The literature on short selling documents substantial evidence that short sellers are generally informed investors (e.g., Diamond and Verrecchia, 1987; Asquith and Muelbrook, 1996). This dissertation investigates three specific implications of informed short selling for a firm and its investors. The first essay investigates if short selling discourages managers from pursuing over-optimistic projects by reducing equity market timing. By conditioning short selling on firm overvaluation, this essay shows that short selling reduces managerial equity market timing and increases leverage. This moderating impact of short selling is more pronounced in smaller firms and those with low institutional ownership or higher intangible assets. Furthermore, the results show that board independence facilitates the above effect of short selling which helps protect shareholder interests. The second essay investigates if board independence reduces informed short selling prior to earnings announcements. This essay estimates short sellers’ correct prediction of the direction of unexpected quarterly earnings through Logistic regression and finds that short sellers’ correct prediction decreases in firms with independent boards relative to firms with non-independent boards. Furthermore, this effect is more pronounced in firms with CEO duality and large board size. The quasi-natural experiment using the exogenous shock to board independence from the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, provides further support to our hypotheses. The third essay provides Sell recommendations by examining pre-announcement short selling of firms ahead of their earnings announcements. The methodology makes Sell recommendations for firms with the highest short position prior to their quarterly earnings announcement. The post-announcement raw, excess, and abnormal returns of firms having the Sell recommendations are statistically and economically significant for multiple-holding periods showing the methodology’s significant trading strategy implication. This dissertation significantly contributes to short selling, governance, capital structure, and investment literature.

[pt] A relação entre risco idiossincrático e o retorno já foi amplamente estudada em diversas publicações internacionais, contudo, os resultados encontrados são controversos. Para o caso brasileiro, estudos sobre este tema são ainda escassos. Este trabalho procura verificar a relação entre o risco idiossincrático e o retorno das ações no mercado brasileiro. Para isso, utilizou-se dois métodos para estimação da volatilidade idiossincrática: um através dos resíduos de regressões baseadas no Modelo de Três Fatores de Fama e French, e o outro através do modelo EGARCH, que forneceu a volatilidade condicional. As variáveis encontradas foram adicionadas a modelos de regressões cross-section, juntamente com outras variáveis específicas às ações, a saber: beta, valor de mercado, índice book-to-market, efeito momentum e liquidez. Os resultados mostram que a volatilidade idiossincrática apresenta influência positiva e significante sobre o retorno, e que o modelo de explicação mais apropriado é o que inclui todas as variáveis citadas, utilizando como variável de volatilidade idiossincrática a estimada segundo o primeiro método citado. / [en] The relationship between idiosyncratic risk and stock returns has been widely studied in various international publications, however, the results are controversial. For the Brazilian case, studies on this subject are still scarce. This work seeks to verify the relationship between idiosyncratic risk and stock returns in the Brazilian stock market. To achieve this goal, two methods to estimating the idiosyncratic volatility were used: one through the residuals of regressions based on the Fama and French Three-Factor Model, and the other one through the EGARCH model, which provided the conditional volatility. These variables were added to cross-section regression models, along with other stock-specific variables, namely: beta, market value, book-to-market ratio, momentum effect and liquidity. The results show that idiosyncratic volatility has positive and significant influence on stock returns, and that the most appropriate model is the one that includes all the mentioned variables.

The final aim of this thesis is to evaluate opportunities and risk factors of investing in China, in terms of pros and cons, and also to elaborate an optimal portfolio strategy. The pros regarding investments in China are (1) the economic liberalisation and reforms of the institutional framework; (2) the Chinese market’s huge potential and the high-growth IT and telecommunications sectors; (3) a favourable macroeconomic climate and an impressive development. The cons are (1) the mismanagement of the state-run companies; (2) the mainland exchanges’ intra-year volatility; (3) the export sector’s performance might decline; (4) the institutional framework is largely responsible for many risk factors; (5) a tougher competition climate after the entry in the WTO. Also, our calculations on an optimal portfolio strategy suggest that less risk-averse investors may want to consider the World/Shanghai portfolio, whereas the World/Shenzhen portfolio might instead suit the preferences of more risk-averse investors.

The focus of this empirical paper is to outline and evaluate certain determinants of lever-aged buyouts (LBOs) in Europe. The paper begins by providing a detailed description of LBOs, with particular emphasis on the European markets. This allows for the development of the four determinants that are studied in greater detail, specifically interest rate, out-standing stock, anti-director rights, and creditor rights. The conclusions indicate that coun-tries with more outstanding stock have larger LBO markets since equity is more liquid in these countries. Further, the results suggest that long-run interest rate is negatively related to the size of the LBO market. The paper goes on to test whether anti-director rights and creditor rights, as developed by La Porta et al. (1998) are related to the size of the LBO markets, but no evidence is found to support this notion. It is thus concluded that deter-minants focused on financing the buyouts play the most significant role in European LBO transactions.

Since 1994 when the Warsaw Stock Exchange has been acknowledged as a full member of World Federation of Exchanges and became one of the fastest developing security markets in the region, it has been hard to find any studies relating to the assets price performance on this exchange. That is why I decided to write this paper in which the Nobel price winning theory namely the Capital Asset Pricing Model has been tested. The Capital Asset Pricing Model (or CAPM) is an equilibrium model which relates asset’s risk measured by beta to its returns. It states that in a competitive market the expected rate of return on an asset varies in direct proportion to its beta. In this paper the performance of 100 stocks traded continuously on the main market in the years 2002-2006 has been tested. I have performed three independent tests of the CAPM based on different methods and techniques to better check the validity of the theory and then compared the results. As in the case of many other studies of the Capital Asset Pricing Model, this one didn’t find a complete support for the model but couldn’t reject some of its features either.

Modern portfolio theory stipulates that an investor can reduce systemic risk simply by diversifying its assets across national boundaries. Therefore, the issue of whether stock markets are cointegrated carries important implications for portfolio diversification. This study aims to identify and model a relationship between four equity markets namely, Turkish, European, North American and emerging markets using cointegration technique. We investigated the existence of cointegrating equation between four stock market indices and also the existence of a structural break. During our investigation, we constructed a vector error correction model (VECM) to observe short and long run relationships between the four markets. We used daily data from the October 23, 1995 until November 20, 2009 and relevant Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) indices, namely MSCI Turkey, MSCI North America, MSCI Europe and MSCI Emerging Markets. Our first finding was that the Turkish equity markets are cointegrated with European, North American and emerging markets indicates that investing in the Turkish equity market does not provide an opportunity for risk diversification for international investors in the long run. It is only possible to benefit from the discrepancies which may occur in the short run. Furthermore, we identified a structural break contemporaneous with crisis of November 2000.

<p>The focus of this empirical paper is to outline and evaluate certain determinants of lever-aged buyouts (LBOs) in Europe. The paper begins by providing a detailed description of LBOs, with particular emphasis on the European markets. This allows for the development of the four determinants that are studied in greater detail, specifically interest rate, out-standing stock, anti-director rights, and creditor rights. The conclusions indicate that coun-tries with more outstanding stock have larger LBO markets since equity is more liquid in these countries. Further, the results suggest that long-run interest rate is negatively related to the size of the LBO market. The paper goes on to test whether anti-director rights and creditor rights, as developed by La Porta et al. (1998) are related to the size of the LBO markets, but no evidence is found to support this notion. It is thus concluded that deter-minants focused on financing the buyouts play the most significant role in European LBO transactions.</p>

<p>The final aim of this thesis is to evaluate opportunities and risk factors of investing in China, in terms of pros and cons, and also to elaborate an optimal portfolio strategy. The pros regarding investments in China are (1) the economic liberalisation and reforms of the institutional framework; (2) the Chinese market’s huge potential and the high-growth IT and telecommunications sectors; (3) a favourable macroeconomic climate and an impressive development. The cons are (1) the mismanagement of the state-run companies; (2) the mainland exchanges’ intra-year volatility; (3) the export sector’s performance might decline; (4) the institutional framework is largely responsible for many risk factors; (5) a tougher competition climate after the entry in the WTO. Also, our calculations on an optimal portfolio strategy suggest that less risk-averse investors may want to consider the World/Shanghai portfolio, whereas the World/Shenzhen portfolio might instead suit the preferences of more risk-averse investors.</p>

Eventos puramente cosméticos como o desdobramento ou grupamento de ações não deveriam gerar modificações no preço de mercado das empresas que realizaram tais operações. Porém, inúmeros estudos realizados nos mercados internacionais indicam que existem retornos anormais no preço das ações para tais eventos. Foi verificada a reação do mercado brasileiro aos grupamentos de ações que ocorreram entre 1986 e 2007 através do método de estudo de eventos. Os resultados indicam que não há retorno anormal nos preços das ações e que o evento possui efeitos puramente cosméticos no mercado acionário brasileiro, divergindo dos estudos realizados ao redor do mundo, predominantemente no mercado americano. Tal fato pode ocorrer pelas diferenças institucionais entre os dois países. / Purely cosmetic events such as the split or inplits should not generate changes in market prices of companies that performed such operations. However, numerous studies in international markets indicate that there are abnormal returns in the stock price for such events. It was found that the reaction of the Brazilian market to groups of actions that occurred between 1986 and 2007 by the method of study events. The results indicate that there are no abnormal returns in stock prices for these events in the national market. These results indicate that the event is purely cosmetic in the Brazilian equity market which differs from studies conducted in other markets, but predominantly in the U.S. market, and this fact can occur by the difference in institutional settings between the two countries.

Eventos puramente cosméticos como o desdobramento ou grupamento de ações não deveriam gerar modificações no preço de mercado das empresas que realizaram tais operações. Porém, inúmeros estudos realizados nos mercados internacionais indicam que existem retornos anormais no preço das ações para tais eventos. Foi verificada a reação do mercado brasileiro aos grupamentos de ações que ocorreram entre 1986 e 2007 através do método de estudo de eventos. Os resultados indicam que não há retorno anormal nos preços das ações e que o evento possui efeitos puramente cosméticos no mercado acionário brasileiro, divergindo dos estudos realizados ao redor do mundo, predominantemente no mercado americano. Tal fato pode ocorrer pelas diferenças institucionais entre os dois países. / Purely cosmetic events such as the split or inplits should not generate changes in market prices of companies that performed such operations. However, numerous studies in international markets indicate that there are abnormal returns in the stock price for such events. It was found that the reaction of the Brazilian market to groups of actions that occurred between 1986 and 2007 by the method of study events. The results indicate that there are no abnormal returns in stock prices for these events in the national market. These results indicate that the event is purely cosmetic in the Brazilian equity market which differs from studies conducted in other markets, but predominantly in the U.S. market, and this fact can occur by the difference in institutional settings between the two countries.