I study the role of institutional stock ownership in facilitating flexibility in firms' payout policy by examining payout reductions during the financial crisis of 2008-2009. Treating the financial crisis as a systemic, negative shock to firms' access to capital markets, I find that firms with...

We show a dark-side view of internal capital markets in which one segment exploits the funding advantage of another profitable segment to relax its financial constraints. Results demonstrate that bank holding companies (BHCs) shield their nonbank segments, and not their bank segments, from...

The purpose of this Article is to provide the reader with a detailed analysis of the existing regulations on shareholders' rights, recently updated by the Shareholders' Rights Directive II, as well as in light of the U.S. regulation on the topic. The paper aims to adequately address and explore...

This study examines the role of activist investors in firms' decisions to conduct open market share repurchases. Compared with firms making ordinary share repurchases, firms making activist-involved repurchases have more cash holdings, are more undervalued, experience better subsequent stock...

We measure the impact of reputation for proxy fighting on investor activism by estimating a dynamic model in which activists engage a sequence of target firms. Our estimation produces an evolving reputation measure for each activist and quantifies its impact on campaign frequency and outcomes....

We propose a “noisy signaling" hypothesis of open market share repurchase (OMSR) programs, where the equity market equilibrium that prevails after OMSR program announcements is a partial pooling rather than a fully separating equilibrium. We argue that two complementary mechanisms, namely,...

I study repurchase motives by examining trading from institutional investors, usually considered informed traders, around the events. When firms conduct repurchases, the likelihood of institutional selling increases and institutional buying decreases, consistent firms repurchasing to provide...

Passive institutional investors are an increasingly important component of U.S. stock ownership. To examine whether and by which mechanisms passive investors influence firms' governance, we exploit variation in ownership by passive mutual funds associated with stock assignments to the Russell...

We use institutional trading data to examine whether skilled institutions exploit positive abnormal ex-dividend returns. Results show that institutions concentrate trading around certain ex-dates, and earn higher profits around these events. Dividend capture trades represent 6% of all...

This paper discusses empirical methods that rely on Russell 1000/2000 index assignments for identification. Using simulated data, the paper illustrates why the varying approaches reach conflicting conclusions about the effect of index assignment on a firm's ownership structure and corporate...