This paper establishes that credit ratings affect the choice of payment method in mergers and acquisitions. We find that bidders holding a high rating level are more likely to use cash financing in a takeover. We attribute this finding to lower financial constraints and enhanced capability of...

We use hand-collected board data around the issuance of two distinct government-led board structure mandates in the U.K. to establish the effect of outside directors on acquirer performance. Increases in outside director representation are associated with better acquirer returns in deals...

We contribute to the debate on whether stock-financed acquisitions destroy value for shareholders. A stock-financed acquisition is a joint takeover/equity-issue event. Using SEO announcement returns, we estimate through linear prediction and propensity-score matching the share price drop that...

Using a global M&A data set, this paper provides evidence that the empirical observations relating public acquisitions to, at best, zero abnormal returns, and their stock-financed subset to negative abnormal returns for acquiring firms around the deal announcement are not unanimous across...

We provide new evidence on the role of financial advisors in M&As. Contrary to prior studies, top-tier advisors deliver higher bidder returns than their non-top-tier counterparts but in public acquisitions only, where the advisor reputational exposure and required skills set are relatively...

This study explores the impact of joint corporate asset restructuring decisions where firms sell an asset in order to fund a subsequent acquisition (selling-to-buy). We find that firms with asset sales are associated with increased acquisition probability. The effect is more pronounced for...

There is a curvilinear relation between credit ratings and acquisitions. Non-investment grade firms make more acquisitions as their ratings improve, consistent with the relaxation of financial constraints. However, this pattern reverses for investment grade firms, supporting the view that such...

Using a data set of bank loans to Greek firms during the period of the Greek sovereign crisis, we provide empirical evidence that firms affiliated with groups are less likely to default on their bank loan during a credit crunch, compared to stand-alone firms. We show that the lower default risk...

Using a unique dataset of corporate loans of 13,070 Greek firms for the period 2008-2015 and an identification strategy based on the internal credit ratings of banks, we provide evidence that one out of six firms with non-performing loans are strategic defaulters. Furthermore, we investigate...