This paper investigates the patterns of directors' trades and returns around takeover announcements. We find that the pre-announcement net value (the difference between buy value and sell value) of directors' trading is positively related to acquirers' announcement period abnormal returns. This...

This paper offers new evidence on informed trading around merger and acquisition announcements from the UK equity and options market. The analysis suggests that in about 25%-33% of events there is abnormal option trading volume during the month that precedes the announcement. Such evidence is...

This paper examines the pattern and profitability of institutional trades around takeover announcements. We find that the trades of funds as a group, either before or after takeover announcements, are not profitable. However, funds whose main broker is also a target advisor are net buyers of...

Merger and Acquisition (M&A) activities are not well-anticipated corporate events in the equity market. Do institutional investors possess material non-public information before M&A announcements? Using a novel methodology that infers high frequency institutional trading, this paper investigates...

We demonstrate how insider trading analysis may benefit from textual analysis. We analyze reported insider trading behavior and explain the association between corporate as well as 3rd-party news announcements on directors' dealings activity. Previous approaches are extended by adding the...

We contribute to the M&A literature by characterizing the information available to insiders of selling firms during the pre-public takeover negotiations by analyzing insider trading during this period. We show that target insiders increase their net purchases only once bidders start signing...

We document pervasive informed trading activity in equity options before M&A announcements. About 25% of takeovers have positive abnormal volumes. These volume patterns indicate that informed traders are likely using bullish directional strategies for the target and volatility strategies for the...

This study analyzes the effectiveness of the Market Abuse Directive (MAD) in reducing possible profits from insider trading during voluntary tender offers with the purpose of delisting initiated by controlling shareholders. Exploiting the quasi-experimental setting provided by the introduction...

This paper investigates the informativeness and value relevance of analyst target prices in the context of mergers and acquisitions (M&A). Our results indicate that firms with high 12-month ahead target prices relative to current stock prices are more likely to become a takeover target and offer...

How do managers comment on merger transactions? By analyzing initial public announcements of Mergers and Acquisitions (M&As) between 1995-2020 and extracting the linguistic sentiment from statements made by acquirer and target firms, we provide new evidence on the information value of M&A...