This dissertation has three essays. In the first essay, I investigate whether the decision to repurchase stock is driven by investor demand for repurchases. Specifically, I hypothesize that firms cater to investor demand for repurchases by initiating repurchases when investors place premiums on the stock prices of repurchasing firms. I propose proxies (analogous to Baker and Wurgler (2004)) that measure the repurchase premium. I find that the lagged repurchase premium is positively and significantly related to repurchase initiation and continuation decisions, even after controlling for tax effects, year trends and alternate investment opportunities. I find that a greater fraction of dividend paying firms also repurchase stock when the repurchase premium has been high. The fraction of dividend payers that repurchase stock is found to be negatively related to the lagged dividend premium, establishing the competing attractiveness of dividends and repurchases based on the respective dividend and repurchase premium. Firms are more likely to repurchase stock when the repurchase premium is high and the difference between the repurchase and dividend premium is positive. The second essay looks at a relatively new way of buying back shares, called Accelerated Share Repurchases (ASRs). ASRs are credible commitments by firms to repurchase shares immediately. Including an ASR in a repurchase program reduces the flexibility that firms have to alter an announced program in response to subsequent changes in the price and liquidity of its stock, unexpected shocks to cash flow and/or investment, etc. We investigate whether firms decisions to include ASRs in their repurchase programs are associated with factors expected to influence the costs of lost flexibility and the benefits of enhanced credibility and immediacy. The third essay looks at stock market trading characteristics around ASR announcements. I find that the trading costs decrease following an ASR announcement. On average, market quality improves; trading volume increases; and trade size increases following an ASR announcement. The information asymmetry component of spread also increases post ASR.

We extend the existing literature on the factors explaining the value of acquired firms by examining the effect of corporate governance and other characteristics of Japanese and U.S. acquirers on the long-term post-acquisition stock and accounting performance of their U.S. targets over 1980 2000, a period during which both U.S. and Japanese economies experienced both superior and poor performances. In addition to analyzing the bidder target relationship in general, focus on Japanese bidders permits us to investigate the role of unique Japanese characteristics: keiretsu membership, cross-holding and ties to a main bank. The unresolved debate on the efficiency of the U.S. versus Japanese corporate governance system developed in the early 1990s, following the slowdown in the U.S. and boom in the Japanese economy. Critics claim that the main banks do nothing special and that the whole discussion is theory driven. In addition, the hypothesized advantages of the Japanese governance system, namely cross-holding, negligible shareholding, latitude and long-term focus of managers, may lead to greater agency problems. For data availability reason we analyzed U.S. targets whose stock continued to independently trade for at least a year following the acquisition. To separate general and uniquely Japanese effects of bidders, a sample of U.S. targets, that independently existed following acquisition by U.S. bidders, were selected from the same industry and year in which Japanese acquired U.S. targets. Overall results suggest that better managed bidders with more resources positively affect the performance of smaller targets in related industries. In the presence of alternative methods for managing the agency problem the targets leverage becomes more important as a source of funds than a tool to manage agency problem. The mixed results for the Japanese governance variables, expected positive for the main bank and unpredicted negative for the keiretsu and cross-holding, do not allow a clear-cut answer as to which governance system is dominant since the characteristics of the Japanese governance system have mixed effects on the corporate performance.

The corporate governance literature generally assumes that shareholders incentives to monitor management depend on how much of the firm the shareholders own. This dissertation proposes that another determinant of monitoring incentive is how long large shareholders intend to hold their shares, which can be measured by the turnover rate of their shares. To test this assertion, I explore two primary issues on large shareholders, defined as outside blockholders with at least 5% ownership stake in the firm. First, I examine whether outside blockholders investment horizons vary across the firms in which they invest, and if so, what determine their investment horizons. The empirical results show that outside blockholders horizons do vary with the investee firm characteristics. The systematic association suggests that outside blockholders horizons vary in ways that reflect outside blockholders rational responses to their monitoring cost-benefit trade-offs due to investee firm characteristics. Second, I examine how outside blockholders horizons are related to the design of the investee firms CEO compensation, an alternative to direct monitoring. I find that investee firms with greater outside blockholder turnover (i.e., shorter-horizon outside blockholders) are likely to design CEO compensation with greater pay-performance sensitivity and a higher level of CEO compensation. The greater pay-performance sensitivity is primarily due to option-based incentives but not due to cash-based incentives. These results indicate that firms with shorter-horizon outside blockholders use incentive contracting more extensively to counter the potentially weaker monitoring by their outside blockholders.

In this work, I look at two competitive auction settings where a profit maximizing seller chooses auctions as a vehicle to sell to strategic bidders. In both essays, the auctioneers problem is the selection of the optimal auction format. In the first essay, the auctioneer has a single item to sell while in the second essay, there are two items. In this work, I use game theoretic methods to derive the best course of action for the buyer and use this to arrive at the best course of action for the auctioneer. In essay 1, I consider a hybrid (between English outcry and second price sealed bid) auction format where at any point in time, the identity of the highest bidder and the second highest price is known to all. I show that this format would generate higher revenues than the English outcry format if the bidders valuations are interdependent. This is because of lesser risk of overpayment and winners curse for the bidders in the hybrid auction and consequently, they are better off bidding their valuations earlier. Such behavior results in a quicker convergence of the outstanding price to the final price realized as the bidders can update their valuations with certainty. I test this claim by comparing objects auctioned in Yahoo! and eBay as eBay follows the hybrid action format while Yahoo! follows the English outcry format and do find that with interdependent object valuations revenue from the hybrid auction format is higher. In the second essay, I consider an auctioneer who has two items to sell. These could be complements or substitutes or independent products. Given a pool of strategic bidders, I investigate whether he is better off auctioning the items sequentially or as a bundle. To do so, I first solve the bidders optimization problem and use the solution to arrive at the implications for the seller. I find that with a moderate number of bidders (N>4), it is optimal to bundle strong complements only. On the other hand, I find that bundling is optimal when the number of bidders is less than four.

Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A) continue to be a popular vehicle for corporate profitability and growth. Although a rich stream of theory and research exists on M&A, there is considerable diversity in the findings and no consistent evidence validating the role of M&A in improving firm performance (e.g., Datta, Narayanan, and Pinches 1992; Haspeslagh and Jemison 1991; King et al. 2004; Ravenscaft and Scherer 1987). This apparent disconnection leaves open the possibility that a broader set of factors, beyond the constructs typically studied, may influence the outcome of M&A. Consequently, there is a recognized need for research to identify a theoretical framework that can help explain M&A performance. M&A, as a vehicle to access and integrate assets and capabilities that exist outside the firms boundaries, can be a promising field of study in marketing. Surprisingly, it has received relatively limited attention from marketing scholars. Likewise, research on M&A has been mute on related marketing issues. Against this backdrop, the central thesis of this dissertation is to adapt a marketing perspective and explore additional theories to provide insights into a new set of determinants to explain M&A performance. Within the purview of resource-based view of the firm (Barney 1991; Wernerfelt 1984), I elaborate and empirically assess the link between the resource configuration of the merging firms and M&A performance and also delineate the contingent factors that enhance or mitigate these effects. Specifically, I investigate how the strategic emphases of the merging firms facilitate merger performance. In this research, I define strategic emphasis as the relative emphasis a firm places on building either brand resources or R&D resources (Mizik and Jacobson 2003). In this process, I examine whether M&A performance is a function of similarity or complementarity in strategic emphasis between merging firms. There are conceptual and analytical arguments supportive of both resource similarity (e.g., Ansoff 1965; Hitt et al. 2001; Montgomery and Hariharan 1991) and complementarity (e.g., Harrison et al. 1991, 2001; Hoskisson and Busenitz 2002) as a positive driver of performance. The lack of a definitive answer is critical. I advance a contingency perspective based on merger motive to systematically explain the competing arguments. Much previous research has focused only on the main effect view of merger motives. I use two broad classifications: Consolidation- based M&A and Diversification- based M&A, and examine how each interacts with similarity and complementarity in the strategic emphases of the merging firms. I suggest that when there is similarity in strategic emphasis alignment, value creation is enhanced under the consolidation motive. Alternatively, for complementarity in strategic emphasis alignment, value is enhanced when the merger motive is one of diversification. I use forward-looking financial market-based measures to evaluate M&A performance. Using stock market reactions to merger announcements, I examine synergistic gains accruing to the merging firms and wealth creation for the acquiring firms. The analysis draws from M&A announcements in two different industries that took place over the 22 year period between 1980 and 2001. Empirical tests considerably support the models prediction; the findings point to the distinct role of resource configuration of merging firms, as well as to important interactions between resource configuration and motives. The findings provide practical insights into how firm-specific factors affect M&A performance. I discuss the implications of these results for research on marketings role within a firm and set a theoretical and empirical basis for future research on firm specific resources and M&A performance.

Changes in two important monitoring mechanisms - ownership structure and board structure around restructuring events are examined. To examine ownership structure I use a sample of corporate spin-offs. To examine board structure I use a sample of acquirers in the banking industry. The results of the dissertation show that public corporations self-adjust their governance around events that require such adjustment. This dissertation significantly extends the literature that suggests that monitoring mechanisms arise endogenously.

Although electronic commerce technology often reduces overall costs, it also creates a discontinuity in the order fulfillment segment of the buying process: the fulfillment process becomes a black box. This discontinuity means that the customer does not have complete information of the purchase affecting customer perceptions of the transaction. Information technology provides a variety of ways for firms to make this process more visible. Providing information about the fulfillment process is expected to increase perceived justice by reducing customer anxiety, enhancing the fairness of the transaction; and ultimately improving customer outcomes, mainly customer satisfaction, service satisfaction, word of mouth and repurchase intention. The objective of this study is to analyze the role of process visibility in mitigating this discontinuity and its impact in customer outcomes. The research method is a scenario-based experiment and factors involved are fulfillment process visibility, the presence of fulfillment problems and compensation for fulfillment problems. Also customer prior experience with online retail channels is used as a control variable. The design is a between-subjects, incomplete 2x2x2, with an unbalanced number of participants and two missing cells. The participants were 153 undergraduate business students from an American northeast university. The results show that process visibility by itself has a positive impact on customer outcomes. Compensation and online buying experience did not show a direct impact on customer outcomes. Online buying experience moderates the impact of process visibility on service satisfaction and repurchase intention. Lastly procedural justice mediates the impact of process visibility on customer outcomes. The major practical implication from this study is that process visibility should be taken in consideration in online designs. It is shown that process visibility alleviates the discontinuity introduced by computer mediation, making the customer more satisfied, and increasing customer outcomes. The major theoretical implication is that it demonstrates how and why electronic commerce is different from traditional commerce. The discontinuity will also affect other behavioral aspects of electronic commerce, like trust, perceived risk, etc; and technical aspects, like business integration, web site design, etc. This research study opens a new path to be followed by electronic commerce researchers.

This study addresses the relation between the exit of venture capital and opportunistic behavior in financial disclosure. Specifically, I examine whether the exit of venture capital is associated with income-increasing earnings management in the IPO year and financial statement restatements related to the period prior to the exit of venture capital. After controlling for the endogenous choice of exit, I document that, consistent with earnings management, the exit of venture capitalists (VCs) is significantly positively related to performance-matched discretionary accruals in the IPO year. Regardless of VCs exiting, their stockholdings prior to the expiration of the lockup period are negatively related to discretionary accruals in the IPO year. Surprisingly, VC representation on the audit committee has no significant relation with income-increasing earnings management. Restatements are less likely to happen prior to or during the period of VCs exit, and more likely to happen after VCs exiting. My results support this hypothesis. I find that the exit of venture capital right after the lockup expiration is negatively associated with the probability of announcing a restatement in the period T1, but positively associated with the probability of announcing a restatement in the period T2. More importantly, the exit of venture capital has a significant impact on the relation between VCs stockholdings and the probability of announcing a restatement prior to VCs exiting. Only for firms with VCs exiting, does VC representation on the audit committee have a significantly negative association with the probability of announcing a restatement prior to VCs exiting. Neither VCs holdings nor VCs representation on the audit committee has a significant relation with the probability of announcing a restatement after the exit of venture capital. The associations I find are robust to the usage of different instruments for the exit of venture capital, different measure for discretionary accruals, the inclusion of control variables for the intended use of proceeds, auditors characteristics and CEOs incentives to manage earnings. Finally, my results indicate that as in the case without VC exit, firms with VCs exiting have similar abnormal stock returns during the lockup period and for the period from the lockup expiration through the record date of the first proxy available thereafter. The exit of venture capital is associated with a lower likelihood of securities class action after the IPO. In addition, I find some evidence that income-increasing earnings management imposes some costs on venture capitalists, e.g., fewer new IPOs and greater underpricing for new IPOs. Overall, my findings suggest that litigation risk and reputation cost are not strong enough to restrain venture capitalists from pursuing the benefits of opportunistic behavior in financial disclosure.

In this study, I address the general research question, "What are the conditions under which stakeholders will take action against an organization?" I respond to this question by acknowledging that a stakeholder is likely to act when it is motivated to do so: accordingly I adopt two of the most well-established motivation theories, equity theory and expectancy theory, based on which I develop a framework for understanding when a stakeholder is likely to take action against the focal organization (FO). I assert that stakeholders are likely to take action against the FO when they perceive underreward inequity in their relationship with the FO, and when they have high expectancies that they can successfully take action in order to remedy that inequity. To test hypotheses derived from this framework I develop an experiment wherein subjects peruse two vignettes, each concerning a specific stakeholder-FO relationship, and respond to various questions concerning the likelihood that they would engage in various actions. Results provide support for the idea that both stakeholder perceptions of the degree of equity (or inequity) in their relationship with the FO and their expectancies that they can successfully engage in action that will result in valued outcomes affect stakeholders' propensities to take action against the FO. Other results indicate that overrewarded stakeholders may be more likely than others to engage in behaviors that help the FO. Results concerning the impact of equity sensitivity on stakeholder propensities to engage in action either detrimental to or supportive of the FO were mixed.

This dissertation examines consumer response to one aspect of logo redesign: shape. Relatively little research has focused exclusively on logos and even less attention has been given to logo redesign. Reaction to change in logo shape is hypothesized to be a function of the degree of change (from incremental to considerable) and the level of commitment (from strong to weak) a consumer has towards the underlying brand. Consumers who are strongly committed to a brand will more negatively evaluate redesigned logos and have more negative attitude toward the brand. Conversely, consumers less committed to a brand will more positively evaluate redesigned logos and have more positive attitude toward the brand. Four experimental studies are discussed. The first three studies used athletic shoe logos as stimuli. The fourth study extended generalizability by replicating the effects of Study Three with bottled water brands and considered a number of mediating variables. Results fully support the concept of brand commitment moderating logo evaluation and change in brand attitude. The mediating variables were found to not influence the main effect of brand commitment on logo evaluation and change in brand attitude.