This study examines the impact of reducing tick size and, in particular decimalization on stock splits. Based on previous studies, this study examines hypotheses in the following three areas: first, market reaction around stock split announcement and ex-dates, second, the effect of tick size on liquidity after stock split ex-dates, and third, the effect of tick size on return volatility after stock split ex-dates. The impact of tick size on market reaction around split announcement and ex-dates is measured by abnormal returns and buy and hold abnormal returns (BHARs). Also, this study investigates the long term impact of decimalization on market reaction for small, medium, and large firms for the three different tick size periods. The effect of tick size on liquidity after stock split ex-dates is measured by turnover, relative bid ask spread, and market maker count. The effect of tick size on return volatility around stock split announcement and ex-dates is measured by return standard deviation. Also, this study investigates the long term impact of decimalization on volatility after split ex-dates for small, medium, and large firms for three different tick size periods.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of the "limits of arbitrage" on securities mispricing. Specifically, I investigate the effect of the availability of substitutes and financial constraints on stock mispricing. In addition, this study investigates the difference in the limits of arbitrage, in the sense that it will lead to lower mispricing for these stocks, relative to non-S&P 500 stocks. I also examine if the lower mispricing can be attributed to their lower limits of arbitrage. Modern finance theory and efficient market hypothesis suggest that security prices, at equilibrium, should reflect their fundamental value. If the market price deviates from the intrinsic value, then a risk-free profit opportunity has emerged and arbitrageurs will eliminate mispricing and equilibrium is restored. This arbitrage process is characterized by large number of arbitrageurs which have infinite access to capital. However, a better description of reality is that there are few numbers of arbitrageurs to the extent that they are highly specialized; and they have limited access to capital. Under these condition arbitrage is no more a risk-free activity and can be limited by several factors such as arbitrage risk and transaction costs. Other factors that are discussed in the literature …

Issuers’ credit ratings change by one or more notches when credit rating agencies provide new ratings. Unique to the literature, I study the influences affecting multi notch versus single notch rating upgrades and downgrades. For Standard & Poors data, I show that rating changes with multiple notches provide more information to the market than single notch rating changes. Consistent with prior literature on the business cycle, I show that investors value good news rating changes (upgrades) more in bad times (recession) and that investors value bad news rating changes (downgrades) more in good times (expansion). I model and test probit models using variables capturing the characteristics of the previous issuer’s credit rating, liquidity, solvency, profitability, and growth opportunity to determine the classification of single notch versus multi notch rating changes. The determinants of multi notch versus single notch rating changes for upgrades and downgrades differ. Business cycle influences are evident. Firms that have multi notch rating upgrades and downgrades have significantly different probit variables vis-à-vis firms that have single notch rating upgrades and downgrades. The important characteristics for determining multiple notch upgrades are a firm’s prior rating change, prior rating, cash flow, total assets and market value. The important characteristics …

Do firms with higher levels of innovation output, measured by patent counts and citations, enjoy lower costs of funds? The process to develop and apply for patents involves valuable resources. Thus, applying for a patent is a credible signal that the underlying invention is valuable. This value is validated to some degree when the patent is granted. In addition, patents contain detailed information about the firm's inventions and provide collateral value as they can be sold and licensed. The number of citations a firm receives act as a proxy for high-quality inventions, active networking, and pioneering. These attributes are expected to attract investors and reduce the cost of funds. Univariate and cross-sectional regression analyses of a sample consisting of 404,595 firm-years, involving firms from twenty-eight countries spanning from 1976 to 2012, demonstrate a significant negative association between innovation output and the cost of funds. The evidence suggests that the marginal benefit of innovation diminishes as innovation output increases. The results are robust to different measures of the cost of equity and the cost of debt. The negative association between the cost of equity and innovation output is economically larger for younger and smaller firms. The long-term level of innovation seems …

Several studies have observed that stocks tend to drop by an amount that is less than the dividend on the ex-dividend day, the so-called ex-dividend day anomaly. However, there still remains a lack of consensus for a single explanation of this anomaly. Different from other studies, this dissertation attempts to answer the primary research question: How can investors make trading profits from the ex-dividend day anomaly and how much can they earn? With this goal, I examine the economic motivations of equity investors through four main hypotheses identified in the anomaly’s literature: the tax differential hypothesis, the short-term trading hypothesis, the tick size hypothesis, and the leverage hypothesis. While the U.S. ex-dividend anomaly is well studied, I examine a long data window (1975 to 2010) of Thailand data. The unique structure of the Thai stock market allows me to assess all four main hypotheses proposed in the literature simultaneously. Although I extract the sample data from two data sources, I demonstrate that the combined data are consistently sampled. I further construct three trading strategies: “daily return,” “lag one daily return,” and “weekly return” to alleviate the potential effect of irregular data observation. I find that the ex-dividend day anomaly exists …

Midwest Independent Transmission System Operator, Inc. (MISO) is a non-profit regional transmission organization (RTO) that oversees electricity production and transmission across thirteen states and one Canadian province. MISO also operates an electronic exchange for buying and selling electricity for each of its five regional hubs. MISO oversees two types of markets. The forward market, which is referred to as the day-ahead (DA) market, allows market participants to place demand bids and supply offers on electricity to be delivered at a specified hour the following day. The equilibrium price, known as the locational marginal price (LMP), is determined by MISO after receiving sale offers and purchase bids from market participants. MISO also coordinates a spot market, which is known as the real-time (RT) market. Traders in the real-time market must submit bids and offers by thirty minutes prior to the hour for which the trade will be executed. After receiving purchase and sale offers for a given hour in the real time market, MISO then determines the LMP for that particular hour. The existence of the DA and RT markets allows producers and retailers to hedge against the large fluctuations that are common in electricity prices. Hedge ratios on the MISO …

During the Great Recession of 2007 and 2008, liquidity and credit dried up, threatening the stability of financial institutions, particularly the banking firms. Traditional source of funds from the last resort, the Discount Window of the Federal Reserve System, failed to remedy the liquidity problem. To assuage the liquidity and credit problem, the Federal Reserve System established several emergency lending facilities and provided unprecedented amount of loans to the banking industry. Using a dataset published by Bloomberg LLP in the aftermaths of the financial crisis, which contains daily loan balances from the Fed, I conduct an event study to test whether financial markets are efficient in reflecting all public, anticipated and classified information in security prices. The most important contribution of this dissertation to the finance discipline and literature is the investigation and analysis of the Fed’s unprecedented loans to the banking industry during the Great Recession and the market reaction to it. The second major contribution of this study is the empirical test of strong form efficient market hypothesis, which has not been feasible due to legal data challenges. This dissertation has other contributions to the finance discipline and banking research. First, I develop an algorithm for measuring the …