Determination of mean atmospheric densities from the explorer ix satellite

Mean atmospheric densities from changes in orbital elements of Explorer IX satellit

Activist Directors and Agency Costs: What Happens When an Activist Director Goes on the Board?

We develop and apply a new and more rigorous methodology by which to measure and understand both insider trading and the agency costs of hedge fund activism. We use quantitative data to show a systematic relationship between the appointment of a hedge fund nominated director to a corporate board and an increase in informed trading in that corporation’s stock (with the relationship being most pronounced when the fund’s slate of directors includes a hedge fund employee). This finding is important from two different perspectives. First, from a governance perspective, activist hedge funds represent a new and potent force in corporate governance. A robust debate continues as to whether activist funds reduce the agency costs of corporate governance, but this is the first attempt to investigate whether the activist hedge fund also imposes new agency costs through widened bid/ask spreads and informed trading. Second, although insider trading is almost universally condemned, it has only been studied in individual cases. Using instead a quantitative approach, we develop a tool that enables regulators (civil and criminal) to identify suspicious trading patterns: Both to demonstrate such a pattern and to map these new agency costs, we assembled a data set of 475 settlement agreements, between target companies and activists funds relating to the appointment of fund nominated directors, from 2000 and 2015, in order to focus on what happens once such a fund-nominated director goes on the board. Among our principal findings are: Prevalence of Hedge Fund Employees on Slate. Approximately 70% of fund-nominated director slates include a hedge fund employee. Increase in Information Leakage. Once a fund-nominated director goes on the board, an abrupt increase in “information leakage” follows, with the result that the target corporation’s stock price begins to anticipate future public disclosures. Specifically, we examine some 635,450 Form 8-K’s filed by 7,799 public traded companies over the period of January 1, 2000 to September 30, 2016, and we construct a control group for each of the corporations subject to an activist intervention. We find that firms appointing an activist nominee or nominees experience a difference-in-differences increase in leakage of 25-27 percentage points. Hedge Funds versus Other Activists. We next consider whether post-appointment increases in leakage depend on the identity of the activist investors (i.e., hedge fund versus other activist investors). We find that the leakage effect is clearly driven by hedge fund activists (and no other type of activist). Leakage and Hedge Fund Employees. We investigate whether leakage increases depend on the identity of the director appointed to target firm’s board, distinguishing between hedge fund employees and non-hedge fund employees. We find that the increase in leakage is driven by the appointment of activist fund employees to the corporate board (and not by the appointment of other persons, such as industry professionals). Leakage and Confidentiality Provisions. We consider whether post-settlement increases in leakage are associated with confidentiality provisions restricting information sharing in the settlement agreements. The majority of settlement agreements have no confidentiality provisions, and information leakage is concentrated in these cases. Market Response to Settlement Agreements. We next examine whether the stock market’s response to settlement agreements depends on (a) whether a hedge fund employee is on the director slate, and (b) whether the settlement agreement contains or refers to a confidentiality provision. We find that the 5-day CAR is more than twice as high (4.2% vs. 1.97%) for settlements with only non-employee directors and also significantly higher (2.02% vs. 0.42%) for settlements with an explicit restriction on information sharing. Effect on Bid-Ask Spread. Bid-ask spreads increase by statistically meaningful amounts in our treatment group after an activist director gains access to the boardroom. Bid-ask spreads do not widen for the control groups. Further, we find that the increase in bid-ask spreads is concentrated in those cases in which (i) a hedge fund employee is appointed to the board, or (ii) no confidentiality provision is referenced in the settlement agreement. Options Trading. We find that options trading increases significantly after the appointment of an activist director and in a manner consistent with informed trading. Consistent with earlier research on informed trading, we find that options traders exploit unscheduled Form 8-K filings. Implications. The foregoing pattern is most plausibly explained as the product of informed trading. Material, non-public information appears to travel on a conduit from the hedge fund’s employee-director to others, whose trades move the market price prior to public disclosure. We reach no conclusions about who is trading or its legality in any individual case. Yet, the widened bid-ask spread strongly suggests that the market expects such trading, and the much more positive market response to director slates without a hedge fund employee (or with a confidentiality provision) suggests that the market suspects that informed trading is closely associated with the appointment of a hedge fund employee to the board. Hypothesis. Our data suggests that the ability to engage in informed trading is a significant subsidy that may inflate the rate of hedge fund activism (producing more engagements than if stronger controls on information sharing were imposed) and may encourage activists to pursue inefficient engagements. Further, information sharing may be the cement that holds together a “wolf-pack” of activists that would otherwise logically be unstable. Reforms. We consider and evaluate a variety of possible reforms that are consistent with an energetic role for hedge fund activism, but that remove (to various degrees) the subsidy of informed trading

The Mass of the Convective Zone in FGK Main Sequence Stars and the Effect of Accreted Planetary Material on Apparent Metallicity Determinations

The mass of the outer convective zone in FGK main sequence stars decreases dramatically with stellar mass. Therefore, any contamination of a star's atmosphere by accreted planetary material should affect hotter stars much more than cool stars. If recent suggestions that high metal abundances in stars with planets are caused by planetesimal accretion are correct, then metallicity enhancements in earlier-type stars with planets should be very pronounced. No such trend is seen, however.Comment: Submitted ApJ Letters March 26th; accepted April 30th. 12 pages, 2 figure

Brief of Corporate Law Professors as Amici Curie in Support of Respondents

The Supreme Court has looked to the rights of corporate shareholders in determining the rights of union members and non-members to control political spending, and vice versa. The Court sometimes assumes that if shareholders disapprove of corporate political expression, they can easily sell their shares or exercise control over corporate spending. This assumption is mistaken. Because of how capital is saved and invested, most individual shareholders cannot obtain full information about corporate political activities, even after the fact, nor can they prevent their savings from being used to speak in ways with which they disagree. Individual shareholders have no “opt out” rights or practical ability to avoid subsidizing corporate political expression with which they disagree. Nor do individuals have the practical option to refrain from putting their savings into equity investments, as doing so would impose damaging economic penalties and ignore conventional financial guidance for individual investors

Array-Based FMR1 Sequencing and Deletion Analysis in Patients with a Fragile X Syndrome–Like Phenotype

Background: Fragile X syndrome (FXS) is caused by loss of function mutations in the FMR1 gene. Trinucleotide CGG-repeat expansions, resulting in FMR1 gene silencing, are the most common mutations observed at this locus. Even though the repeat expansion mutation is a functional null mutation, few conventional mutations have been identified at this locus, largely due to the clinical laboratory focus on the repeat tract. Methodology/Principal Findings: To more thoroughly evaluate the frequency of conventional mutations in FXS-like patients, we used an array-based method to sequence FMR1 in 51 unrelated males exhibiting several features characteristic of FXS but with normal CGG-repeat tracts of FMR1. One patient was identified with a deletion in FMR1, but none of the patients were found to have other conventional mutations. Conclusions/Significance: These data suggest that missense mutations in FMR1 are not a common cause of the FXS phenotype in patients who have normal-length CGG-repeat tracts. However, screening for small deletions of FMR1 may be of clinically utility

Risk-shifting Through Issuer Liability and Corporate Monitoring

This article explores how issuer liability re-allocates fraud risk and how risk allocation may reduce the incidence of fraud. In the US, the apparent absence of individual liability of officeholders and insufficient monitoring by insurers under-mine the potential deterrent effect of securities litigation. The underlying reasons why both mechanisms remain ineffective are collective action problems under the prevailing dispersed ownership structure, which eliminates the incentives to moni-tor set by issuer liability. This article suggests that issuer liability could potentially have a stronger deterrent effect when it shifts risk to individuals or entities holding a larger financial stake. Thus, it would enlist large shareholders in monitoring in much of Europe. The same risk-shifting effect also has implications for the debate about the relationship between securities litigation and creditor interests. Credi-tors’ claims should not be given precedence over claims of defrauded investors (e.g., because of the capital maintenance principle), since bearing some of the fraud risk will more strongly incentivise large creditors, such as banks, to monitor the firm in jurisdictions where corporate debt is relatively concentrated

Imaging Molecular Structure through Femtosecond Photoelectron Diffraction on Aligned and Oriented Gas-Phase Molecules

This paper gives an account of our progress towards performing femtosecond time-resolved photoelectron diffraction on gas-phase molecules in a pump-probe setup combining optical lasers and an X-ray Free-Electron Laser. We present results of two experiments aimed at measuring photoelectron angular distributions of laser-aligned 1-ethynyl-4-fluorobenzene (C8H5F) and dissociating, laseraligned 1,4-dibromobenzene (C6H4Br2) molecules and discuss them in the larger context of photoelectron diffraction on gas-phase molecules. We also show how the strong nanosecond laser pulse used for adiabatically laser-aligning the molecules influences the measured electron and ion spectra and angular distributions, and discuss how this may affect the outcome of future time-resolved photoelectron diffraction experiments.Comment: 24 pages, 10 figures, Faraday Discussions 17