Based on a sample of 7,378 firms going public in the 1975-2005 period, we document a significant underperformance of IPO firms over the first year after going public, while there is virtually no underperformance thereafter. Moreover, by decomposing the Carhart-alpha we find that IPO...

We present a regression-based generalization of the calendar time portfolio approach which allows for decomposing the risk-adjusted performance of private investors (or firms or mutual funds) into multivariate and continuous subject characteristics. Our technique remedies several well-known...

Based on a new methodological framework we investigate IPO (under-)performance in asample of 7,378 firms going public in the 1975-2005 period. We explicitly vary the time horizonin our analysis and document a significant underperformance of IPO firms over the firstyear after going public, while...

We analyze the zero-leverage phenomenon around the world. Countries with a common law system, high creditor protection, and a dividend imputation or dividend relief tax system exhibit the highest percentage of zero-leverage firms. The increasing prevalence of zero-leverage firms in all sample...

Based on practices and legislation in the shipping industry, we construct a corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure index for listed shipping companies. We use Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) techniques for Bayesian inference, and we estimate the marginal effects of firm characteristics...