Exploiting the staggered deregulation of short sales in China as a quasi-experiment, we investigate whether firms change investor relations (IR) strategy when they face short-selling pressure. We document significant increases in IR efforts as measured by the frequency of company visits when...

We extend Jin and Myers’ (2006) model to derive the relation between stock price crash risk and operating leverage (i.e., the fraction of fixed costs in total costs). The model predicts that (i) firms’ operating leverage decreases as stock price crash risk increases, and (ii) the negative...

We examine the role of ESG performance during market-wide financial crisis, triggered in response to physical and economic lockdowns arising from the COVID-19 global pandemic. These unique circumstances create an inimitable opportunity to question if investors interpret ESG performance as a...

We conjecture that an introduction of the Hong Kong Hang Seng Chinese Enterprise Stock Index (H-share Index) futures induces additional speculating activities in the underlying equities, leading to an increase in volatility and volume of the underlying stocks. Whereas, a subsequent introduction...

The literature shows that investor attention to customer-supplier disclosure increases when suppliers' information arrival is anticipated. Due to the widespread of city lockdowns in China and the implementation of social distancing to control the COVID-19 pandemic, investor attention to...

COVID-19 has stimulated additional research interest on economic sustainability and ESG in both academia and industry. This study adopts a DEA approach to examine the efficiency of achieving ESG targets and their relationships with financial performance. Using MSCI ESG data from 2015-2019 on...

Through the interest rate deregulation and banks' off-balance-sheet activities (OBSAs) in Hong Kong, this study investigates the debate over the impact of banking deregulation on banks' risk-taking behaviour. On one hand, the Arrow effect implies that increased competition caused by the interest...

This study examines the impacts of directors' dealings on firm liquidity. Consistent with the information asymmetry hypothesis, spread widens and depth falls on insider trading days as compared to non-insider trading days. This result suggests that increased share trading by insiders impairs...