In a comprehensive sample of mergers and acquisitions, we find a reference price effect: Acquirers earn higher (lower) announcement-period returns when their pre-announcement stock prices are well below (near) their 52-week highs. This reference price effect is stronger in acquisitions of...

Unlisted acquisitions differ from listed ones in three important aspects: the possibility of forming blockholders, which substitute debt as a monitoring mechanism; the liquidity discount, which mitigates managerial hubris; and the distinct deal process through which two-sided asymmetric...

We propose an alternative measure of the long-term economic impact of mergers on firm value: post-acquisition changes in intrinsic value. Consistent with the literature on post-acquisition returns, acquirers tend to lose industry-adjusted intrinsic values in the three years following merger...

This paper examines the information content of insider silence, periods of no insider trading. We hypothesize that, to avoid litigation risk, rational insiders do not sell own-company shares when they anticipate bad news; neither would they buy, given unfavorable prospects; thus they keep...

In this paper we examine the role of the timing of 52-week high, or recency, in the post earnings announcement drift (PEAD) puzzle. We argue that, because investors are less likely to bid up (down) a stock price if a stock's 52-week high occurred in the recent (distant) past, these stocks are...

We hypothesize there is an increased noise demand for stocks of acquirers in response to acquisition announcements and that the demand is greater for acquirers with higher uncertainty in their equity valuation. Using idiosyncratic volatility to measure uncertainty, we find support for limits of...