Premiums and Stock Price Responses in Equity-Stake Purchase Deals in Korea’s Stock Market

Abstract

In this study, we examine a sample of 160 equity-stake purchase deals between companies listed on Korea’s stock market during 2009~2017. The sample comprises deals in which acquiring firms buy at least 5% of the target’s common stock but excludes mergers or acquisitions of the target’s entire equity. The deal premium is measured by the difference between the deal price and the target’s share price a day or a week before the deal’s announcement. We find that although the deal premium tends to increase with the size of the equity stake in the target, it is negative in about half of the sample and its median value is close to zero. Moreover, the deal premium is positively associated with the won value of the deal size relative to acquiring firms’ assets but negatively associated with their quality (measured by operating profitability) and size of insider ownership. We also analyze stock price responses to deal announcements. For acquiring firms, the mean cumulative abnormal return over (-2, 2) (i.e., CAR (-2, 2)) is not statistically significant but CAR (-2, 2) increases with deal premium and the target’s operating performance. For target firms, the mean CAR (-2, 2) is significantly positive (approximately 1.6%) but we cannot identify factors that are systematically associated with their CAR (-2, 2).