Business Ethics: The Bottom Line

Teaching Business Ethics -     

The 2000 presidential election and the information cost of sensitive versus non-sensitive S&P 500 stocks

We investigate the information cost of stock trading during the 2000 presidential election. We find that the uncertainty of the election induces information asymmetry of politically sensitive firms under the Bush/Gore platforms. The unusual delay in election results creates a significant increase in the adverse selection component of the trading cost of politically sensitive stocks. Cross-sectional variations in bid-ask spreads are significantly and positively related to changes in information cost, controlling for the effects of liquidity cost and stock characteristics. This empirical evidence is robust to different estimation methods.     

The pricing of dividend consistency

This study investigates the pricing of dividend consistency. The approach used is to study the announcement effects around significant dividend changes; specifically dividend omissions, resumptions, and increases or decreases of 25% or more. We focus on the relation between the magnitude of the announcement effect and the firm's history of dividend payment consistency using an ARIMA model. We find that dividend consistency is not priced.