ADRs,Analysts, and Accuracy: Does Cross Listing in the United States Improve a Firm's Information Environment and Increase Market Value?

This paper investigates the relation between cross listing in the United States and the information environment of non‐U.S. firms. We find that firms that cross list on U.S. exchanges have greater analyst coverage and increased forecast accuracy than firms that are not cross listed. A time‐series analysis shows that a change in analyst coverage and forecast accuracy occurs around cross listing. We also document that firms that have more analyst coverage and higher forecast accuracy have higher valuations. Furthermore, the change in firm value around cross listing is correlated with changes in analyst following and forecast accuracy, suggesting that cross listing enhances firm value through its effect on the firm's information environment. Our findings support the hypothesis that cross‐listed firms have better information environments, which are associated with higher market valuations.     

Choice of foreign listing location: Experience of Chinese firms

At the end of October 2003, there were 237 Chinese firms' listings on various stock exchanges outside of Mainland China. Beyond geographical proximity and other obvious explanations of why Chinese firms prefer listing in Hong Kong more than in the United States, we identify two additional benefits of a Hong Kong listing. We find that Chinese firms listed in Hong Kong have a better information environment than those listed solely in the United States. We also find that the Hong Kong-listed firms are less financially constrained, which may be due to their ability to access the Hong Kong capital market for external financing. The results of our study show that different stock markets offer different benefits as a listing venue and the benefits of foreign listing may depend on the choice of listing location.     

What do investment banks charge to underwrite American Depositary Receipts?

We investigate how investment banks determine the gross spreads paid by American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) from 1980 to 2004. We begin by comparing the gross spreads of ADR IPOs and ADR SEOs to those of matching US IPOs and US SEOs. We document clustering at the 7% level for our ADR IPO sample (44% for the ADR IPO firms without a previous equity listing), whereas our ADR SEO sample exhibits no discernable clustering at any level. We then find that ADR IPO gross spreads can be explained by firm and offer characteristics (similar to our matched sample of US IPOs), and by whether the ADR IPO firm has a previous equity listing. ADR SEO gross spreads can be explained more by offer characteristics (more similar to our matched sample of US SEOs).     

Information environment,market-wide sentiment and IPO initial returns:Evidence from analyst forecasts before listing

Measuring the information environment of firms using analyst(price)forecast bias and forecast dispersion before listing,we empirically examine the interactive i...     

The decision to list abroad: The case of ADRs and foreign IPOs by Chinese companies

This paper examines the decision to list abroad by Chinese companies in the form of ADRs and foreign IPOs from 1993 to 2005. Our sample consists of 33 ADRs, 218 foreign IPOs, and a sample of 1418 domestic listings. We find evidence to support that issuers are motivated to cross-list due to the legal and accounting standards of the foreign markets, more stringent listing requirements and closer regulatory monitoring, significant demands for external capital due to rapid growth, an expanded shareholder base, and foreign expertise. The motives and firm factors differ by the type of issue (ADR versus foreign IPO) and by the market in which the foreign exchange is located (Hong Kong versus Singapore). Subsequent to the listing events, issuers experience a significant drop in profitability, tangible assets ratio, and asset turnover. There is no significant change in capital expenditure. Stock returns after the listing events are generally negative for ADR and foreign IPO stocks. More significantly, these stocks under-perform the market in the post-event window ranging from 3 days to 3 years.     

Underpricing and aftermarket performance of American depositary receipts (ADR) IPOs

American depositary receipts (ADRs) are negotiable instruments representing foreign company shares traded in US dollars in the US capital market. We present comparative analyses of the pricing and aftermarket performance of Initial Public Offerings (IPOs) by ADRs and a matching sample of US firms over the 1990–2001 period. Offered by large, well-known multinationals, ADR IPOs go through a detailed scrutiny, and incur significant costs, during the pre-IPO period to recast financial statements in conformity with SEC rules and the US GAAP. This mitigates the information asymmetry between the IPO firm and investors. We categorize the ADR issuing country as developed or emerging, and our sample includes several cases of privatization of state owned corporations. The analyses indicate that (1) ADR IPOs are significantly less underpriced than comparable US IPOs; (2) IPOs from developed countries are more underpriced; and (3) Privatization IPOs are less underpriced than non-privatizations. The lower underpricing of ADR IPOs persists even after differential IPO attributes, the traditional proxies for information asymmetry and, the unique characteristics associated with ADR IPOs, are accounted for. We conclude that extant literature offers only partial explanation for this puzzling phenomenon.     

What drives delistings of foreign firms from U.S. Exchanges?

We examine time dependency in the factors motivating delistings of foreign firms from major U.S. Exchanges over the period 1962–2006. For firms listing before Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX), we find that governance has no significant effect on delisting but after SOX, it becomes one of the main forces driving delisting. For firms whose delisting decision is most likely attributable to SOX, we find they realize low benefits from listing – they originate from countries with strong home market governance, and from listing onward realize low trading volume, analyst coverage, and make little use of capital raising. Our results suggest that SOX has had a large influence on the benefits seek from a U.S. listing, leading firms from well governed countries and low capital raising needs to delist.     

Corporate governance and the information environment: Evidence from Chinese stock markets

This article explores the relationship between corporate governance and the information environment in Chinese stock markets. We construct a parsimonious governance measure for public firms using a 2003 through 2011 sample period. We use four indicators to proxy for the information environment: analyst following, analyst forecast accuracy, analyst forecast dispersion, and price timeliness. We find that better governed firms tend to be associated with larger analyst followings and more informative forecasts. We also find that better governed firms tend to improve on the timeliness of bad news relative to good news.     

THE EFFECT OF CROSS‐LISTING ON TRADING VOLUME: REDUCING SEGMENTATION VERSUS SIGNALING INVESTOR PROTECTION

We examine the relation between cross‐listing on the U.S. and UK regulated and unregulated exchanges and trading volume for a sample of 500 foreign firms from 34 countries. We find that the increase in trading volume is a function of both reducing segmentation and signaling investor protection. In addition, we find that home market trading volume, firm size, firm returns, and analyst forecast accuracy are the major determinants of a firm's trading volume. We also show that U.S. and UK investors trade foreign securities that originate from low‐investor‐protection countries more than they trade those from high‐investor‐protection countries, which is consistent with the bonding hypothesis.     

The Effect of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act on Analyst Forecast Properties: The Impact of Firm Size and Growth Opportunities

Abstract:  We provide evidence that the effect of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act (the Act) of 1995 on analyst forecast properties is conditional on firm size and growth opportunities. We show that analyst coverage, frequency of forecast revisions, forecast errors and dispersion after the Act decreased for large firms and for firms with low growth opportunities but increased for small firms and for firms with high growth opportunities. These results are consistent with the hypothesis that the Act results in additional high quality disclosures in large firms, which face higher litigation risk and tighter scrutiny from investors but not in smaller firms. Our findings of increases in analyst coverage and revision but deterioration in accuracy and precision of analyst forecasts for firms with high growth opportunities after the Act suggest that in spite of increased corporate disclosures, the information environment for analysts deteriorated in those firms.     

Market Segmentation Effects in Corporate Credit Rating Changes: The Case of Emerging Markets

We examine stock market reactions to corporate credit rating changes in 26 emerging market countries included in the Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) Emerging Market Index. We hypothesize and test the notion that emerging market firms in the American Depository Receipts (ADRs) markets are more likely to purchase ratings from the Big Two (Moody’s and S&P), and that they react more strongly to the announcements of corporate rating changes by Moody’s or S&P than to those of raters in local markets. We compare the effect of credit rating changes of the Big Two in two emerging stock markets: local markets (local currencies) and ADR markets (U.S. dollars). We find significant price reactions in the ADR markets, and insignificant reactions in local markets, and conclude that there is capital market segmentation in ADR markets for credit rating changes of emerging market firms. We find evidence that investors react more strongly in the ADR markets than local markets because they require higher costs of capital for firms cross-listed both in the ADR markets and local markets due to greater expected bankruptcy costs and foreign exchange risks of those firms. We also report that stock markets react significantly, not only to rating downgrades, but also to upgrades in the ADR markets.

The effect of option listing on financing decisions

This paper investigates the effect of option listing on corporate financing decisions. Firms experience a significant drop in leverage, which is driven mainly by an increase in new equity issues. This effect is more prominent in firms with greater information asymmetry and lower percentages of quasi-index and transient investors before listing and those with active options trading after listing. After options are listed, the newly listed firms hold more cash and engage in more acquisitions, which are funded mainly by equity issues. These findings suggest that option listing has a significant impact on financing decisions because of lower information asymmetry and that firms use the post-listing equity to build up financial slack and support major investments, such as acquisitions.     

Product market competition and analyst forecasting activity: International evidence

In this study, we investigate how product market competition affects the extent of analyst following and the properties of analyst forecasts. Using a broad sample of firms from 37 countries over the 1990–2008 period, we find that firms that operate in more concentrated industries and with stronger pricing power are associated with greater analyst following, higher forecast accuracy, and lower forecast dispersion. Moreover, the effect of product market power on analyst following and forecast properties is more pronounced in countries with less effective competition laws and higher entry costs. These findings suggest that high industry concentration and a dominant market position enhance the earnings predictability of firms and lower their information uncertainty, and that country-level institutions that promote competition effectively constrain the power in product markets.     

An empirical study of multiple direct international listings

In this study, we examine the multiple direct foreign-listing by analyzing characteristics of listing firms as well as hosting and home countries. Our results show that listing premium increases over time, but this premium diminishes as the firm lists in additional foreign markets. Multiple listing is closely related to the firm's ability to list, but does not translate into better future or higher returns. Additionally, we find no evidence to support the bonding hypothesis. We conclude that firms list in additional foreign countries to take advantage of higher valuation to raise capital more cheaply, rather than to benefit from a better legal environment.     

Cross-Listing and Operating Performance: Evidence from Exchange-Listed American Depositary Receipts

Abstract:  In this paper we examine the operating performance of non-US firms that enter major US stock exchanges using American Depositary Receipt (ADR) programs. Our dataset consists of 108 capital-raising and non-capital-raising firms from twenty four countries, cross-listed on major US stock exchanges during the period 1994–2004. We provide evidence that capital-raising cross-listed firms experience improvements in their operating performance after the listing, relative to a non-cross-listed matched sample of firms and relative to the pre-listing period, whereas non-capital-raising cross-listed firms out-perform a non-cross-listed matched sample of firms for both the pre-listing and the post-listing periods. These results suggest that the type of ADR program conveys information about changes in the post-listing operating performance. Moreover, both capital-raising and non-capital-raising cross-listed firms have positive abnormal returns due to the cross-listing and these abnormal returns are positively related with the post-listing abnormal changes in operating performance, suggesting that the market anticipates the post-listing abnormal changes in operating performance. Results are robust after adjusting for various firm and country risk characteristics.     

Did Regulation Fair Disclosure,SOX, and Other Analyst Regulations Reduce Security Mispricing?

Between 2000 and 2003 a series of disclosure and analyst regulations curbing abusive financial reporting and analyst behavior were enacted to strengthen the information environment of U.S. capital markets. We investigate whether these regulations reduced security mispricing and increased stock market efficiency. After the regulations, we find a significant reduction in short‐term stock price continuation following analyst forecast revisions and earnings announcements. The effect was more pronounced among higher information uncertainty firms, where we expect security valuation to be most sensitive to regulation. Analyst forecast accuracy also improved in these firms, consistent with reduced mispricing being due to an improved corporate information environment following the regulations. Our findings are robust to controls for time trends, trading activity, the financial crisis, analyst coverage, delistings, and changes in information uncertainty proxies. We find no concurrent effect among European firms and a regression discontinuity design supports our identification of a regulatory effect.     

The Real Effects of Financial Shocks: Evidence from Exogenous Changes in Analyst Coverage

We study the causal effects of analyst coverage on corporate investment and financing policies. We hypothesize that a decrease in analyst coverage increases information asymmetry and thus increases the cost of capital; as a result, firms decrease their investment and financing. We use broker closures and broker mergers to identify changes in analyst coverage that are exogenous to corporate policies. Using a difference‐in‐differences approach, we find that firms that lose an analyst decrease their investment and financing by 1.9% and 2.0% of total assets, respectively, compared to similar firms that do not lose an analyst.     

Pricing of American Depositary Receipts under Market Segmentation

This article examines the pricing of American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) in a three-factor pricing model. A seemingly unrelated regression model is utilized to test the nonlinear parameter restriction implied by the model. It is found that, although ADRs are traded in the U.S. securities market, their returns are significantly affected by their respective home market factors rather than by U.S. market movements. While U.S. investors are exposed to incremental risk from foreign equity market, they do not command a risk premium. The findings suggest that (1) markets are segmented and ADR listing does not integrate world capital market and (2) ADRs behave more like a foreign security and ADR is an effective tool of global risk diversification for U.S. investors.     

Diversification with American Depository Receipts: The Dynamics and the Pricing Factors

This paper studies the role of American Depository Receipts (ADRs) in international diversification by using a sample of 113 ADRs from eight foreign countries over 1980–1994. We find that investing in ADRs offers significant improvement in the risk-return trade-off. The effectiveness of ADRs as a vehicle for long-term international diversification is further examined by performing cointegration analysis between ADR and the respective market portfolios. Consistent with Webb, Officer and Boyd (1995), we also find that the movements of ADR and the foreign market are highly correlated. Moreover, the pricing factors of ADRs are further investigated in a GARCH framework.     

Performance commitments and the properties of analyst earnings forecasts: Evidence from Chinese reverse merger firms

We investigate whether the performance commitments in Chinese reverse merger (RM) transactions affect the properties of analyst earnings forecasts. All RM firms in China are required to make performance commitments for a limited number of years after being publicly listed. As performance commitment is an important piece of public information, it can influence analysts' understanding of firms and their efforts to forecast earnings. Using manually assembled information on RM transactions, we find that, in comparison to the control firms, RM firms exhibit an increase in analyst forecast error and dispersion after the end of performance commitment. This effect is more pronounced in firms with lower levels of information transparency. We also document that the public information contents of analyst forecasts decrease and forecast revisions increase in the post-commitment period, while the private information content of analyst forecasts and the number of their firm visits remain unchanged. Overall, our findings suggest that analysts rely greatly on public information; they have important implications for academics and policymakers in understanding how performance commitments in RM transactions affect the market information environment.