Do newly public acquirers benefit or suffer from their pre‐IPO affiliations with underwriters and VCs?

We examine whether pre‐IPO affiliations affect post‐IPO corporate events, namely acquisitions. On the one hand, newly public acquirers may benefit from their pre‐IPO affiliations through residual signaling value or/and resource‐related benefits. On the other hand, newly public acquirers may suffer from those affiliations when conflicts of interests arise during the post‐IPO period. Equity underwriters may have incentive to promote non–value‐creating acquisitions (Type II error), and venture capitalists (VCs) may have incentive to forgo strategically important acquisitions (Type I error). Drawing on a sample of 4,029 acquisitions made by 717 newly public firms, we find that on average the announcement of an acquisition by a newly public acquirer elicits a positive response from investors. The market views more favorably the acquisitions announced by newly public acquirers associated with prestigious equity underwriters, but this reaction becomes negative when the lead underwriter is retained as the acquisition advisor. The market reacts more favorably to acquisitions announced by VC‐backed newly public acquirers, but only when those VCs are committed to a longer lockup period. The effects of pre‐IPO affiliations on expected returns are stronger for newly public acquirers with a high intangible resource base and persist throughout the three‐year post‐IPO period (across each subsequent acquisition announcement). Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

注册制下IPO定价有效吗？——以创业板市场为例

2023年2月1日，我国正式启动全面实行股票发行注册制改革，在此制度下，新股首发定价是否有效，对投资者、上市公司、承销机构、监管者等各方而言无疑都是一个值得关注的问题。在梳理国内外新股发行定价有关文献的基础上，构建基于成本函数的单边随机前沿模型，并利用创业板上市公司股票首发数据和公开财务数据，依次使用OLS、MLE和单边随机前沿估计等方法对新股首发定价的有效性进行检验。结果发现，注册制下创业板股票首发定价存在明显的溢价效应。据此从监管者视角，提出未来监管应重点提高承销商的定价能力和自我约束，同时进一步强化投资者教育，培育理性投资理念，以推动创业板市场健康发展。     

监管信息披露、机构投资者行为与新股发行定价效率

经过三年多的科创板注册制试点后,我国的证券市场进入全面注册制的新时代。新的发行制度带来更充分的信息披露与更多的机构投资者参与,必然会对新股发行的定价效率产生影响。在收集了科创板开板至2020年9月共175家上市公司数据并进行实证分析后发现:监管信息披露增加了市场可信信息,提高了机构投资者参与询价意愿与申购数量,有利于吸引更多的机构投资者参与科创板市场交易。但监管信息披露同时降低了IPO定价效率,这是由于目前询价过程中采取高价去除的密闭平均价格拍卖策略,机构投资者为了避免机会错失而倾向于压低报价,从而导致发行价格下行与抑价率提高。此外,机构投资者行为在监管信息与定价效率之间发挥着重要中介效应。研究结果为发行制度进一步优化工作提供了经验证据和政策参考。     

Segmented financial risk tolerances within the standardised initial public offering regulatory environment of the Australian Securities Exchange

This study examines differentiated financial risk tolerance attitudes between three listing branches within the Australian Securities Exchange’s (ASX) standardised listing environment. Western Australia’s (WA) concentration of earlier-stage IPOs (51% of all ASX small, (predominately mining) initial public offerings (IPOs)) appears to reflect a localised ‘entrepreneurial’ risk attitude towards smaller, higher-risk transactions, comparative to New South Wales and Victoria . Our mixed method approach identifies that the concentration of small-cap, capital raising experiences that are (in)/formally shared through key ‘gatekeepers’, shape locally adopted funding capabilities, business processes, and risk attitudes. Underlying risk attitudes were influenced by the shared confidence in the recognition and management of risk, thereby increasing the propensity to participate in more speculative opportunities, and WA’s presumptive higher risk tolerance.     

Is sustainability rating material to the market?

This study examines whether information about a firm's engagement in environmental, social, and governance (ESG) practices is material to market participants. Evidence from a sample of 1856 initial public offerings (IPOs) by U.S. companies for the 2007–2018 period robustly documents that firms for which there is available ESG performance information prior to going public exhibit higher underpricing due to a positive market response. Such a reaction is validated by agency cost-reducing practices that ESG-rated firms follow prior to the IPO, the superior post-IPO market performance they exhibit in terms of equity financing, and the higher share of financially sophisticated investors they attract compared to their ESG-unrated peers. Overall, our results highlight that it pays off to do good and to have the right investors; however, firms’ good ESG practices need to be visible to the market, through rating practices, to reap the benefits.     

SPAC merger announcement returns and subsequent performance

Special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) are created to raise capital and then find non-listed operating companies with which to merge. While most of the extant research has focused on SPAC initial public offerings, we study what happens when SPACs announce business combinations. Our analysis of 236 ‘deSPACs’ completed between January 2012 and June 2021 in the United States documents an average short-term announcement return of +7.4% and a 1-year abnormal return of −14.1% (−18.0% over 2 years) for public investors beginning from the merger announcement. Short-term returns decrease with longer times from initial public offering until announcement.     

Stock market restrictions and corporate social responsibility: Evidence from IPO suspension in China

Improving corporate social responsibility (CSR) requires not only the efforts of firms themselves but also the support of the appropriate institutional environment. This paper assesses whether access to the stock market can promote firms’ CSR. Using China’s suspension of IPOs in 2012–2014, we find that firms affected by the suspension show lower CSR in their listing year. The later listing after the suspension ends, the greater reduction in CSR. Moreover, the effect of the IPO suspension is more serious for firms with financial constraints than for non-financially constrained firms. Furthermore, we show that the IPO suspension has an adverse impact on firms’ liquidity and profitability. When this suspension ends, firms’ CSR activities recover within 1–2 years. Overall, our conclusion enriches the literature on the factors influencing CSR and provides firm-level evidence of the adverse impact of an IPO suspension.     

IPO performance of portfolio ventures funded by impact investors versus venture capital investors

With the global rise of impact investments to achieve societal goals, an increasing number of new ventures that aim to create societal impact now seek to go public. However, while many conceptual studies suggest that impact investors are less likely to pursue financially oriented exit plans in exchange for generating societal impact, there is little empirical evidence to back up this claim. Using a propensity score matching approach, we draw on data from Crunchbase and empirically compare the initial public offering (IPO) performance of a large sample of 3398 investments by impact investors with 3398 investments by matched venture capital (VC) investors. We find that impact investor investments are less likely to lead to an IPO than VC investments. Besides, our results indicate that syndication by impact investors increases the likelihood of an IPO. This suggests that companies funded by impact investors benefit more from syndication than their VC-funded counterparts. Our findings have practical implications for impact investors, portfolio ventures, and policymakers.     

U.S. banks’ IPOs and political money contributions

This study analyses the effect of political money contributions on U.S. banks’ IPOs. We employ unbalanced panel data of 367 U.S. banks’ IPOs for the period January 1998 to December 2019. Our findings reveal that investors perceive Political Money Contributions (PMC) by U.S. banks as a proxy for political reach and connectedness. We document an inverse relationship between total PMC and the level of underpricing, which implies that both lobbying and PAC expenditure pay off on issue day as donors incur less underpricing. Initial returns decrease with PAC contributions to House of Representatives candidates, whereas the returns relate to the partisan identity of the candidates receiving PAC contributions. We document that those individual contributions by directors bring significant benefits to the IPO banks. Finally, we show that the political contributions of board members, particularly those of CEOs and founders, are associated with better returns in the long term.     

Do investors turn a blind eye to risk-factor disclosures by state-supported firms?

There is scant empirical evidence on how government involvement affects investor reactions toward firm-specific information. Our study provides new evidence on how investors respond to risk-factor disclosures in IPO prospectuses in China, where state-supported firms presumably receive government-offered implicit insurance against bankruptcy risk while bearing significant agency risks. We find an insignificant association between risk-factor disclosure quality and IPO underpricing (or post-IPO stock return volatility) among state-supported firms. The finding suggests that state-offered implicit insurance becomes the predominant consideration when investors value IPO shares of state-supported firms, thereby weakening investor reactions to high-quality risk-factor disclosures. Our study expands the scope of IPO underpricing literature by implying that simply increasing disclosure transparency in the IPO prospectus may not resolve the IPO underpricing issue in a government-dominated economy such as China.