When an event is anticipated, the firm's stock return around the announcement of the event may have an inconsistent sign: a positive sign around negative news, or vice versa. We attempt to quantify the frequency of this problem, first with a brief mathematical model and simulation, then with...

Firms covered by more analysts are more likely to become takeover targets and more likely to enter deals in which their acquirers initiate private merger negotiations. Moreover, when equity analysts' pre-acquisition price forecasts imply greater target undervaluation, target firms are more...

The widely cited empirical relation between equity misvaluation and the choice of merger currency has been recently called into question in a substantive manner. How can it be that the academic community was misled by this spurious correlation for more than a decade? We investigate this question...

Using unique, hand-gathered data, this paper examines how public news about the target firmreleased publicly during the private merger negotiation process affects bidding strategies. Weprovide strong evidence that market reactions to information events during the private sale processhave a...

The monthly volatility of IPO initial returns is substantial, fluctuates dramatically over time, and is considerably larger during "hot" IPO markets. Consistent with IPO theory, the volatility of initial returns is higher among firms whose value is more difficult to estimate, i.e., among firms...