Do rating agencies’ decisions impact stock risks? Evidence from European markets

This article analyses the effect of rating agencies’ decisions on stock risks for European issuers concerning five kinds of events. Our approach is an extension of dummy variable regression event study methodology, using a GARCH(1,1) estimation to capture simultaneously the impact on both systematic and specific stock risks. This new methodology allows us to obtain both global results by categories of rating decisions and individual results, event by event. We document, globally, a positive impact of upgrading on systematic risk, a negative impact of rating confirmation on specific risk, and no significant impact in all other cases. Regarding event-by-event results, the proportion of rating actions exhibiting a significant effect on risk is almost always observed between 20% and 30%. The weak evidence of a global effect on systematic risk may be due to the lack of informational content of the rating decisions on the stocks’ risk, or the existence of rebalancing effects between systematic and idiosyncratic risks. Furthermore, it should be noticed that the decline in volatility in case of a rating affirmed is an insight of the certification role played by the agencies.     

Do Upgradings and Downgradings Convey Information? An Event Study of the French Bond Market

This study has two purposes:

• 1 

  To present an alternative method for the study of events related to bond spreads applicable when only a small number of events is available;

       

Dividend Policy and Reputation

Abstract:  We examine the role of reputation when firms use dividends to signal their profitability. We analyze a signaling model in which reputation plays no role in equilibrium. We then show that taking reputation into account as a link between sequential dividend decisions makes it possible to endogenize signaling costs and obtain a separating equilibrium. Lastly, we use the reversibility hypothesis and assume that in each period, managers can reverse their choices in terms of dividend distribution. We find that in most cases, the signaling equilibrium becomes unstable, causing any dividend signaling policy to become difficult to implement.