Using several different methodologies, we quantify the statistical robustness of variables used in prior research to explain initial IPO returns. We establish a parsimonious list of robust variables and evaluate their implications for different theories of IPO underpricing and clustering....

This paper provides a rational explanation for the apparent ability of managers to successfully time the maturity of their debt issues. We show that a structural break in excess bond returns during the early 1980s generates a spurious correlation between the fraction of long-term debt in total...

Previous studies have found that the proportion of equity in total new debt and equity issues is negatively correlated with future equity market returns. Researchers have interpreted this finding as evidence that corporate managers are able to predict the systematic component of their stock...

Both market timing and investment-based theories of corporate financing predict under-performance after firms raise capital, but only market timing predicts that the composition of financing (equity compared with debt) should also forecast returns. In cross-sectional tests, we find that the...

Mutual funds whose managers are in the same educational network as the firm's CEO are more likely to vote against shareholder-initiated proposals to limit executive compensation than out-of-network funds are. This voting propensity is stronger when voting among the funds in a family is not...