Theoretical models suggest that ownership structure may be an important determinant of securities' market characteristics. For example, the presence of informed traders leads to greater bid-ask spreads (Copeland and Galai (1983), and Glosten and Milgrom (1985)), and strategic trading of informed...

This dissertation consists of two chapters. First chapter examines whether herding by actively managed equity funds affects their performance. For this purpose, first the effect of herding on stock returns is reexamined and evidence is found that, during the herding quarter, stocks bought...

Several research studies in finance have investigated the effect of financial factors on investment decisions of firms. More recently, researchers have extended conventional models of firm-investment by incorporating a role for financing constraints in determining the firm's investment decision....

This dissertation examines whether simultaneously conditioning on themultidimensional characteristics of information signals can help predict returnsthat are of economic significance. We use large price changes, publicannouncements, and large volume increases to proxy for the...