

Historically a key advantage of being a public firm was broader access to capital, from a disperse group of shareholders. In recent years, such capital has increasingly become available to private firms as well. We document a dramatic increase over the past twenty years in the number of mutual...

Using a unique dataset of dealer-level trading data in bookbuilding IPOs, we find strong evidence that lead underwriter trades in IPO firms are significantly related to subsequent IPO abnormal returns. This relation is concentrated among issues in which underwriters' information advantage is...