IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/empleg/v9y2012i3p482-510.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Predicting Securities Fraud Settlements and Amounts: A Hierarchical Bayesian Model of Federal Securities Class Action Lawsuits

Author

Listed:
  • Blakeley B. McShane
  • Oliver P. Watson
  • Tom Baker
  • Sean J. Griffith

Abstract

This article develops models that predict the incidence and amount of settlements for federal class action securities fraud litigation in the post‐PLSRA period. We build hierarchical Bayesian models using data that come principally from Riskmetrics and identify several important predictors of settlement incidence (e.g., the number of different types of securities associated with a case, the company return during the class period) and settlement amount (e.g., market capitalization, measures of newsworthiness). Our models also allow us to estimate how the circuit court a case is filed in as well as the industry of the plaintiff firm associate with settlement outcomes. Finally, they allow us to accurately assess the variance of individual case outcomes revealing substantial amounts of heterogeneity in variance across cases.

Suggested Citation

  • Blakeley B. McShane & Oliver P. Watson & Tom Baker & Sean J. Griffith, 2012. "Predicting Securities Fraud Settlements and Amounts: A Hierarchical Bayesian Model of Federal Securities Class Action Lawsuits," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 9(3), pages 482-510, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:wly:empleg:v:9:y:2012:i:3:p:482-510
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1740-1461.2012.01260.x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1740-1461.2012.01260.x
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/j.1740-1461.2012.01260.x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Theodore Eisenberg & Geoffrey P. Miller, 2010. "Attorney Fees and Expenses in Class Action Settlements: 1993–2008," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 7(2), pages 248-281, June.
    2. Tom Baker, "undated". "Insurance and the Law," University of Connecticut School of Law Working Papers uconn_ucwps-1004, University of Connecticut School of Law.
    3. Stephen J. Choi, 2007. "Do the Merits Matter Less After the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act?," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 23(3), pages 598-626, October.
    4. Brian T. Fitzpatrick, 2010. "An Empirical Study of Class Action Settlements and Their Fee Awards," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 7(4), pages 811-846, December.
    5. Stephen J. Choi & Karen K. Nelson & A. C. Pritchard, 2009. "The Screening Effect of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 6(1), pages 35-68, March.
    6. A. C. Pritchard & Hillary A. Sale, 2005. "What Counts as Fraud? An Empirical Study of Motions to Dismiss Under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 2(1), pages 125-149, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Dain C. Donelson & Justin J. Hopkins, 2016. "Large Market Declines and Securities Litigation: Implications for Disclosing Adverse Earnings News," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(11), pages 3183-3198, November.
    2. Michael J Bommarito II & Daniel Martin Katz, 2016. "Measuring the temperature and diversity of the U.S. regulatory ecosystem," Papers 1612.09244, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2017.
    3. Joshua Cutler & Angela K. Davis & Kyle Peterson, 2019. "Disclosure and the outcome of securities litigation," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 24(1), pages 230-263, March.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Joshua Cutler & Angela K. Davis & Kyle Peterson, 2019. "Disclosure and the outcome of securities litigation," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 24(1), pages 230-263, March.
    2. Kim, Irene & Skinner, Douglas J., 2012. "Measuring securities litigation risk," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(1), pages 290-310.
    3. Billings, Mary Brooke & Cedergren, Matthew C., 2015. "Strategic silence, insider selling and litigation risk," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(2), pages 119-142.
    4. Allen H. Huang & Jianghua Shen & Amy Y. Zang, 2022. "The unintended benefit of the risk factor mandate of 2005," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 27(4), pages 1319-1355, December.
    5. Stephen J. Choi & Karen K. Nelson & A. C. Pritchard, 2009. "The Screening Effect of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 6(1), pages 35-68, March.
    6. Cécile Carpentier & Douglas Cumming & Jean‐Marc Suret, 2012. "The Value of Capital Market Regulation: IPOs Versus Reverse Mergers," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 9(1), pages 56-91, March.
    7. Dain C. Donelson & Justin J. Hopkins & Christopher G. Yust, 2018. "The cost of disclosure regulation: evidence from D&O insurance and nonmeritorious securities litigation," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 23(2), pages 528-588, June.
    8. Jae Hwan Ahn, 2022. "The road not taken: A comparison of Accounting and Auditing Enforcement Releases and securities class actions," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 49(9-10), pages 1489-1529, October.
    9. Dewan, Yasir, 2019. "Corporate crime and punishment : The role of status and ideology," Other publications TiSEM 08d87b94-7449-4a1f-a3ae-0, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    10. Nguyen, Nam H. & Phan, Hieu V. & Lee, Eunju, 2020. "Shareholder litigation rights and capital structure decisions," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 62(C).
    11. Clive Lennox & Bing Li, 2020. "When Are Audit Firms Sued for Financial Reporting Failures and What Are the Lawsuit Outcomes?," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 37(3), pages 1370-1399, September.
    12. Wang, Qiming & Cheng, C.S Agnes & Lian, Qin & Liu, Cathy Zishang, 2022. "Law firm market share and securities class action litigation outcomes," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 596-609.
    13. Chu, Yongqiang, 2017. "Shareholder litigation, shareholder–creditor conflict, and the cost of bank loans," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 318-332.
    14. Douglas Cumming & Na Dai, 2009. "Capital Flows and Hedge Fund Regulation," Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 6(4), pages 848-873, December.
    15. Hassan, M. Kabir & Houston, Reza & Karim, M. Sydul, 2021. "Courting innovation: The effects of litigation risk on corporate innovation," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 71(C).
    16. Xu, Wenming, 2016. "Reforming private securities litigation in China: The stock market has already cast its vote," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 23-32.
    17. Dyck, Alexander & Morse, Adair & Zingales, Luigi, 2023. "How pervasive is corporate fraud?," Working Papers 327, The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, George J. Stigler Center for the Study of the Economy and the State.
    18. Leigh Johnson, 2013. "Index Insurance and the Articulation of Risk-Bearing Subjects," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 45(11), pages 2663-2681, November.
    19. Wang, Tracy Yue & Winton, Andrew, 2021. "Industry informational interactions and corporate fraud," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 69(C).
    20. Andrea Pontiggia & Lala Hu & Marco Savorgnan, 2013. "ChinaÕs Human Resources Development: Recent Evolution and Implications for the Global Market," Working Papers 29, Department of Management, Università Ca' Foscari Venezia.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wly:empleg:v:9:y:2012:i:3:p:482-510. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://doi.org/10.1111/(ISSN)1740-1461 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.