Positive Stock Price Reaction Research Articles

In search of a signaling effect: The wealth effects of corporate name changes

We find that evidence of a positive stock price reaction to the announcement of a name change is very weak and is sensitive to sample selection. We interpret the evidence as a caution against the popular opinion that corporate name changes have significant valuation effects. We also find little evidence that corporate name changes correspond to changes in a firm's stock return covariability with its industry index or changes in the firm's earnings growth rate. These results cast doubt on two purported motives for name changes: that they convey information to the market about changes in the firm's line of business or that they signal management's private information about the firm's future performance. Corporate name changes may serve useful purposes, but such purposes have small valuation effects or tend to be anticipated by investors.

Shareholder Wealth Effects of Directors' Liability Limitation Provisions

The adoption of liability limitation provisions (LLPs) is associated with insignificant stock price reactions for all firms, but with positive stock price reactions for poorly performing firms. This result is consistent with the hypothesis that the net benefit of LLPs is larger for financially troubled firms than for other firms because outside directors are valuable to the distressed firm and LLPs substantially affect experts' expected costs of serving as directors

Bank Debt Reduction Announcements and Negative Signaling

We examine 242 NYSE/AMEX and OTC common stock offerings that reduce bank debt and 254 that retire nonbank debt. We discover that bank debt reductions are associated with negative announcement period stock returns that are more than twice the magnitude of the negative returns found for nonbank debt reductions. The significant difference in returns indicate bank debt reductions transmits negative information beyond that previously cited in the stock offering literature. Regression tests show that the explanatory variable representing bank debt signaling models best explains stock returns. █ Bankers are parties to information about a firm's financial condition through their special relationship as lenders. This premise is the basis for the predictions of bank debt signaling models, which posit that bank debt issuance announcements convey positive news about a firm. Empirical research on debt offering announcements that raise cash for multi-corporate purposes supports this claim. The research documents statistically significant positive stock price reactions to bank debt announcements and negative reactions to nonbank debt announcements. If bank debt issuance announcements signal more favorable news than nonbank debt announcements, it follows that bank debt reduction announcements should signal more negative news than nonbank debt reduction announcements. Market participants will view bank debt reduction announcements as the result of decisions made by bankers acting upon unfavorable inside information. Our study extends prior research on equity offerings that reduce debt. We analyze 242 stock offering announcements that reduce bank debt, and 254 announcements that retire nonbank debt. Consistent with the predictions of bank debt signaling models, returns for bank debt reductions are more negative than returns for nonbank debt reductions, and the differences in returns are statistically significant.

Stock repurchases: A further test of the free cash flow hypothesis

This study explores the empirical puzzle currently existing regarding the observed positive stock price reaction associated with self-tender offer announcements. The puzzle stems from Lang and Litzenberger's (1989) findings that Jensen's (1986, 1989) free cash flow (overinvestment) hypothesis is consistent with changes in cash dividends, whereas Howe, He and Kao's (1992) study of analogous cash events (i.e., self-tender offers and specially designated dividends) finds no support for the free cash flow hypothesis. By stratifying our sample of firms repurchasing their stock by the source of the firm's free cash flow (overinvestment) problem, additional light is shed on the interaction between the signalling and free cash flow theories.

Internalization: An event study test

The internalization theory of multinational firms proposes that direct international investment occurs when a firm has information-related intangible assets with public good properties. We find that firms with characteristics suggesting the presence of information-based assets experience a significantly positive stock price reaction upon announcing a foreign acquisition. On the other hand, firms apparently lacking such assets experience at best zero abnormal returns upon announcing overseas acquisitions.

The Effects of International Joint Ventures on Shareholder Wealth

AbstractThe purposes of this study are to measure the wealth effects of international joint ventures on the U.S. firms' shareholders and to determine whether these effects are related to the economics status of the partner's home country. The results indicate that overall investor reactions to joint ventures with foreign firms are negative and that only joint ventures with firms from lesser developed countries have nonnegative effects on shareholders' wealth. These findings are in contrast with previous reports of positive stock price reactions to both dimestic and international joint ventures.

Capital Structure Theory and REIT Security Offerings

ABSTRACTIn this paper, we examine the stock price reactions to announcements of new security offerings by Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs). REITs offer a unique setting in which to study these events because they do not pay taxes at the firm level. Theory suggests that the net tax gain to corporate borrowing is unambiguously negative for a REIT. Contrary to some recent studies, however, we find a positive stock price reaction to debt offerings, while the negative equity‐issuance effect is preserved. Further empirical evidence lends support to signalling as the explanation for the positive significant debt‐issuance effect.

Some empirical evidence on stock returns and security credit regulation in the OTC equity market

This paper studies price reactions of OTC stocks that are added to and deleted from the Federal Reserve Board's Official List of OTC Margin Stocks. We interpret any price reactions as economic effects related to the Fed's security credit regulatory activities under the 1969 Amendment to the 1934 Securities Exchange Act. We test for three effects: (1) Fed endorsement, (2) credit, and (3) asymmetric information. Using both weekly and daily data we find strong positive stock price reactions when OTC stocks are added to the Fed's list. No major effects are discernible when stocks are removed from the Fed's list. We interpret these findings to be consistent with a credit convenience effect.