Several studies document a robust negative association between net external financing and average stock returns, which is referred to as the external financing effect. Using total asset growth as a comprehensive measure of overall corporate investment and total profitability gross of R&D...

We investigate whether the liquidity premium is better explained by the risk-based model or the characteristic-based model. Based on three widely-used liquidity measures that are supposed to reflect different aspects of liquidity, we find that liquidity as a characteristic carries a significant...

Executive pay disparity, as measured by CEO pay slice (CPS), is positively associated with the implied cost of equity, even after controlling for other determinants of the cost of equity. The difference in the cost of equity can explain 43% of the difference in the valuation effect attributable...

In this paper, we study whether firm intangible information affects analyst behavior. We find direct evidence that when analysts make more judgment-intensive decisions, such as issuing stock recommendations, they overweight intangible information, leading to overreaction to intangible...

Japanese stock returns are even more closely related to their book-to-market ratios than are their U.S. counterparts, and thus provide a good setting for testing whether the return premia associated with these characteristics arise because the characteristics are proxies for covariance with...

The paper investigates whether and how a state's local corruption environment affects firms' financing costs. We find that firms in high-corruption states are associated with significantly higher loan spreads and tighter loan covenants. We use an instrumental variable approach and a...

Using a sample of 279 upgrades and 310 downgrades from 1996 to 2004, we find that bond rating changes affect asymmetric information of stock trading and other measures of information risk. More specifically, when a firm's bond rating is upgraded (downgraded), its stock information asymmetry and...

In this paper, we investigate the effects of legal protection of investors and the equity-financing channel on the relationship between corporate investment and stock prices in an international setting. We find that firms in countries with stronger legal protection of investors have investments...

This study examines how uncertainty affects corporate capital investment and how managerial flexibility influences this effect. Our evidence is consistent with the prediction of real options theory on investment. Specifically, we find that firms that face more uncertain future environment...