From 2008, employee stock bonus must debt expense according to national law and policy. How to get balance between employees and shareholders without eroding benefits becomes the most difficult challenge to many enterprises. The employee stock bonus has been implemented in Taiwan for a long time. This system does play a significant role in high-tech industry and make a great contribution to Taiwan¡¦s economics. However, since a series of business scandals starting with Enron case in 2001, this unique system has been broadly discussed and caused serious debates. One of the most controversial arguments claims that employee stock bonus will weaken the stock price and hurt equity. The study is based on pooled time-series data during 1998-2007 from the IC industry corporations trading on the Taiwan Stock Exchange Corporation and Over-The-Counter market. The purpose is to examine the impact of employee stock bonus on Taiwan stock market by analyzing the variation in Cumulative Average Abnormal Revenue (CAR). The empirical results are summarized as follows: 1.With the factor of employee stock bonus, the ex-dividend effects still existed in IC industry of Taiwan stock market. The negative CAR was particular in evidence on the three days prior to the ex-date. There were no obvious trends of ex-dividend effects during this decade. Both employee stock bonus and dividends were declined year by year which represented that corporation had adjusted their policy with a downward tendency. 2.Before the ex-date, the group of moderate employee stock bonus was beneficial to the CAR and created better performance of stock price with the least dilution effect. On the contrary, the group of low employee stock bonus came out the worst performance. After the ex-date, the group of high employee stock bonus exhibited the best ex-dividend effects and sustained the performance longer. But the group of low employee stock bonus still performed poorly with the most negative CAR. Base on above findings, employee stock bonus not really hurt the stock price but benefit equity if corporations use this system adequately. High employee stock bonuses maybe deliver a positive signal which implicates a bright future.

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TSEC and OTC listed companies conduct capital increase by retained earnings and stock dividend distribution numerously and that weakens performance of return on equity (ROE), return on asset (ROA) and earnings per share (EPS) and increases stress on managements. Since Formosa International Hotels Corporation pioneered in reducing capital and returning cash to shareholders, this topic has commonly discussed in capital market. Has a company been unable to utilize cash efficiently, reducing capital followed by returning cash to shareholders is a practical option to elevate financial ratio. This study discusses the effect on stock price subsequent to announcement of reducing capital followed by returning cash to shareholders. This study adopts event study to discuss the effect on stock price after declaring reducing capital and returning cash to shareholders and the sample size covers 27 TSEC and OTC listed companies which conducted capital reduction followed by returning cash to shareholders. The results are as follows: 1.The stock price shows positive effect when a company announces reducing capital followed by returning cash to shareholders for the first time. On the date of announcement and the first date after announcement, the average abnormal returns are generated evidently. Accumulated abnormal returns reach the highest level on the date of announcement and the first two days after announcement. Therefore, announcement effect of reducing capital followed by returning cash to shareholders is effective in short term. 2.Based on regression model analysis, return on asset, ratio of reducing capital and P/E ratio are positively correlated with announcement of reducing capital followed by returning cash to shareholders.

Operations strategies, whether prompted by competitive or regulatory forces, can greatly impact firm performance. While operations strategies cover a wide spectrum of issues - supply chain management, technology choice, capacity allocation, etc. - this dissertation focuses on two such issues, namely, sustainability and product development. The thesis comprises three essays. The first essay (Chapter 2) examines a regulatory aspect of sustainability strategy, product take-back, a form of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR). With a stylized model, we analyze the trade-offs between assigning full responsibility for product recovery to a single echelon in a multi-echelon supply chain versus sharing responsibility between echelons. We demonstrate how the sharing of EPR program costs between the echelons can move the supply chain closer to the coordinated profit benchmark. The second essay (Chapter 3) examines a voluntary aspect of sustainability from an empirical perspective. We investigate the impact from various types of corporate environmental initiatives and environmental awards and certifications on the market value of the firm. We find that the market is selective in reacting to environmental performance, with certain types of initiatives and awards even valued negatively. The third essay (Chapter 4) is an empirical examination of the shareholder value effects that result from the restructuring of firms' product development activities. We find that, on average, the stock market reacts positively to product development restructuring, and that the reaction is dependent on the firm's prior financial performance, restructuring objective, R&D expenditures, and size.

<p>Background:</p><p>Studying insider trading is difficult due to its sensitive and delicate nature. Therefore it is hard to gauge the extent of such activities. This problem has resulted in a fierce debate whether it should be prohibited or not. Using a method where the effect on monopolistic information usage can be isolated insider trading can be monitored. Such an event is a profit warning.</p><p>Purpose:</p><p>This paper examines whether insider trading exist for companies</p><p>making a profit warning between year 2003 and 2007 on the Stockholm</p><p>Stock Exchange. Furthermore the aim with the study is to contribute</p><p>to the debate on the insider trading legislation.</p><p>Method:</p><p>The study’s purpose is achieved through an event study studying the</p><p>cumulative abnormal return as well as average daily returns during</p><p>the thirty days preceding the warning for a sample of thirty companies.</p><p>Since profit warnings should be completely random and as such</p><p>almost impossible for the market to know in advance, a significant</p><p>abnormal return can only be explained with insider trading. The abnormal returns were calculated using the Capital Asset Pricing Model</p><p>since it is the most widely used model.</p><p>Conclusion:</p><p>For the chosen time frame, when testing on a 95% significance level,</p><p>the study found a significant abnormal return during the last 10 days</p><p>of the event window but not for the entire period of thirty days. The</p><p>daily average return for the thirty companies were significant for six</p><p>of the thirty days within the event window. Two of them were included</p><p>in the last ten day period with a confirmed significant abnormal</p><p>return which might suggest that on average insider trading tend</p><p>to occur during these days. The other four was discarded due to</p><p>sample issues. Since the study was limited to a period of four years</p><p>extending the results to a period other than tested should be made</p><p>with great care since conditions may differ over time. Concerning the</p><p>current debate on the insider legislation, the findings can be used by</p><p>both sides. Either to argue for a strengthening of the law or to question its existence.</p>

<p>This paper examines whether the phenomena of price drift around quarterly earnings re-leases exist among firms listed on the large cap. list at the Stockholm Stock Exchange for a time period ranging from the first quarter of 2003 to the second quarter of 2006. It fur-thermore examines the ability of the variables forecast error, relative to analyst’s estimates, and firms’ size to explain the variation in price drift among firms.</p><p>A sample of some 30 firms were drawn in the first three quarters of each year between 2003 and 2005, for the year of 2006 only the fist two quarters were included in the study. For each quarter all firms were classified into three different portfolios on the basis of earnings deviations relative to mean analyst’s estimates (forecast error). The returns for each firm in all portfolios were investigated during 20 days post- and pre quarterly earnings release date, resulting in an event window totaling 41 days. In order to clear out effects from general market movements the Capital Asset Pricing Model, CAPM, was used in which betas were estimated for all firms each quarter.</p><p>The findings from this study indicate that price drift, measured by cumulative abnormal re-turn, occur for firms with both negative forecast error as well as positive. For firms with positive error, statistically significant positive price drift was found for both the pre- and post period. As for the firms with earnings below analyst’s mean estimates, negative prean-nouncement drift was statistically supported.</p><p>The ability of firms size and forecast error to explain the variation in price drift on a stock level was very weak, R2 measures of below 5% was reported. However, forecast error was a strongly significant independent variable in the context of the regressions run for both pre- and post-announcement drift. The firms below the lower market cap. quartile in the sample show, on average, lower pre-announcement drift than the firms belonging in the largest quartile.</p><p>Concerning market efficiency among the large cap. firms the price drift found is an indica-tion of market inefficiency both it terms of the semi strong and the strong form. However, care should be taken before generalizing the results from this study but. Possible misspeci-fication of the equilibrium return model will skew the price drift measurement. Moreover, speculation is not explicitly controlled for in this test. Finally, this study is done within a li-mited time span; hence generalization over time is not possible</p>

People with insight are known as insiders and they often have access to information which have not yet been publiched. Previous research show that insiders can use their information leverage to assimilate abnormal returns. The purpose of this study is to examine whether insiders in a company can generate abnormal returns by trading shares in their own company. A quantitative methodology has ben practiced in order to achieve the desired result. Data has been collected through Finansinspektionen about the insider trades on the Swedish stock market. We have further used an event study to calculate both the expected and also the abnormal return in order to answer our research issue. The results given from this study show significant abnormal returns when insiders trade with shares in their own company. / Aktier medför ett placeringsalternativ med en viss risk och ger investerare möjligheten att generera en avkastning på sin portfölj. Personer som anses ha tillgång till förtrolig samt kurspåverkande information inom ett företag betecknas som insynspersoner. Tidigare forskning visar att insynspersoner kan utnyttja detta informationsövertag i sin egen vinning för att tillgodogöra sig överavkastning. Syftet med denna studie är att granska huruvida insynspersoner kan generera en viss överavkastning gentemot andra aktörer på marknaden. I denna forskning har en kvantitativ metod tillämpats med en deduktiv ansats. Via Finansinspektionens insynslista kan vi detektera transaktioner genomförda av insiders för att sedan, med användandet av en eventstudie, besvara forskningsfrågan, om insynspersoner kan generera en överavkastning. Hypotesprövningar ligger sedan till grund för att bedöma huruvida resultatet påvisar signifikans. Utifrån denna studie kan vi dra slutsatsen om att nollhypotesen bör förkastas, således menar vi att det förekommer en signifikant överavkastning i samband med att insynspersoner bedriver handel på värdepappersmarknaden.

Huvudsyftet med uppsatsen är att se hur ett företags annonsering om återköp av aktier påverkar dess börskurs i Sverige. Som delsyfte kommer även en undersökning göras om huruvida reaktionen skiljer sig mellan olika branscher samt om Sveriges reaktion skiljer sig från den tidigare forskningen i USA och i Storbritannien. Undersökningen har genomförts med hjälp av en eventstudie där den abnormala avkastningen beräknas. En intervju utförs för att bekräfta resultatet. Resultatet gav en sammanlagd kumulativ avkastning på 0,57 %. Det visade även att det finns en skillnad mellan olika branschers reaktion på en annonsering av ett återköp. Sveriges reaktion jämförs bäst med Storbritanniens som har en abnormal avkastning på 1,14 % än med USA som har en abnormal avkastning på 3,5 %. / The purpose with this study is to examine how a company’s announcement of a repurchase of stocks affect the stock price in Sweden. There will also be an investigation about how the reaction differ between branches and if the reaction found here in Sweden is different than the ones that has been found in USA and the United Kingdom. The examination has been carried out with an event study where the abnormal return has been calculated. An interview has been performed to confirm the result. The result showed a cumulative abnormal return with 0,57 %. It also showed that there is a difference in reaction between branches. Sweden is more comparable with the United Kingdom who has an abnormal return with 1,14 % than it is with USA which has an abnormal return with 3,5 %.

In this dissertation, I investigate three different issues related to signalling and price dynamics in mergers and acquisitions. The first issue is whether the act of raising capital signals an increase in takeover probability for a forthcoming target. Analysing target returns under event-study methodology, I find that this is indeed the case, as was initially pre-supposed by financial journalists. The second issue is whether the observed increase in target returns which are associated with the increase in takeover probability can be attributed to the actions of sophisticated traders, either via information leakage or through the adept analysis of publicly available information. An examination of price-volume dynamics reveals that investors incorporate the increased likelihood of a takeover attempt into target firm returns without necessarily resorting to illegal insider trading. The final issue is whether this public signal of raising capital impacts the target price runup and takeover premium in a meaningful way. Multivariate regression analysis reveals substantial support that raising capital close in proximity to the acquisition announcement date is associated with significant increases in both target firm returns as well as takeover premiums paid by acquiring firms. In sum, these three essays provide evidence which supports the notion that raising capital can act as both a statistically and economically significant signal to all market participants of a forthcoming takeover attempt. / Thesis (Ph.D, Management) -- Queen's University, 2011-08-12 10:35:35.142

In a crisis managers are confronted with a dilemma between an ethical responsibility to respond to victims and their fiduciary responsibility to protect shareholder’s wealth. This study provides empirical evidence that a company apology made during a crisis can have a positive or negative effect on stock price depending on the level of responsibility for a crisis born by the firm. We use Coombs’ (2007) Situational Crisis Communication Theory to classify crises and appropriate re-sponse type for 235 unique crises between 1983 and 2013. We use event study methodology to study the effect of an apology on returns. The results show that managers apologizing to those affected for a victim or accidental crisis jeopardize shareholder wealth; however offering an apology for a preventable crisis offsets this negative effect.