Cumulative Abnormal Stock Returns Research Articles

Value creation or political trick? An event study on anti-ESG regulations

This paper examines the effect of the anti-ESG regulations approved in 18 states from 2021 to 2023. Focusing on the fuel energy sector, we find that the regulatory intervention leads to 0.8 % to 3.5 % cumulative abnormal stock returns (CARs) around the regulation approval dates. The market reactions are found to be more positive and pronounced when the firm has poor previous ESG performance, when the firm is financially more constrained, and when the regulation is less controversial. Meanwhile, although fuel energy firms have more institutional ownership afterwards, their carbon emission also increases, indicating potential negative economic effects of anti-ESG policies.

“Let Me Get Back to You”—A Machine Learning Approach to Measuring NonAnswers

Using a supervised machine learning framework on a large training set of questions and answers, we identify 1,364 trigrams that signal nonanswers in earnings call questions and answers (Q&A). We show that this glossary has economic relevance by applying it to contemporaneous stock market reactions after earnings calls. Our findings suggest that obstructing the flow of information leads to significantly lower cumulative abnormal stock returns and higher implied volatility. As both our method and glossary are free of financial context, we believe that the measure is applicable to other fields with a Q&A setup outside the contextual domain of financial earnings conference calls. This paper was accepted by Kay Giesecke, finance. Supplemental Material: The data files are available at https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2022.4597 .

Corporate R&D spending, subsidies and stock market reactions to seasoned equity offering announcements: evidence from China

PurposeThis study focuses on an emerging market, China, and investigates the effects of corporate research and development (R&D) spending and subsidies on stock market reactions to seasoned equity offering (SEO) announcements.Design/methodology/approachThe study uses a sample of SEOs announced over the period of 2003–2018 in the Chinese A-share market. The cumulative abnormal stock returns (CARs) are adopted to measure the stock market response to SEOs. The R&D spending-to-sales ratio (R&D subsidies) in 2 years before SEO announcements is used to measure the pre-SEO R&D spending (R&D subsidies). The instrumental variable (IV) regression method is applied to address the endogeneity problem in the robustness test.FindingsThis study demonstrates that firms with high R&D spending suffer stock overpricing and experience a negative market reaction when they announce SEOs, but R&D subsidies alleviate stock overpricing and mitigate the negative relationship between R&D spending and SEO market reactions.Originality/valueAlthough the prior studies have demonstrated that information asymmetry, which causes stock overpricing, explains negative stock market reactions to SEOs, it is unclear if a certain factor that causes information asymmetry affects SEO market reactions. This study fills this gap and focuses on R&D spending, demonstrating that R&D spending is negatively related to SEO performance.

“Red” and “green” flags of risk disclosures – identifying associations between positive and negative key phrases and consecutive cumulative abnormal stock returns

PurposeThe usefulness of risk disclosures (RDs) to support equity investors’ investment decisions is highly discussed. As prior research criticizes the extensive aggregation of risk information in existing empirical research, this paper aims to provide an attempt to identify disaggregated risk information associated with cumulative abnormal stock returns (CARs).Design/methodology/approachThe sample consists of 2,558 RDs of companies listed in the S&P 500 index. The RDs were filed within 10 K filings between 2011 and 2017. First, this study automatically extracted 35,685 key phrases that occurred in a maximum of 1.5% of the RDs. Second, this study performed stepwise regressions of these key phrases and identified 67 (78) key phrases that show positive (negative) associations with CARs.FindingsThe paper finds that investors seem to value most the more common key phrases just below the 1.5% rarest key phrase threshold and business-related key phrases from RDs. Furthermore, investors seem to perceive key phrases that contain words indicating uncertainty (impacts) as a negative (positive) rather than a positive (negative) signal.Research limitations/implicationsThe research approach faces limitations mainly due to the selection of the included key phrases, the focus on CARs and the methodological choice of the stepwise regression analysis.Originality/valueThe study reveals the potential for companies to increase the information value of their RDs for equity investors by providing tailored information within RDs instead of universal phrases. In addition, the research indicates that the tailored RDs encouraged by the SEC contain relevant information for investors. Furthermore, the results may guide the attention of equity investors to relevant text passages whose deeper analysis might be useful with regard to investors’ capital market decisions.

The Dynamics of Investors’ Reactions to Informal Central Bank Communications

Central bank informal communications became more frequent and acquired more mass media attention after the global financial crisis. Do investors react to the content (e.g., future expansionary or restrictive policy) of informal central bank communications? And especially, do investors have a memory of past “similar” speeches? Focusing on informal Central Bank communications in the United States, we show that speeches with an expansionary content positively influence cumulative abnormal stock returns. However, this effect is lower when there is more intense past informal communication with the same expansionary tone. This weakening effect is stronger when the previous expansionary speech is further back in time, suggesting a lack-of-confidence in the monetary policy’s effectiveness (skepticism hypothesis).

Rival Growth Prospects and Equity Prices: Evidence from Mass Layoff Announcements

AbstractWe investigate the impact of mass layoff announcements on industry rivals and find that investors perceive layoff announcements as news about industry prospects. When a layoff announcement conveys good (bad) news for the announcer, rivals on average witness a 0.51% increase (0.65% decrease) in cumulative abnormal stock returns. To explain this industry effect, we test a “growth opportunities” channel, where rivals with greater growth opportunities are affected most by changing industry prospects, and find that these firms experience the strongest contagion effect. Alternative industry classifications and a placebo test confirm that our results are not driven by confounding factors.

Is a promise a promise? Analyzing performance commitment in acquisitions and target firm performance

Using the acquisition data in China from 2011 to 2019, we show that acquiring firms are more likely to provide target firms with performance commitment (PC) contracts when they (1) use stocks to pay acquisitions, (2) have low profits, (3) make cross-industry and domestic acquisitions, (4) are young, small, non-stated-owned enterprises and not related parties with target firms, and (5) deal value is high. Although PC increases the takeover premia, acquirers with PC experience high cumulative abnormal stock returns (CARs) during the announcement period. Double PC contracts drive acquirers' CARs even higher. Although target firms with double PC have better profitability than those with single PC during the commitment period, their profit starts to decrease sharply once the commitment period expires, and those with double PC deteriorate even further. Finally, we find that target firms with PC engage in earnings management during the commitment period to meet their promised performance. Overall, we do not support previous studies because PCs engender earnings management and impair the values of acquirers in the post-commitment period.

'Red' and 'Green' Flags of Risk Disclosures – Identifying Associations between Positive and Negative Key Phrases and Consecutive Cumulative Abnormal Stock Returns – Online Repository

This online repository complements the main manuscript titled Red and Green Flags of Risk Disclosures - Identifying Associations between Positive and Negative Key Phrases and Consecutive Cumulative Abnormal Stock Returns

Valuation Effect of Emotionality in Corporate Philanthropy

Despite receiving a great deal of research attention, the effect of corporate philanthropy on shareholder value remains inconclusive. To address this issue, the present paper examines emotionality as an important factor based on which investors infer about the firm’s motive as well as the beneficiary’s worthiness and react accordingly. Consistent with attribution theory, our event study shows that announcements with more emotional expressions are associated with higher cumulative abnormal stock returns and the effect is stronger when investor attention is greater. We further find that the positive interaction effect between emotionality and investor attention is more pronounced for scandal-free firms than for firms with corporate social irresponsibility (CSI). The empirical evidence remains consistent under various robustness tests. The paper concludes with implications for future research and managerial practices.

Econlinguistics

It is relatively easy for us humans to detect when a question we asked has not been answered – we aim to teach this skill to a computer. Using a supervised machine learning framework on a large training set of questions and answers, we identify 1,364 trigrams that signal non-answers in earnings call Q&A. We show that this glossary has economic relevance by applying it to contemporaneous stock market reactions after earnings calls. Our findings suggest that obstructing the flow of information leads to significantly lower cumulative abnormal stock returns and higher implied volatility. As both our method and glossary are free of financial context, we believe that the measure is applicable to other fields with a Q&A setup outside the contextual domain of financial earnings conference calls.

Investor reactions to restatements conditional on disclosure of internal control weaknesses

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate investor reactions to financial restatements conditional on disclosures of internal control weaknesses under Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. Design/methodology/approach The research uses cumulative abnormal stock returns (CARs) as a proxy for investor reactions. Restatements and internal control reports are available on audit analytics. Multivariate regression analyses were used for testing. Findings Using a sample of restating firms whose original misstatements are linked to underlying internal control weaknesses, the research finds that cumulative abnormal returns for firms disclosing internal control weaknesses in a timely manner is negative in a three-day window around the restatement announcements. The finding indicates that restatements with early disclosure of internal control weaknesses provide more persuasive evidence of the ineffectiveness of a firm’s internal control over financial reporting, rather than early disclosure lowering the information asymmetry between a firm and investors. Research limitations/implications This study employs CARs to examine the market reaction to restatements conditional on disclosure of internal control weaknesses. Practical implications Further study on reactions by creditors who have access to private information on firms could extend the implications of the finding. Originality/value The study contributes to the existing research by documenting that early disclosure of material weaknesses in internal control affects investors’ reactions to financial restatements.

The effects of liquidity trading on insider trade timing when an underlying option is present

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine whether the underlying option impacts an insider’s propensity to purchase and sell before corporate announcements, the proportion of insiders’ trading after announcements relative to before announcements, and the insider’s profitability around corporate announcements.Design/methodology/approachThe authors test whether the timing information and option have impacted on the tendency of insider trade, the percentage of all shares traded by insiders in the post-announcement to pre-announcement periods and the average cumulative abnormal stock returns during the pre-announcement period.FindingsInsiders’ propensity to trade before announcements is higher for stocks without options listed than for stocks with traded options. This result is stronger for unscheduled announcements than for scheduled ones. The proportion of insiders’ trade volume after announcements relative to before announcements in stocks that have not options listed is higher than those in stocks with traded options. The positive relationship between the insiders’ signed volume and the informational content of corporate announcements is stronger in stocks without traded options than in stocks with options listed. Insider trades prior to unscheduled announcement are more profitable than those before scheduled ones.Research limitations/implicationsThe paper examines whether there is a difference between the effects of optioned stock and non-optioned stock. Roll et al. (2010) use the relative trading volume of options to stock ratio (O/S) to proxy for informed options trading activity. Future research could explore the impact of O/S. Moreover, the authors examine how insiders with private information use such information to trade in their own firms. Mehta et al. (2017) argue that insiders also use private information to facilitate trading (shadow trading) in linked firms, such as supply chain partners or competitors. Therefore, future research could consider the impact of shadow trading.Social implicationsSince the insider’s propensity to buy before announcements in stocks without options listed is larger than in stocks with traded options and the relationship is stronger for unscheduled announcements than for scheduled ones, the efforts of regulators should focus on monitoring insider trading in stocks without options listed prior to unscheduled announcements.Originality/valueFirst, Lei and Wang (2014) find that the increasing pattern of insider’s propensity to trade before unscheduled announcements is larger than that before scheduled announcements. The authors document the underlying option has impacted the insider’s propensity to purchase and sell, and the relationship is stronger for unscheduled announcements than for scheduled ones. Second, related studies show insider’s trading activity has shifted from periods before corporate announcements to periods after corporate announcements to decrease litigation risk. This paper find the underlying option has influenced the proportion of insiders’ trading after announcements relative to before announcements when the illegal insider trade-related penalties increase.

Rival Growth Prospects and Equity Prices: Evidence from Mass Layoff Announcements

We investigate the impact of mass layoff announcements on the equity value of industry rivals. When a layoff announcement conveys good (bad) news for the announcer, rivals on average witness a 0.44 percent increase (0.60 percent decrease) in cumulative abnormal stock returns. This effect is concentrated on rivals with high growth opportunities. Consistent with this finding, we also show that our results are strongest in technology industries, where growth opportunities matter the most. Our results suggest that investors perceive layoff announcements as news about industry prospects rather than just the announcer.

Rival Growth Prospects and Equity Prices: Evidence from Mass Layoff Announcements

We investigate the impact of mass layoff announcements on the equity value of industry rivals. When a layoff announcement conveys good (bad) news for the announcer, rivals on average witness a 0.44 percent increase (0.60 percent decrease) in cumulative abnormal stock returns. This effect is concentrated on rivals with high growth opportunities. Consistent with this finding, we also show that our results are strongest in technology industries, where growth opportunities matter the most. Our results suggest that investors perceive layoff announcements as news about industry prospects rather than just the announcer.

“Alcohol Bans”: Can they reveal the effect of Xi Jinping's anti-corruption campaign?

China is perceived to be one of the most politically corrupt countries in the world. Chinese government officials establish firm ties with trusted people through lavish banquets with flowing alcohol, providing privileged access to scarce resources like licenses, land, bank loans, subsidies, and government contracts. In China, Baijiu, the most popular grain liquor at these parties, works as the currency of bribery and is the lubricant for political connections for corruption. Xi Jinping's anti-corruption policy, known as the “Alcohol Bans,” has targeted Baijiu in an attempt to stop the boozy banquets, and, consequently, to bring an end to this channel of political networking. This paper employs the event study approach and connects cumulative abnormal stock returns of high-end Baijiu companies with the impact of the Alcohol Bans. It applies the difference-in-difference method to rule out unobserved reasons for stock market changes. The result is unchanged in both the efficient market hypothesis test and the abnormal return test. We consider if Baijiu may be substituted for other luxuries, and find little evidence for such “substitution effects.” Our work concludes that the Alcohol Bans has partially contributed to Xi's anti-corruption campaign.

Shareholder Wealth Effects of Women on Boards Promoting Policies: Evidence from Germany

This study discusses differences in the effectiveness of voluntary and mandatory policies promoting women on boards and their potential effects on stock price returns. Furthermore, it classifies the announcements of the policy proposals discussed in Germany and analyzes their impact using event study methodology. The event date identification follows a two-step procedure employing search engine query data from GoogleTrends and traditional search methods using Lexis-Nexis and newspapers. One key event produces negative significant cumulative abnormal stock returns (CAR) of approximately 1.3 percentage points. Further regression analysis of the CAR reveals that the share of women on the supervisory board of firms which were not planned to be subject to the mandatory board gender quota exhibits significant negative CAR around the event days. On the contrary, the effect of the share of women on the supervisory board is positively associated with the CAR for firms planned to be subject to the mandatory board gender quota. Thus, the implementation of a mandated quota was costly especially for shareholders of companies not affected by the mandatory quota.

Market effects of SEC regulation of short-term borrowing disclosure

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to offer an alternative approach to measure the cost-benefit tradeoff, by analyzing stockholders’ reactions to the announcement and vote on the proposed rule. More specifically, the authors use event study methodology to investigate the stock price reaction on two key dates; that is, the announcement date and the voting date of the proposed short-term borrowing disclosure regulation, and argue that positive abnormal stock returns indicate that the expected benefits of the regulation outweigh the compliance costs. A negative reaction would indicate that, in the eyes of investors, the costs of compliance exceed the expected benefits. Design/methodology/approach The authors use event study analysis and apply the market model to equal-weighted portfolios of 2,450 financial and 3,985 non-financial US firms to calculate mean cumulative abnormal stock returns (MCARs, hereafter) on the announcement and voting dates. Then, the authors conduct mean difference tests on firm-level MCARs across three event windows, that is, (−30,−1), (0,+1) and (+2,+30), to confirm if the MCARs of financial firms are different from those of non-financial firms on both the announcement and the voting dates. Finally, robustness tests are performed with alternate benchmark, using value-weighted portfolios, for the market. Findings The authors find that the market reaction is positive and significant at the announcement date and negative and significant at the voting date of the proposed regulation of short-term borrowing disclosure regulation. Overall, the paper documents a positive market reaction, indicating the usefulness of the disclosure from the vantage point of users. Examining and comparing the results for various subsets, including commercial banks and saving institutions, bank holding companies, size quartiles, and exchange listed and OTC registrants, the authors find that a “one-size-fits-all” approach to regulation is undesirable. Originality/value This is first empirical study, to best of the authors’ knowledge, to explore stockholder reaction to a proposed, rather than an enforced, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) regulation and may contribute to the SEC’s final decision on the rule. Second, given a dissimilar reaction from investors of different firms, the results suggest that the SEC needs to reconsider its one-size-fit-all approach for the proposed rule. Finally, because the proposed disclosure would affect all SEC registrants, the economic implications of the findings are important not only for stockholders, but also for regulators, as they attempt to manage systematic risk and optimize the level of market intervention.

The Announcement Impact of Hosting the FIFA World Cup on Host Country Stock Markets

Abstract This study is an investigation of the impact of hosting the FIFA World Cup soccer tournament on the stock market of the host country when the tournament is announced. The sample under examination for this study consists of the 5 FIFA World Cups, between the period 1994 and 2010. Additional factors to be assessed include investigating whether stock markets react efficiently or show a positive reaction to hosting the FIFA World Cup. An event study research methodology is used to investigate the impact of hosting the FIFA World Cup on the stock exchange of the host country, by examining the movement of stock market returns across various event windows during the announcement and tournament starting date stages. It is found that country stock markets react differently to the announcement of the tournament. For instance South Africa appears to show a positive trend in stock returns at the tournament announcement date, while Japan shows a decline in daily stock returns a day after the announcement of the tournament. It is found that for the tournament announcement, most countries show insignificant negative cumulative abnormal stock returns for different event windows. There are however few instances where country stock markets do show positive cumulative abnormal stock returns, with statistical significant results. The implication of this study is that FIFA World Cups have varied impacts on host country stock markets. This study contributes to the understanding of the impacts of mega sporting events on host country stock markets, with specific reference to the FIFA World Cup.

Do CEOs exercise managerial discretion to save their jobs?

Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) wield considerable power and authority. In many industries and contexts, CEO turnover is studied in terms of antecedents, the event itself, and the related consequences. However, the extent to which CEOs exert their power and attempt to prevent their dismissal has not been thoroughly examined. In this study, we examine the role of CEOs exercising managerial discretion in their effort to prevent their own corporate demise. We hypothesize that CEOs cut discretionary expenses such as research and development, advertising, and rent in order to boost earnings and enhance financial performance. A sample of CEO turnover from Standard and Poor’s ExecComp database for the period 1992–1998 in US firms yielded 474 turnover firms and 2,066 control firm-years. We tested the effects of CEO turnover and managerial discretion on firm performance measured by cumulative abnormal stock returns. We also compared the turnover and non-turnover firms in terms of pattern of discretionary spending prior to CEO turnover. The results are consistent with our prediction that CEOs facing termination attempt to post higher earnings by reducing discretionary spending after controlling for firm performance, firm diversification, book to market ratio, and CEO ownership, industry-, and year dummies.

Information diffusion and value redistribution among transaction partners of the IPO firm

This paper examines the diffusion of information around the initial public offering (IPO) process and identifies transaction partners on which IPO firms are dependent. Using a resource payments perspective, we argue that this dependence will lead to greater cumulative abnormal stock returns for transaction partners when this information is revealed in the market (when the initial form S-1 is filed with the SEC). Moreover, we examine the uniqueness of the resource configuration between the IPO firm and transaction partners and find that greater uniqueness is associated with higher valuation for these transaction partners. We also find that multiple dependencies (by the IPO firm) reduce the valuation effect for transaction partners, indicating that a bargaining effect reduces the potential value that any transaction partner can appropriate.