Do checks on bureaucrats improve firm value? Evidence from a natural experiment

This paper studies the impact on firm value of tighter checks on bureaucrats’ behaviour. We use as a natural experiment the revision in 2015 by the Communist Party of China (CPC) of its regulations on disciplinary actions. We document a positive and substantial market reaction following this unexpected policy change that tightened and formalised constraints on bureaucrats’ misconduct. The impact is less pronounced for firms with state ownership, firms having CEOs or directors with CPC membership, and firms that operate in provinces with better institutional quality. The subsequent revision in 2018 that enforced political obedience is not associated with a positive market reaction.     

Allocation to Anchor Investors,Underpricing, and the After‐Market Performance of IPOs

We study bidding by anchor investors in a two‐stage initial public offering (IPO) process and document a negative, causal relation between allocation to anchor investors and underpricing. We find that anchor investors are likely to invest in hard‐to‐place offerings characterized by valuation uncertainty. We also document a positive relation between allocation to reputed anchor investors and returns up to lock‐up expiration. Our evidence provides support for information revelation and targeting specific investors’ theories of book building. Anchor‐backed IPOs earn superior returns mainly due to monitoring. Who bids in an IPO seems to matter just as particular types of bids do.     

The temporary shutdown decision: Lessons from the Great Recession

The temporary shutdown condition provides guidance on dealing with a serious transitory downturn in demand. The traditional condition says managers should stop production when revenues fall below avoidable costs. This condition is flawed because it ignores how lost human capital and reputational damage harm future profits. As a consequence, firms may optimally operate with losses far larger than stipulated by the traditional condition. We provide the first broad empirical analysis of the temporary shutdown decision, focusing on the Great Recession. We show that large operating losses were common and temporary shutdowns were exceedingly rare, even among very small public firms.     

Spatial-equilibrium analysis of transferable development rights

Transfer of development rights (TDR) programs combine low-density incentives with zoning flexibility to generate a market for development rights and to redirect land-use patterns. A differentiated spatial-equilibrium model is used to study the impacts of brokered and unbrokered TDR programs on rents, consumption/location patterns, household utility, and property-tax revenues. Properties of the TDR market, the relationship of TDR systems to uncontrolled and zoned economies, and questions regarding the optimal control of a TDR program are also examined.     

Evaluating Permanent Disability Ratings Using Empirical Data on Earnings Losses

Workers' compensation systems are typically designed to assign higher permanent disability benefits to workers with more severe disabilities. However, little or no scientific work exists to guide the design of ratings systems to properly account for the amount of earnings power lost due to disability. In this article, we examine the effectiveness of disability ratings using matched administrative data on ratings and earnings for a large, representative sample of permanent disability claimants in California. We find that while workers with higher ratings do experience larger earnings losses on average, there are large and persistent differences in average earnings losses for similarly rated impairments in different parts of the body. We then explore how adjusting permanent disability ratings to reflect cross-impairment differences in earnings losses can affect the equity of permanent disability benefits. Adjusting disability ratings to account for typical earnings losses reduces cross-impairment differences substantially. The adjusted ratings result in a more equitable distribution of disability benefits across workers with different impairments.