Essays on Firm Valuation and Value Appropriation

Sophisticated valuation techniques such as adjusted present value and real options, attract ever-increasing attention from theory and practice. A huge number of papers in the academic field provide various applications of these advanced tools, for instance valuing research and development, strategic alliances and real estate. Real options have also been used for valuing mergers and acquisitions. However, notwithstanding the rich knowledge about valuation models applicable for valuing takeovers, there remains a need to further develop theories about the distribution of the value creation between the target’s and acquirer’s shareholders. In other words, what part of the value creation can the acquirer appropriate? Strategic management literature underlines the impact of possessing unique capabilities, and both the strategic and financial literature emphasize the role of information asymmetry in explaining value appropriation in acquisitions. In this dissertation both simple and more complex valuation models are discussed, and we propose a real option-game model that analyzes the acquirer’s value appropriation. In our valuation and value appropriation models, the specific resources and capabilities of the evaluator are considered. By explicitly taking the acquirer resources into account in the valuation analysis, and by developing a new application of a combined option-game model, this PhD thesis is taking a step in further bridging the gap between finance theory and strategic management.Wouter De Maeseneire (1977) obtained his Master’s degree in Applied Economics magna cum laude from Ghent University, Belgium, in 1999. He joined the Department of Corporate Finance at Ghent University and the Competence Centre Accounting and Finance at the Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School in September 1999. In September 2001, Wouter was awarded with a scholarship from the Fund for Scientific Research-Flanders (Aspirant). In September 2002 he also joined ERIM as a PhD candidate to carry out his doctoral research. His work has been presented at several international conferences e.g., at the conferences of the European Financial Management Association and of the Strategic Management Society. His current research interests include valuation, real options and private equity

Acquisitions as a Real Options Bidding Game

This paper uses a unified treatment of real options and game theory to examine value appropriation in takeovers within a competitive environment of imperfect information. The integrated model considers a potential target as a shared real option on a bundle of resources. Competing potential buyers may sequentially perform due diligence and incur costs (option premium) to become informed about their firm-specific target value (underlying value) before making a bid (exercise price). The first player’s bid provides a signal on its own and rivals’ target value, thereby affecting potential bidders’ option value. The level of information costs and the option value, affected by heterogeneity between bidders (correlation), their expected target value, and uncertainty, determine value appropriation in acquisitions

31st Annual Meeting and Associated Programs of the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC 2016) : part two

Background The immunological escape of tumors represents one of the main ob- stacles to the treatment of malignancies. The blockade of PD-1 or CTLA-4 receptors represented a milestone in the history of immunotherapy. However, immune checkpoint inhibitors seem to be effective in specific cohorts of patients. It has been proposed that their efficacy relies on the presence of an immunological response. Thus, we hypothesized that disruption of the PD-L1/PD-1 axis would synergize with our oncolytic vaccine platform PeptiCRAd. Methods We used murine B16OVA in vivo tumor models and flow cytometry analysis to investigate the immunological background. Results First, we found that high-burden B16OVA tumors were refractory to combination immunotherapy. However, with a more aggressive schedule, tumors with a lower burden were more susceptible to the combination of PeptiCRAd and PD-L1 blockade. The therapy signifi- cantly increased the median survival of mice (Fig. 7). Interestingly, the reduced growth of contralaterally injected B16F10 cells sug- gested the presence of a long lasting immunological memory also against non-targeted antigens. Concerning the functional state of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs), we found that all the immune therapies would enhance the percentage of activated (PD-1pos TIM- 3neg) T lymphocytes and reduce the amount of exhausted (PD-1pos TIM-3pos) cells compared to placebo. As expected, we found that PeptiCRAd monotherapy could increase the number of antigen spe- cific CD8+ T cells compared to other treatments. However, only the combination with PD-L1 blockade could significantly increase the ra- tio between activated and exhausted pentamer positive cells (p= 0.0058), suggesting that by disrupting the PD-1/PD-L1 axis we could decrease the amount of dysfunctional antigen specific T cells. We ob- served that the anatomical location deeply influenced the state of CD4+ and CD8+ T lymphocytes. In fact, TIM-3 expression was in- creased by 2 fold on TILs compared to splenic and lymphoid T cells. In the CD8+ compartment, the expression of PD-1 on the surface seemed to be restricted to the tumor micro-environment, while CD4 + T cells had a high expression of PD-1 also in lymphoid organs. Interestingly, we found that the levels of PD-1 were significantly higher on CD8+ T cells than on CD4+ T cells into the tumor micro- environment (p < 0.0001). Conclusions In conclusion, we demonstrated that the efficacy of immune check- point inhibitors might be strongly enhanced by their combination with cancer vaccines. PeptiCRAd was able to increase the number of antigen-specific T cells and PD-L1 blockade prevented their exhaus- tion, resulting in long-lasting immunological memory and increased median survival

How do Investments Banks Value Initial Public Offerings (IPOs)?

We investigate the valuation and the pricing of initial public offerings (IPOs) by investment banks for a unique dataset of 49 IPOs on Euronext Brussels in the 1993¿2001 period. We find that for each IPO several valuation methods are used, of which Discounted Free Cash Flow (DFCF) is the most popular. The offer price is mainly based on DFCF valuation, to which a discount is applied. Our results suggest that DDM tends to underestimate value, while DFCF produces unbiased value estimates. When using multiples, investment banks rely mostly on future earnings and cash flows. Multiples based on post-IPO forecasted earnings and cash flows result in more accurate valuations

What drives leverage in leveraged buyouts? An analysis of European leveraged buyouts' capital structure

This paper examines leverage in European private equity-led leveraged buyouts (LBOs). We use a unique, self-constructed sample of 126 European private equity (PE)-sponsored buyouts completed between June 2000 and June 2007. We find that determinants derived from classical capital structure theories do not explain leverage in LBOs, while they do drive leverage in a control group of comparable public firms. Rather, we document that leverage levels in LBOs are related to the prevailing conditions in the debt market. In addition, our results indicate that reputed private equity sponsors use more debt and that secondary buyouts have higher leverage levels. © 2011 The Authors. Accounting and Financ