This paper examines how market frictions influence the managerial incentives and organizational structure of new hedge funds. We develop a stylized model in which new managers search for accredited investors and have stronger incentives to acquire managerial skill when encountering low investor...

Using comprehensive quarterly data on hedge fund stock holdings, we study the role of hedge funds in the process of stock price formation. We find that hedge funds tend to hold undervalued stocks, and that both hedge fund ownership and their trades are positively related to the degree of stock...

We investigate an important question for institutional investors — namely, which hedge fund investing styles help to hedge against bad times? We define good versus bad times as (1) up and down equity market regimes derived from the 200-day moving average of the S&P 500 price index or (2)...

We explore a new dimension of fund managers' timing ability by examining whether they can time market liquidity through adjusting their portfolios' market exposure as aggregate liquidity conditions change. Using a large sample of hedge funds, we find strong evidence of liquidity timing. A...

We explore a new investment dimension relating hedge fund exposure to the real estate market. Using fund level data from 1994 to 2012 from a major hedge fund data vendor, we identify 1,321 hedge funds as having significant exposure to direct or securitized real estate. We test for the economic...

We study the relation between hedge fund equity holdings and measures of informational efficiency of stock prices derived from intraday transactions, as well as daily data. Our findings support the role of hedge funds as arbitrageurs who reduce mispricing in the market. Hedge funds invest in...

To understand the nature of hedge fund managers' skills, we study the implementation of risk arbitrage by hedge funds using their portfolio holdings and comparing them with those of other institutional arbitrageurs. We find that hedge funds significantly outperform a naive risk arbitrage...

We reexamine hedge fund preferences for stock characteristics using aggregate quarterly hedge fund holdings and a large set of firm characteristics. We find that the expanded set of firm characteristics is important in explaining variation in quarterly hedge fund holdings. Consistent with prior...

We examine the relation between changes in hedge fund stock holdings and measures of informational efficiency of equity prices derived from transactions data, and find that, on average, increased hedge fund ownership leads to significant improvements in the informational efficiency of equity...