We examine the performance of acquirers who hire an advisor that employs a “star” analyst covering the target (i.e., “star-crossed” deals) and show that such deals have lower abnormal announcement returns (2.1%), lower total acquisition returns (8.9%), and greater subsequent goodwill...

We examine the impact of shared auditors, defined as audit firms that provide audit services to a target and its acquirer firm prior to an acquisition, on transaction outcomes. We find shared auditors are observed in nearly a quarter of all public acquisitions and targets are more likely to...

We examine the impact of shared auditors, defined as audit firms that provide audit services to a target and its acquirer firm prior to an acquisition, on transaction outcomes. We find shared auditors are observed in nearly a quarter of all public acquisitions and targets are more likely to...

In this paper we argue that managers confront a paradox in selecting strategy. On the one hand, capital markets systematically discount uniqueness in the investment strategy choices of firms. Uniqueness in strategy heightens the cost of collecting and analyzing information to evaluate a firm's...

We develop a novel metric of environmental corporate social responsibility (CSR) rivalry capturing the sustainability engagements of a firm relative to its “green” and “toxic” peers. We document that our measure has superior predictive power about firms' future pollution levels when...

We find that an increase in a firm's incentives to use trade secrets to protect its intellectual property results in a more actively managed capital structure. Exploiting U.S. states' adoption of the Uniform Trade Secrets Act as a positive “shock” in the protection afforded to trade secrets,...