We propose a simple measure of investor sophistication based on financial statement experience derived from publicly available EDGAR log data about accounting information acquisition activity. This approach allows us to provide unique empirical evidence for the existence of attention induced...

Stock prices occasionally move in response to unverified rumors. I propose a cheap talk model in which a rumormonger's incentives to tell the truth depend on the interaction between her investment horizon and the information acquisition decisions of message-receiving investors. The model's key...

In a financial market where agents trade for short-term profit and where news can increase the uncertainty of the public belief, there are strategic complementarities in the acquisition of private information and, if the cost of information is sufficiently small, a continuum of equilibrium...

We study the prices of a firm's debt and equity in a market where investors have private information and may exhibit differences of opinion. We show how debt and equity valuations, and the impact of public information and distress risk on these valuations, depend upon disagreement and the...

Investors who use biased information from news media subsequently tend to make irrational decisions about acquiring firm-specific information compared to rational expectations. This model of information acquisition yields testable predictions that are verified by using a novel dataset. First,...

We survey the theory and evidence of behavioral corporate finance, which generally takes one of two approaches. The market timing and catering approach views managerial financing and investment decisions as rational managerial responses to securities mispricing. The managerial biases approach...

This study presents the results from a comprehensive out-of-sample test of long-run returns following mergers and acquisitions (M&As). Using a unique sample from 23 frontier markets of almost 800 transactions conducted during the years 1992 to 2016, we implement both cross-sectional tests and...