Legal investor protection is associated with how firms choose to issue shares. The likelihood of private placements relative to rights offerings increases with investor protection, as does the likelihood of public offerings relative to both private placements and rights offerings. These findings...

Shareholder participation in domestic rights offerings averages only 64%, which is considerably lower than previously thought. This causes wealth transfers from nonparticipating to participating shareholders which average 7% of the value of the offering. Wealth transfers are larger in...