Offer Price, Target Ownership Structure and IPO Performance

Although the choice of an IPO offer price level would seem to have little economic significance, firms do not decide this arbitrarily. Our findings suggest that firms select their IPO offer prices to target a desired ownership structure, which in turn has implications for underpricing and post-IPO performance. Higher priced IPOs are marketed by more reputed underwriters and attract a relatively larger institutional investment. These IPOs are relatively more underpriced, possibly as compensation for the monitoring and information benefits provided by institutional investors. IPOs whose offer prices are below the median level seem to be targeted towards a retail investor clientele. These IPOs are also relatively more underpriced, possibly as a cost of adverse selection. Our finding that long-run performance increases with offer price confirms that higher priced IPOs are better firms.Initial public offerings; share prices; share allocation

Is Share Price Related to Marketability? Evidence from Mutual Fund Share Splits

We examine the "marketability hypothesis," which states that stock splits enhance the attractiveness of shares to investors by restoring prices to a preferred trading range. We examine splits of mutual fund shares because they provide a clean testing ground for the marketability hypothesis, since the conventional rationales for common stock splits do not apply. We find that splitting funds experience significant increases (relative to non-splitting matched funds) in net assets and shareholders. Stock splits do appear to enhance marketability.

Credit Enhancement through Financial Engineering: Freeport-McMoRan's Gold-Denominated Depository Shares

In 1993 and early 1994, Freeport McMoRan Copper and Gold (FCX), a mining company, issued two series of gold-denominated depositary shares to raise 430 million dollars expanding their mining capacity in Indonesia. We price the depositary shares using a term structure model for the forward rates implied by gold futures and we show that FCX successfully enhanced the credit quality of the issue. This credit enhancement is achieved because the effect of linking the payoff of the depositary shares to gold reduces default risk and is similar to conventional risk management. However, the bundling of financing and risk management allows the firm to target hedging benefits only to the newly issued securities. The design of the security also overcomes the asset substitution problem. The depositary shares issued by FCX illustrate how firms can enhance credit quality through financial engineering without changing the existing priority ordering of their capital structure.Risk management, Gold-linked, Hybrid Securities

Credit Enhancement Through Targeted Risk Managment: Freeport-McMoRan's Gold-Dominated Depository Shares

In 1993 and early 1994, Freeport McMoRan Copper and Gold (FCX), a mining company, issued two series of gold-denominated depositary shares to raise 430 million dollars for expansion of their mining capacity in Indonesia. We price the depositary shares using a term structure model for the forward rates implied by gold futures and we show that FCX successfully enhanced the credit quality of the issue. This credit enhancement is achieved because the effect of linking the payoff of the depositary shares to gold reduces default risk and is similar to conventional risk management. The building of financing and risk management, however, allows the firm to target hedging benefits only to the newly issued securities. The design of the security overcomes the asset substitution problem and credibly commits the firm to hedging. The depositary shares issued by FCX illustrate how firms can enhance credit quality through financial engineering without changing the existing priority ordering of their capital structure

The New Divisia Monetary Aggregates

This is the publisher's version, also available electronically from http://www.jstor.org/stable/183199

Accounting: A General Commentary on an Empirical Science

Many researchers have questioned the view of accounting as a science. Some maintain that it is a service activity rather than a science, yet others entertain the view that it is an art or merely a technology. While it is true that accounting provides a service and is a technology (a methodology for recording and reporting), that fact does not prevent accounting from being a science. Based upon the structure and knowledge base of the discipline, this paper presents the case for accounting as an empirical science