Jumps and Dynamic Asset Allocation

This paper analyzes the optimal dynamic asset allocation problem in economies with infrequent events and where the investment opportunities are stochastic and predictable. Analytical approximations are obtained, with which a thorough comparative study is performed on the impacts of jumps upon the dynamic decision. The model is then calibrated to the U.S. equity market. The comparative analysis and the calibration exercise both show that jump risk not only makes the investor's allocation more conservative overall but also makes her dynamic portfolio rebalancing less dramatic over time.  

Investment opportunities,free cash flow,and stock valuation effects of secured debt offerings

This paper examines the role of investment opportunities and free cash flow in explaining the source of the stock valuation effects of secured debt offerings. We find a significantly positive relation between a firm's investment opportunities and its stock price response to announcements of secured debt issues. This evidence supports the investment opportunities hypothesis that secured debt financing is more valuable for issuing firms with high growth opportunities. In contrast, we find a lack of support for the free cash flow hypothesis. These findings hold even after controlling for other potentially influential variables. Our study provides a better understanding of the relative importance of various potential determinants in explaining the variation in the valuation impact of secured debt issues.

The Underinvestment and Overinvestment Hypotheses: an Analysis Using Panel Data

We study the relationship between firm value and investment to test the underinvestment and overinvestment hypotheses. The results obtained, using panel data methodology as the estimation method, indicate that the abovementioned relation is quadratic, which implies that there exists an optimal level of investment. As a consequence, firms that invest less than the optimal level suffer from an underinvestment problem, while those investing more than the optimum suffer from overinvestment. The quadratic relation is maintained when firms are classified depending on their investment opportunities, the optimum being in accordance with the quality of investment opportunities.  

Additional Evidence on the Association Between Director Stock Ownership and Incentive Compensation

Governance scholars argue that outside directors have little incentive to monitor managers when their equity stake in the firm is not significant. A sample with a substantial level of outside director shareholdings is examined and a negative relationship between incentive compensation and outside director stock ownership is found. While firms pay higher incentive compensation when they have greater investment opportunities, the compensation contains excess pay due to ineffective corporate governance. Overall, the results suggest more effective corporate governance and lower incentive compensation when outside director stock ownership is higher.  

The Diversification Effects of Initial Public Offerings

Abstract:  A firm's stock becomes publicly tradable through an initial public offering (IPO). This study suggests a portfolio diversification perspective to explore IPOs. We examine whether investors can gain diversification benefits by adding an IPO portfolio to a set of benchmark portfolios sorted by firm size and book-to-market ratio. Using US IPOs from 1980-2002, we find that adding a value-weighted IPO portfolio does lead to a statistically and economically significant enlargement of the investment opportunity set for investors relative to investing solely in a set of benchmark portfolios. Specifically, the Sharpe ratio of the tangency portfolio increases by 5.50% on average after including IPO stocks. Furthermore, IPOs associated with prestigious lead underwriters are the main source of this augmentation of the mean-variance investment opportunity set. Finally, our study implies that issuing IPO exchange traded funds or similar products can provide diversification gains to investors.  

Does audit quality matter more for firms with high investment opportunities?

This paper examines the association of firms with high investment opportunities with high quality audits (proxied by Big 5 auditors) and whether that association results in a lower likelihood of earnings management. Firms with high investment opportunities may demand high quality audits for curbing earnings management. This is because they have more flexibility in the provision of discretionary accruals that arises from the attendant operating uncertainty which creates particular monitoring problems. Big 5 auditors will provide high quality audits that will constrain earnings management for firms with high investment opportunities because the risk of losing (and hence the likelihood of maintaining) auditor independence is higher. Results show the following. First, firms with high investment opportunities are more likely to hire Big 5 auditors than firms with low investment opportunities. Second, firms with high investment opportunities are more likely to have more discretionary accruals but this relationship is weaker when they have Big 5 auditors. These results are robust to various sensitivity tests.  

股权激励对上市公司的影响及投资策略分析

本文探讨了我国上市公司实施股权激励的环境条件，分析了股权激励对管理层、股东影响的内在机制，分析了实施股权激励对上市公司价值和业绩的影响。对股权激励类上市公司上涨因素的定量化分析显示，其上涨与公司现有的各项财务指标没有必然联系，而与公司的市场地位、行业发展趋势和关联交易之间存在明显的关系。本文认为，我国上市公司已基本具备实施股权激励的环境条件，实施股权激励有利于解决管理层和股东利益一致性问题，通过价值转移和价值创造，持续、有效地促进上市公司价值和业绩的提高，从而有效推动上市公司股价的上升，给投资者以强有力的信心和巨大的投资机会。  

A note on the relationship between Fama–French risk factors and innovations of ICAPM state variables

This note examines, over various time scales, the extent to which SMB (the difference between the average returns of the small-stock portfolios and big-stock portfolios) and HML (the difference in returns between the high-BM portfolios and low-BM portfolios) factors share information with the innovations of state variables, which are interpreted as alternative investment opportunities. To examine the relationship, we adopt a new and innovative approach of wavelet analysis as our main empirical method. It is found that SMB and HML may play only a limited role in capturing alternative investment opportunities in the short run, but they share much information with alternative investment opportunities in the long run.  

Voluntary disclosure of operating income

This study investigates whether New Zealand firms’ voluntary disclosure of operating income, which is also known as earnings before interest and tax, in the income statement is related to the investment opportunity set. New Zealand provides an ideal setting to examine this because New Zealand generally accepted accounting principles do not require the disclosure of operating income as an intermediate income number in arriving at net income (earnings) in the income statement. We hypothesize and find evidence that firms with high assets‐in‐place and high leverage are more likely to voluntarily disclose operating income/earnings before interest and tax. However, the assets‐in‐place finding is sensitive to alternative measures of the investment opportunity set.