We document insider trading activities of all companies listed on the NYSE, Amex, and Nasdaq exchanges during the 1975-1995 period. Insider trading is common, and in more than half the sample firms, there is at least some insider activity in a given year. In general, very little market movement...

"This paper investigates the long-run stock returns of privatization initial public offering (IPO) firms using a sample of 241 privatization IPOs from 42 countries during the period 1981-2003. We compare one-, three-, and five-year holding period returns of privatization IPOs to those of the...

We investigate whether voluntary corporate restrictions on insider trading effectively prevent insiders from exploiting their private information. Our results show that insiders of firms with seeming restrictions on insider trading continue to take advantage of positive private information while...

We examine whether equity-linked private securities offerings are used as a mechanism for tunneling among firms that belong to a Korean chaebol. We find that chaebol issuers involved in intragroup deals set the offering prices to benefit their controlling shareholders. We also find that chaebol...

In the first essay, "Do Firms Knowingly Sell Overvalued Equity?", I develop a simple equilibrium model which shows that insider trading around seasoned equity offerings (SEO) depends on both the quality of issuing firms and insiders' exogenous consumption shocks, neither of which are known by...

A rich literature argues that stock repurchases often serve as positive economic signals beneficial to investors. Yet due to their inherent flexibility, open-market repurchase programs have long been criticized as weak signals lacking commitment. We evaluate whether some managers potentially use...

We examine how owner-managers incentives and firm-specific measures of corporate governance affect restructuring decisions during an economy-wide shock. Using a large sample of Korean firms that had experienced a severe financial crisis during 1997-1998, we find that the likelihood of...

This paper investigates the behavior of investors in the equity option market using a unique and detailed dataset of open interest and volume for all contracts listed on the Chicago Board Options Exchange over the 1990 through 2001 period. We document major stylized facts about the option market...