Most initial public offerings (IPOs) feature share lockup agreements, which prohibit insiders from selling their shares for a specified period of time following the IPO. However, some IPO firms agree to have a much longer lockup period than other IPO firms, and some are willing to lockup a much larger proportion of shares. Thus, the primary research question for this study is: "What are the reasons for the divergence of the lockup agreements?" The two main hypotheses that this dissertation investigates are the signaling hypothesis based on information asymmetry, and the commitment hypothesis based on agency theory. This study uses methods that have not been applied by previous studies in the literature relating to IPO lockups. First, I directly use IPO firms operating performance as a proxy for firm quality. The results show neither a negative nor a strong positive relationship between lockup length and firm operating performance. Thus, based on operating performance, the evidence does not support the agency hypothesis while showing weak support for the signaling hypothesis. I then examine the long-run returns for IPO firms with different lockup lengths. I find that firms with short lockup lengths have much better long-run returns than firms with long lockup lengths. Therefore, the results reject the signaling hypothesis while supporting the agency hypothesis. This dissertation further contributes to the IPO long-run underperformance literature by showing that firms with a high agency problem have much worse long-run returns than those with a low agency problem. Finally, I investigate the short-term stock returns around lockup expiry. Generally, I find that firms with short lockup periods experience better stock returns around lockup expiry than firms with long lockup periods, though the returns are not significantly different from one another. Overall, I conclude that the results reject the signaling hypothesis while partially supporting the agency hypothesis. In addition, I show that firms with high agency problems have much worse stock returns than those with low agency problems around lockup expiry, even though the agency variable is not significant in the regression analysis.

This study investigated the impact of the levels of liquidity of Initial Public Offering (IPO) stocks on the long-run performance of IPOs over a five year period. In addition the study sought to investigate if the levels of liquidity of IPO stock were significantly higher than non-IPO stock. The methodology used was the calendar time portfolio approach based on the Fama-French regression equation. The study found that over a five year period IPOs did not underperform or over-perform the market. In addition the study found that the liquidity levels of IPOs were not significantly higher than non-IPOs. While the lower liquidity levels help explain the fact that the IPOs did not underperform the market, they do not indicate the existence of a liquidity risk premium on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE). / Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2011. / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / unrestricted

Jahoda, J. Kofola ČeskoSlovensko, a.s., Fundamental analysis. Diploma thesis. Mendel university in Brno, 2017. Diploma thesis deals with the buy-side fundamental analysis of the publicly traded company. The analysis is followed by a top-down approach. First, macroeconomic factors that affect the intrinsic value of the stock are analyzed. Then industry and company factors are analyzed. The result of the thesis is the determination of the intrinsic value of the stock and its comparison with the current market price on the stock exchange. Further, the verification of the underpricing that occurred at the primary issue of the stocks on the stock market. Subsequently, there is made the investment recommendation with an annual horizon.

In this study, we conducted an event study of 100 Brazilian IPO’s from 2004 to 2010 to detect if there was any significant abnormal returns after the expiration of the IPO lockup period, during which pre-IPO shareholders are prevented from selling their shares. We found no significant abnormal returns for all companies during all event dates examined, though we did detect significant negative abnormal returns around lockup for high- volatility firms. We also find that after the lockup expiration, there is a higher frequency of days with a higher-than-average trading volume.

The market of IPOs experienced its strongest year in over 20 years where 422 IPOs were conducted in Europe. Due to the complex nature of the IPO process, the phenomenon of underpricing can occur. Underpricing can be explained as the positive percentage change of the offer price and the first trading day closing price. This phenomenon is associated with asymmetric information, when one party has more information than the other. Based on previous studies, the existence of ESG tends to reduce asymmetric information and possibly underpricing. ESG is an important factor that companies are taking into consideration when reviewing their business strategy. Besides that, the public sees ESG as a frontier for changing how we fight global problems. This study used ESG scores of companies in Europe that conducted an IPO between 2011-2021 to explain the relationship between ESG scores and underpricing. To thoroughly explain underpricing, this research included industry affiliation and the year the IPO was issued. This is a quantitative study that used a multiple linear regression model, which helps to see the effect between the dependent and independent variables. The findings showed that the ESG score did not affect the level of underpricing in the observed sample. Thus, the market does not take into consideration the ESG score as an important variable when pricing an IPO.

Syfte: Syftet med studien är att studera i vilken utsträckning teknikbolagen på den svenska marknaden är underprissatta och om aktiekurserna avviker mot teknikindex under de tidiga stadierna av börsintroduktionen. Metod: Deduktiv metod. Teoretiskt perspektiv: Tidigare forskning finner att teknikbranschen oftare utsätts för underprissättning än andra branscher eftersom teknikbranschen anses mer riskutsatt. Bland institutionella investerare anses teknikbolagen vara en större riskpå grund av att de har mer instabila kassaflöden och färre likvida tillgångar. Forskningen visar vidare att teknikbolagen presterade bättre på längre sikt än övriga branscher och sämre på kort sikt än övriga branscher. Empiri: Studien omfattar 100 teknikbolag och 98 bolag från de övriga branscherna inom marknaderna Large cap, Mid cap, Small cap, First North, First North Premieroch Spotlight. SX10PI används som benchmark-index i studien. Slutsats: Den studie som här har genomförts ger stöd för den uppfattning som har tidigare forskning pekar på, nämligen att teknikbolag är underprissatta. Studien visade även att teknikbranschen hade avvikande aktiekurser jämfört med andra branscher och branschindex.

This thesis examines the performance of IPO firms in the Swedish markets during their first three years of trading to investigate what effects different factors have on the short- and long-term performance. The level of underpricing on Swedish IPOs are also investigated to detect any abnormalities from previous studies on larger markets in the US and Europe. A total of 175 IPO firms included in the sample in the period between 2000 and 2015. The method used to calculate the aftermarket performance is the buy-and-hold abnormal returns method in an event-time portfolio approach. These returns are used as a dependent variable in a multivariable linear regression analysis. The main findings from this study are that IPO firms in the Swedish markets underperform the OMX market index one month and three years after the offering. Conversely, IPO firms in the Swedish markets overperform after 18 months compared to the OMX market index. The results show that Swedish IPOs are on average underpriced and that underpricing has a significant effect on short-term performance. Firm age, offer size and the technology industry also have a significant effect on the first month’s performance of IPO firms; however, there is little support for these factors to affect the longterm performance.

The pricing of Initial Public Offerings (IPOs) is an area of interest to practitioners and academics alike given the empirical regularity of investors in IPOs making very large first day returns. These first day returns are as a result of share underpricing. Academics have explained the underpricing phenomenon in terms of ex ante uncertainty, namely the risk of pricing, off take and issuing of such shares. In an attempt to predict the degree of the phenomenon much work has been done in linking underpricing to company, issue and market related factors that are known prior to the listing (ex ante as opposed to ex post information). In the case of junior mining companies, underpricing is exacerbated by a lack of financial information making these issues difficult to value since such unseasoned companies have no past earnings history on which to base predictions of future earnings. Given this context, this study identified relevant factors from secondary sources which could be used to proxy the level of ex ante uncertainty and therefore correlate with the degree of underpricing. The analysis firstly sought to ensure that underpricing exists for the issues, market and time period of interest. Secondly the presence of a “hot issue” period (Ritter, 1984), which is exclusive to the natural resources sector, was investigated. Finally the relationship between underpricing and the relevant factors was explored using hypothesis testing about means and regression analysis. It was found that underpricing does indeed exist for junior mining listings on the Toronto Venture Exchange (TSX-V) between 2005-2007. This said no evidence of the “hot issue” period could be found. In terms of linking company, issue and market related factors to the degree of underpricing this study failed to identify any significant predictors. It is argued that junior mining listings on the TSX-V may be a special case since some of these factors have successfully been used, by other researchers, to predict the degree of underpricing of mining IPOs. The fact that junior mining IPO’s listed on the TSX-V show a constant degree of underpricing over time implies that investors do not build market specific factors (market sentiment and commodity price) into the listing price. Rather investors seem to demand a constant degree of underpricing regardless of the market situation to compensate them for the “unknown” exploration risk. / Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2011. / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / unrestricted

Problemformulering 1: Vilken risk-justerad överavkastning på lång sikt ger investeringar i IPO? Problemformulering 2: Vilken av de valda tidshorisonterna som investeringsstrategi genererar den högsta avkastningen när man investerar i IPO:s? Syfte: Syftet med studien är att studera huruvida det går att generera en överavkastning på lång sikt genom att investera i IPO:s, vidare är syftet med studien att ge investeraren ett bättre beslutsunderlag gällande vilken tidshorisont som är mest lönsam när man investerar i IPO: s. Teori: Den teori som denna studie baseras på är den effektiva marknadshypotesen som menar att det inte är möjligt att generera en överavkastning på aktiemarknaden. Detta eftersom all tillgänglig information är inprisad i kursen. Vidare menar EMH att alla investerare är rationella och att alla har samma tillgång till information och att informationen värderas lika av alla investerare. Kritik av EMH diskuteras också. Vi har anledning att ifrågasätta denna teori. Forsättningsvis behandlar vi teorin om informationsasymmetrin och signaleringshypotesen vilket innebär att det finns en skillnad i den information som säljaren och köparen har samt att i detta fall säljaren kan signalera hur bra ett företag genom olika ageranden, respektive. Metod: Metoden för studien består i en kvantitativ metod. Urvalet efter bortfall är 248 IPO:s som har noterats på stockholmsbörsens Small, -Mid & Large Cap listor samt på First North mellan 2008– 2019. Beräkningen av avkastningarna för portföljerna och den eventuella över eller underavkastningen kommer ske genom att beräkna den faktiska avkastningen, buy hold abnormal return samt Cumulative abnormal returns. Resultat & analys: Resultatet från studien är att det går att generera överavkastning på kort sikt jämfört med jämförelseindexet. Det går däremot inte med säkerhet att säkerställa att IPO:s underavkastar på medellång och lång sikt. Vi kan med statistik säkerhet säga att det inte går att generera överavkastningar under livslängden för en IPO mellan 2008–2019. Jämförelsen mellan portföljerna visar att den högsta årliga avkastningen ges genom att investera i börsnoteringar på kort sikt, i vårt fall med en tidshorisont på tre månader. Sämst avkastning har evighetsportföljen. Slutsats: Problemformulering 1 Vilken risk-justerad överavkastning på lång sikt ger investeringar i IPO? – IPO:s på den svenska marknaden har en underprestation jämfört med det valda jämförelseindexetm Six Return Index. Problemformulering 2: Vilken av de valda tidshorisonterna som investeringsstrategi genererar den högsta avkastningen när man investerar i IPO:s? – Investeringsstrategin med en tremånaders tidshorisont ger den högsta avkastningen.

When a company decides to sell their shares to the public for the first time it is called an initial public offering. For quite some time, the literature on the subject has come to the conclusion that the companies going public often undervalue their share price prior to the initial public offering resulting in an abnormal positive return on the first trading day, also known as initial public offering underpricing.  This thesis aims to study whether initial public offering underpricing occurred in the Swedish markets during the selected time period of 2000-2022. The thesis also seeked to find whether there was a significant difference in underpricing depending if the company was listed on OMX Stockholm or First north growth market. Further, with the help of previous research on the topic, a few independent variables were retrieved and later regressed against the initial return on the first trading day and thus seeing if these variables explains if a company will see an increase in the share price on the first trading day or not. The independent variables collected were age of the company at the time of the initial public offering, deal size, the market the company was listed on and lastly the year the company was listed on the stock exchange. The study concluded that there was a significant underpricing in Swedish initial public offerings during the studied time period with an average first day initial return of 12.56%. However, the thesis further concluded that neither of the independent variables studied had a significant effect on the initial return on the first trading day. Neither could the thesis conclude that there was a significant difference in underpricing between the two studied markets, although, the sample from OMX Stockholm saw an average underpricing of 11.09% whilst first north saw an average underpricing of 13.79%.