Has New York become less competitive than London in global markets? Evaluating foreign listing choices over time

We study the determinants and consequences of cross-listings on the New York and London stock exchanges from 1990 to 2005. This investigation enables us to evaluate the relative benefits of New York and London exchange listings and to assess whether these relative benefits have changed over time, perhaps as a result of the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in 2002. We find that cross-listings have been falling on US exchanges as well as on the Main Market in London. This decline in cross-listings is explained by changes in firm characteristics instead of by changes in the benefits of cross-listing. We show that after controlling for firm characteristics there is no deficit in cross-listing counts on US exchanges related to SOX. Investigating the valuation differential between listed and non-listed firms (the cross-listing premium) from 1990 to 2005, we find that there is a significant premium for US exchange listings every year, that the premium has not fallen significantly in recent years, and that it persists when allowing for time-invariant unobservable firm characteristics. In contrast, no premium exists for listings on London's Main Market in any year. Firms increase their capital-raising activities at home and abroad following a cross-listing on a major US exchange but not following a cross-listing in London. Our evidence is consistent with the theory that an exchange listing in New York has unique governance benefits for foreign firms.     

Cost of capital effects and changes in growth expectations around U.S. cross-listings

This paper examines whether cross-listing in the U.S. reduces firms’ costs of capital. We estimate cost of capital effects implied by market prices and analyst forecasts, which accounts for changes in growth expectations around cross-listings. Firms with cross-listings on U.S. exchanges experience a decrease in their cost of capital between 70 and 120 basis points. These effects are sustained and exist after the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. We find smaller reductions for cross-listings in the over-the-counter market and for exchange-listings from countries with stronger legal institutions. For exchange-traded cross-listings, the cost of capital reduction accounts for over half of the increase in firm value, whereas for other types of cross-listings the valuation effects are primarily attributable to contemporaneous revisions in growth expectations.     

Investor communication and the benefits of cross-listing

While studies have sought to explain the benefits of cross-listing, little attention has been paid to the role of communication between managers and investors during this process. In this paper, I investigate whether managers change communication policies around U.S. cross-listings. I document significant increases in communication when firms cross-list. I then test whether these investor communication practices around cross-listing are associated with capital market benefits. I find that cross-listed firms that communicate more with investors experience greater and longer lasting cross-listing benefits. Lastly, I explore two potential reasons that may lead managers to choose higher levels of communication: to support an increase in investor recognition and to facilitate monitoring. I find results consistent with communication increasing visibility and scrutiny, suggesting that communication functions as a supporting tool to achieve managers’ cross-listing goals.     

Equity cross-listings in the U.S. and the price of debt

Using a large panel from 46 countries over 20 years, we find that non-U.S. firms issue corporate bonds more frequently and at lower offering yields following an equity cross-listing on a U.S. exchange. Firms issue more bonds through public offerings instead of private placements and in foreign markets rather than at home, in both cases at significantly lower yields. Moreover, the debt-related benefits are concentrated among firms domiciled in countries with less private benefits of control, efficient debt enforcement, and developed bond markets, suggesting that equity cross-listings cannot completely offset the impact of weak home country institutions. The results support the notion that the monitoring, transparency, and visibility benefits brought about by equity cross-listings on U.S. exchanges are valuable to bond investors.     

Stock price informativeness,cross-listings,and investment decisions

We show that a cross-listing enables firms to obtain, from the stock market, more precise information about the value of their growth opportunities. Thus, cross-listed firms make better investment decisions and trade at a premium. This theory of cross-listings implies that the sensitivity of investment to stock prices is larger for cross-listed firms. Moreover, the cross-listing premium is positively related to the size of growth opportunities and negatively related to the quality of managerial information. The sensitivity of the premium to the size of growth opportunities increases with factors that strengthen the impact of the cross-listing on price informativeness.     

The real earnings management of cross-listing firms

We examine the existence of real and accrual-based earnings management before and after cross-listings on the U.S. market. The results indicate that firms actively manage their earnings around cross-listing events, using both accrual and real earnings management, but real earnings management is dominant. American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) cross-listed at Level 1 and sponsored ADRs show the largest increase in real earnings management from before to after the listing. Firms that have adopted International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) display lower increases than firms under domestic GAAP. Finally, our results confirm a significant negative relationship between long-run performance and real earnings management before and after major corporate events.     

Can foreign firms bond themselves effectively by renting U.S. securities laws?

The study tests the functional convergence hypothesis, which states that foreign firms can leapfrog their countries’ weak legal institutions by listing equities in New York and agreeing to follow U.S. securities law. Evidence shows that the SEC and minority shareholders have not effectively enforced the law against cross-listed foreign firms. Detailed evidence from Mexico further shows that while some insiders exploited this weak legal enforcement with impunity, others that issued a cross-listing and passed through an economic downturn with a clean reputation went on to receive privileged long-term access to outside finance. As compared with legal bonding, reputational bonding better explains the success of cross-listings.     

The value of information in cross-listing

Until 2004, the London Stock Exchange allowed firms to be traded in the specialized SEAQ-I platform without the firm's involvement. Trading only required an application by one LSE trading member firm. Such an institutional arrangement, which made cross-listings possible without a firms' approval, allows for a direct test of different theories of foreign listing. In particular, we can differentiate between market segmentation and liquidity hypotheses, which rely on a firm trading in a foreign exchange and informational hypotheses, which assume that a firm makes the decision to trade in a foreign exchange. We identify a sample of international firms that are admitted to trading on London's SEAQ-I platform without their involvement. We estimate the valuation effects of this multi-market trading event and compare them to those enjoyed by firms that pursue a standard London Stock Exchange cross-listing. A cross-sectional abnormal returns analysis documents significant evidence in support of information-related hypotheses of cross-listing. An analysis of the firms' home market price volatility corroborates the results.     

Cross-Listing, Bonding Hypothesis and Corporate Governance

Abstract:  This paper examines the relationship between cross-listing and corporate governance for Canadian firms, that were cross-listed on US stock exchanges during the period 1997–2003. We find that cross-listed firms have more independent boards and audit committees after the listing relative to a non-cross-listed matched sample of firms and relative to the pre-listing period. Moreover, cross-listed firms experience changes in their ownership structure after the listing. Finally, we provide evidence that the sensitivity of the relation between cross-listed firm valuation with audit committee independence and ownership structure becomes more important after the listing. The results are robust after adjusting for various firm risk characteristics. Overall, the results are consistent with the literature on the bonding role of cross-listings on US stock exchanges.     

International cross-listings by Australian firms: A stochastic dominance analysis of equity returns

This paper examines the share return and risk exposure consequences of Australian companies deciding to cross-list on major international stock exchanges. Due to limited sample availability of cross-listing transactions by Australian companies and concerns regarding non-normality, we apply bootstrapping and stochastic dominance techniques to evaluate share return and return variance changes following cross-listings. The findings provide evidence that firm share returns decline following the undertaking of cross-listings, with an associated fall in the post-listing variance in share returns. Measures of the importance and ownership concentration of stockmarkets in destination countries are found to be correlated with post-listing share return outcomes, however, no evidence of superior return or risk reduction benefits from firms cross-listing in countries providing stronger investor protection or higher accounting reporting and disclosure requirements is identified.     

Returns and network growth of digital tokens after cross-listings

This paper examines the role of cross-listings in the digital token marketplace ecosystem. Using a unique set of publicly available and hand-collected data from 3625 tokens traded in 108 marketplaces, we find significant increases in price, trading volume, network growth and on-chain activity around the date of a token's first cross-listing. Tokens earn a 16% crypto-market adjusted return in the two weeks around the cross-listing date. Daily network growth triples on the day of cross-listing. Using the uniquely heterogeneous characteristics of token marketplaces, we identify specific value-creation channels. We provide the first evidence supporting value creation through network externalities proposed by recent token-valuation models. Consistent with equity cross-listing theory, we find higher returns for cross-listings that reduce market segmentation and improve information production. Our reported findings have significant policy implications in terms of more transparent regulations to reduce financial misconduct in the digital marketplace.     

Gentlemen do not talk about money: Remuneration dispersion and firm performance relationship on British boards

Using a sample of 781 U.K. firms over the period 2000–2008 we study the relationship between remuneration dispersion at executive board level and firm performance. We find that this relationship is sensitive to nationality composition of the executive boards. In contrast with findings on American data, British companies are characterized by a negative dispersion–performance relationship, i.e., the greater the dispersion is, the worse firm performance is, however, boards with American CEOs or at least 30% of American nationality non-CEO executives are characterized by a positive dispersion–performance relationship. The results are robust when controlling for various firm, board and CEO characteristics, including cross-listing on U.S. exchanges and having sales in the U.S. Implications for executive remuneration reforms and board diversity are discussed.     

US cross-listing and corporate disclosure policy

We investigate whether cross-listing in the US contributes to impound more earnings information into stock prices. Our results indicate that US exchange cross-listings are not associated with more future earnings news reflected in current prices, in accord with the view that such mechanism does not improve the information environment of non-US firms. This main finding is robust to many aspects of our methodology.     

Liquidity minimization and cross-listing choice: Evidence based on Canadian shares cross-listed on U.S. venues

This paper examines whether a Canadian-listed firm seeking to cross-list in the U.S. needs to consider liquidity differences when making a choice among the main U.S. venues (AMEX, NYSE or NASDAQ). After controlling for firm characteristics, we find that trade costs for Canadian shares cross-listed in the U.S. do not depend on the U.S. cross-listing venue. This suggests that the choice of U.S. listing venue may be better motivated by the desire to minimize listing fees or to increase investor recognition and visibility.     

Corporate governance and firm value at dual class firms

This study explores whether corporate governance at dual class firms differs from that of their single class counterparts and whether firm value at dual class firms is associated with governance. Employing a sample of 1309 U.S. dual class firm‐year observations for the period 1996–2006, we show evidence that dual class firms are more likely to employ more shareholder rights provisions while exhibiting lower board and board committee independence than single class firms. The results also show that shareholder rights increase while board provisions decrease in wedge at dual class firms. Further findings underscore that firm value at dual class firms decreases in wedge, and increases in shareholder rights and in board‐related provisions, particularly in director independence. While strong board‐related governance at dual class firms is significantly positively related to firm value in a multivariate setting, shareholder rights are significantly associated with firm value only in instances of the weakest board provisions. Following unification, firms employ more antitakeover provisions while strengthening their board and board committee independence.     

The Geography of Equity Listing: Why Do Companies List Abroad?

This paper documents aggregate trends in the foreign listings of companies, and analyzes their distinctive prelisting characteristics and postlisting performance. In 1986–1997, many European companies listed abroad, mainly on U.S. exchanges, while the number of U.S. companies listed in Europe decreased. European companies that cross-list tend to be large and recently privatized firms, and expand their foreign sales after listing abroad. They differ sharply depending on where they cross-list: The U.S. exchanges attract high-tech and export-oriented companies that expand rapidly without significant leveraging. Companies cross-listing within Europe do not grow unusually fast, and increase their leverage after cross-listing.     

The effect of management incentives and cross-listing status on the accounting treatment of R&D spending

This paper investigates the effect of management incentives and cross-listing status on the accounting treatment of research and development (R&D) spending for a sample of Canadian hi-tech and biopharmaceutical firms. U.S. GAAP adopts an immediate expensing rule for all R&D spending except for software development costs for which technological feasibility has been established. Contrary to the U.S., Canadian and international standard setters recommend capitalization if development costs meet certain criteria. Because those criteria are largely based on management judgment, capitalization of R&D spending is an accounting choice that can be used for income manipulation or signaling.Using a logit model, we examine how the decision to capitalize R&D spending is influenced by the cross-listing status and several other key firm characteristics that are well documented in the accounting literature. We find that the probability of capitalizing R&D spending increases for cross-listed and non-cross-listed firms in the software industry. The probability of capitalizing R&D spending also increases for firms that are more leveraged, more mature, and have higher level of cash flows from operations. However, the probability of capitalizing R&D spending decreases for larger corporations, firms with more concentrated ownership and highly profitable firms. Overall our results indicate a preference for Canadian firms in the software industry to emulate U.S. accounting practices for R&D spending. They also suggest that firms use the decision to capitalize or expense R&D spending as an earning management tool to either meet debt covenants or to smooth income.     

Does international cross-listing improve the information environment

We investigate whether cross-listing in the U.S. affects the information environment for non-U.S. stocks. Our findings suggest cross-listing has an asymmetric impact on stock price informativeness around the world, as measured by firm-specific stock return variation. Cross-listing improves price informativeness for developed market firms. For firms in emerging markets, however, cross-listing decreases price informativeness. The added analyst coverage associated with cross-listing likely explains the findings in emerging markets, rather than changes in liquidity, ownership, or accounting quality. Our results indicate that the added analyst coverage fosters the production of marketwide information, rather than firm-specific information.     

Cross-listing and corporate social responsibility

This paper investigates the dynamics of cross-listing and corporate social responsibility (CSR). Using a sample of 10,815 firm-year observations from 54 countries over the period 2002–2011, we find that cross-listed firms have better CSR performance than non–cross-listed domestic firms. This result is robust to endogeneity and different types of cross-listing. We also find that CSR increases (decreases) significantly after cross-listing in (delisting from) U.S. markets. The positive impact of cross-listing on CSR performance is stronger for firms from countries with weaker institutions, lower country-level sustainability, and higher liability of foreignness, and for firms operating in industries with high litigation risk. Finally, we find that cross-listed firms with better CSR performance exhibit higher valuations.     

Peer R&D disclosure and corporate innovation: Evidence from American depositary receipt firms

In this paper, we examine the effect of peer research and development (R&D) disclosures on corporate innovation. R&D disclosures can generate externalities for related firms, enabling those firms to better infer a project's likely payoffs and thus prioritize projects with higher net present values. We use a sample of foreign firms cross-listed on U.S. exchanges to investigate whether U.S. peer firms experience externalities from the cross-listing firm's R&D disclosures. We find that R&D disclosures by cross-listing firms are associated with greater innovation for industry peers in the U.S. market, especially when product market competition is high. The effect also varies with the home country's legal protection systems, disclosure environments, and accounting reporting rules. Cross-sectional analyses indicate that the externalities are more pronounced in industries or firms that rely more on external financing and firms subject to higher financial constraints; disclosures of higher quality appear to promote innovation by ameliorating financing frictions. Overall, this study provides evidence of R&D disclosure as an industry-wide determinant of innovation, thereby contributing to literature on the real effects of peer disclosures.