Testing for deliberate underpricing in the IPO premarket: a stochastic frontier approach

We reevaluate the IPO underpricing phenomenon using the stochasticfrontier methodology. The advantage of the stochastic frontieris that it can be used to measure the level of deliberate underpricingin the premarket without using after-market information. Thisis accomplished through the estimation of a systematic one-sidederror term that measures 'inefficiency' or the difference betweenthe maximum predicted offer price and the actual offer price.Data for the analysis are comprised of 1,035 IPOs of commonstock issued by firm commitment between 1975 and 1984. IPOsappear to be deliberately underpriced in the premarket in bothhot-market and nonhot-market periods. Moreover, the determinantsof the maximum IPO price have different effects in the two timeperiods.     

Governance reform and IPO underpricing

Underpricing of IPOs in Thailand significantly drops following the country's major governance reform, indicating less price-protection by investors. The lower price-protection is associated with fewer instances of absolute control retention by pre-issue insiders during the post-reform period, not reduction in the expropriation risk. While corporate disclosure does not reveal issuers' true risk type before the reform, it does so after the reform. Yet, insiders make significantly less disclosure when retaining absolute control regardless of the reform. We conclude that governance regulation in an economy with fundamentally weak legal institutions works, but its efficacy is limited when insiders retain absolute control.     

Narcissistic managers and IPO underpricing

Using hand-collected data on the signature size of managers in Chinese initial public offerings (IPOs) from 2007 to 2019 as a proxy for managerial narcissism, we examine how IPOs with narcissistic managers (narcissistic IPOs) affect IPO underpricing. The findings suggest that narcissistic IPOs have higher underpricing than non-narcissistic IPOs. Specifically, we find that on average, a narcissistic IPO exhibits approximately 11.3% higher underpricing than a median IPO firm. Our results are robust to alternative metrics of narcissism and underpricing after controlling for endogeneity. Additional analyses suggest that narcissistic IPOs are more likely to engage in earnings management than non-narcissistic IPOs. The former exhibits excessive risk-taking behavior, gauged by earnings volatility pre-IPO and a higher beta post-IPO. In the cross-sectional analyses, we document that the impact of managerial narcissism on IPO underpricing is more salient for IPOs facing unsophisticated investors, high market sentiment, or poor corporate governance.     

Litigation risk and IPO underpricing

We examine the relation between risk and IPO underpricing and test two aspects of the litigation-risk hypothesis: (1) firms with higher litigation risk underprice their IPOs by a greater amount as a form of insurance (insurance effect) and (2) higher underpricing lowers expected litigation costs (deterrence effect). To adjust for the endogeneity bias in previous studies, we use a simultaneous equation framework. Evidence provides support for both aspects of the litigation-risk hypothesis.     

IPO underpricing and mutual fund allocation: New evidence from registration system

We study the effect of mutual fund allocation on China's IPO market under the new registration system. The introduction of mutual fund bids significantly increases the IPO offer price, resulting in a low initial short-term return and suppressed IPO underpricing. Those newly listed stocks witness lower volatility in the following weeks due to preferential allocation to the mutual fund at the primary market. Further analysis suggests that large investors' net purchase strengthens IPO after-market return and volatility. Besides, the effect of mutual fund participation on IPOs is stronger in places where the COVID-19 outbreak. This new evidence suggests that mutual fund allocation plays a critical role in IPO price discovery and decreases investor lottery trading.     

Accounting conservatism and IPO underpricing: China evidence

This study examines how accounting conservatism impacts underpricing of initial public offerings (IPOs) in the Chinese stock market. In addition, we investigate how information asymmetry affects the association of accounting conservatism with IPO underpricing. Based on regression analysis of 674 A-shares companies that went public through IPOs at both Shanghai and Shenzhen Stock Exchanges in China during 2001–2009, we find that (1) accounting conservatism is negatively associated with the magnitude of IPO underpricing; and (2) the relationship between accounting conservatism and IPO underpricing is more pronounced when information asymmetry is high. The findings should shed a light on what drives IPO underpricing and how it could be affected by accounting conservatism in an emerging economy.     

Executive stock options and IPO underpricing

In about one-third of US IPOs between 1996 and 2000, executives received stock options with an exercise price equal to the IPO offer price rather than a market-determined price. Among firms with such “IPO options”, 58% of top executives realize a net benefit from underpricing: the gain from the options exceeds the loss from the dilution of their pre-IPO shareholdings. If executives can influence either the IPO offer price or the timing and terms of their stock option grants, there should be a positive relation between IPO option grants and underpricing. We find no evidence of such a relation. Our results contrast sharply with the emerging literature on managerial self-dealing at shareholder expense.     

Local underwriter oligopolies and IPO underpricing

We develop a theory of initial public offering (IPO) underpricing based on differentiated underwriting services and localized competition. Even though a large number of investment banks compete for IPOs, if issuers care about non-price dimensions of underwriting, then the industry structure is best characterized as a series of local oligopolies. We test our model implications on all-star analyst coverage, industry expertise, and other non-price dimensions. Furthermore, we posit that venture capitalists (VCs) are especially focused on all-star analyst coverage, and develop the analyst lust theory of the underpricing of VC-backed IPOs. Consistent with this theory, we find that VC-backed IPOs are much more underpriced when they have coverage from an all-star analyst.     

UK IPO underpricing and venture capitalists

We analyze the nature and causes of short-run underpricing for a unique sample of 591 Initial Public Offers (IPOs) issued on the London Stock Exchange for the period 1985–2003. We find significant differences between the 1998–2000 bubble years and the rest of the sample. Venture capitalists and reputable underwriters played a certification role in the latter period but not during the bubble years. These years featured significant increases in underpricing, money left on the table, and a decline in operating quality. The combination of venture capitalists and prestigious underwriters was increasingly associated with the highest underpricing witnessed during 1998–2000, which provides indirect support for the spinning hypothesis.     

Worldwide short selling regulations and IPO underpricing

We study the impact of country-level short selling constraints on IPO underpricing. Examining 17,151 IPOs from 36 countries, we find that IPO underpricing tends to be greater in countries that ban short selling or security lending and in countries where short selling is not practiced. Non-positive first-day returns are more common in countries where short selling is allowed, security lending is allowed, and short selling is commonly practiced. Short selling constraints exacerbate the positive relation between investor sentiment and underpricing. Additional evidence suggests that higher quality information environments may partially alleviate the effects of short sale constraints on underpricing.     

Robust determinants of IPO underpricing and their implications for IPO research

Using several different methodologies, we quantify the statistical robustness of variables used in prior research to explain initial IPO returns. We establish a parsimonious list of robust variables and evaluate their implications for different theories of IPO underpricing and clustering. Further, we illustrate how using such a set of robust explanatory variables leads to several different conclusions than prior research that failed to include these important control variables. Researchers who identify new potential predictors of IPO initial returns should control for the list of robust variables we identify.     

ESG government risk and international IPO underpricing

We study the association between environmental, social, and governance (ESG) government risk management and firm-level IPO underpricing between 2008 and 2018. Examining 7446 IPOs issued in 36 countries, we find that IPO underpricing tends to be lower in countries with higher ESG Government Ratings. When we uniquely examine the environmental, social, and governance pillars, we find that underpricing tends to be lower in countries with stronger risk management practices in each of these areas. Additional analysis indicates that the negative impact of ESG ratings on IPO underpricing is more pronounced in countries with more transparent financial disclosures, higher liability standards, and stronger shareholder protections.     

IPO underpricing,signaling, and property returns

This paper investigates whether IPO signals reveal proprietary information about the prospects of an issuing firm’s underlying industry. By analyzing a sample of European property company (EPC) IPOs from 1997 to 2007, we take advantage of a heterogeneous set of industry performance measures, i.e., yields and total returns of direct property investments in various European property markets that can be clearly assigned to each individual IPO. The results reveal that the main signal of interest, underpricing, is in fact positively related to average property yields for a 12-month post-IPO period; a result that supports our assumption. Other signals, as proposed in previous research, do not appear to contain any information about the prospects of the IPO firm’s target property investment market. We also show that total returns seem to be a biased measure for direct property performance. Further tests for the signaling model’s preconditioned presence of information asymmetry among EPCs reveal that underpricing levels are a function of company-specific ex ante uncertainty proxies. In contrast, property-specific ex ante uncertainty proxies do not explain underpricing levels.     

Regulatory underpricing: Determinants of Chinese extreme IPO returns

The Chinese stock market with its unique institutions is rather different from western stock markets. The average underpricing of Chinese IPOs is 247%, the highest of any major world market. We model this extreme underpricing with a supply-demand analytical framework that captures critical institutional features of China's primary market, and then empirically test this model using a sample of 1377 IPOs listed on the Shanghai and Shenzhen Stock Exchanges between 1992 and 2004. We find that Chinese IPO underpricing is principally caused by government intervention with IPO pricing regulations and the control of IPO share supplies. Besides the regulatory underpricing, this paper also documents some specific investment risks of IPOs in China's stock market.     

Model specification and IPO performance: New insights from Asia

This study examines the post-issue stock price performance of initial public offerings (IPOs) from advanced and emerging Asian markets from 1991 to 2004. We provide a comparative assessment on the short- and long-term stock performance of Asian IPOs with comprehensive international evidence. We use several different methods to examine the robustness of IPO performance. Our results reveal that whilst there is initial underpricing in Asian IPOs, the existence of long-run underperformance for the Asian IPOs depends resoundingly on the methodology used for assessment.     

Underwriter reputation and underpricing: evidence from the Australian IPO market

Dimovski and Brooks (J Intern Financ Mark Inst Money 14:267–280, 2004b) examined 358 Australian industrial and mining company initial public offerings (IPOs) from 1994 to 1999 to report that more money was left on the table by IPOs that engaged underwriters than those that did not engage underwriters. Loughran and Ritter (Autumn 5–37, 2004) suggested that the negative relation between underwriter reputation and underpricing has reversed in the 1990s with U.S. IPOs. The main purpose of this paper is to study the relationship between underwriter reputation and underpricing in terms of Australian IPO data. In this paper, we use 380 Australian industrial company IPOs from 1994 to 2004 to perform the empirical study. Our results suggest that more prestigious underwriters are associated with a higher level of underpricing. Other variables that are found to be significant in explaining the level of IPO underpricing are market sentiment, share options, total capital raised and underwriter options.     

创始人、创业投资与创业板IPO抑价

IPO高抑价是创业板市场的显著特征之一。本文从公司治理的视角,运用信息不对称和信号理论分析创始人、创业投资与IPO抑价之间的关系并进行实证研究。研究表明,创始人通过持股数量和兼任CEO具有一定的信号传递作用,降低了IPO抑价,而创业投资降低IPO抑价的作用并不显著。创业投资都具有低价发行保证上市成功的动机,创业投资存在只求上市,不求成长的现象。     

Information precision and IPO pricing

This paper investigates the role of information precision in IPO pricing. The model shows that more precise information will exert more influence on the offer price. In strong support of the model, I find that the proportion of the industry return during the waiting period that is incorporated into the offer price increases with a proxy for the precision of the industry return as a measure of the change in the IPO firm's value during the waiting period. The model and the empirical findings enhance our understanding of the partial adjustment phenomenon: noisy information will be partially incorporated into the offer price.     

Credit ratings and IPO pricing

We examine the effects of credit ratings on IPO pricing. The evidence from U.S. common share IPOs during 1986–2004 shows that when firms go public, those with credit ratings are underpriced significantly less than firms without credit ratings. Credit rating levels, however, do not have a significant effect on IPO underpricing. The existence of credit rating reduces uncertainty about firm value. It is the value certainty that matters, not the value per se. Credit ratings also reduce the degree of price revision during the bookbuilding process and the aftermarket volatility in the post-IPO period. The evidence suggests that credit ratings convey useful information in reducing value uncertainty of the issuing firms as well as information asymmetry in the IPO markets.