IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/pra/mprapa/13155.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Effect of Corporate Break-ups on Information Asymmetry: A Market Microstructure Analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Bardong, Florian
  • Bartram, Söhnke M.
  • Yadav, Pradeep K.

Abstract

This paper investigates the information environment during and after a corporate break-up utilizing direct measures of information asymmetry developed in the market microstructure literature. The analysis is based on all corporate break-ups in the United States in the period 1995-2005. The results document that information asymmetry declines significantly as a result of a break-up. However, this reduction takes place not at the time of its announcement or its completion, but after it has been fully consummated. At the same time, not all investors are equally affected, but informed investors who generate private information by skilled analysis of public information come to play a more important role compared to traditional corporate insiders. This might explain why financial advisors promote break-ups among their corporate clients, as they are likely beneficiaries. The positive stock-market reaction to break-up announcements is significantly related to reductions in insider-related information asymmetry, indicating that the advantage of skilled information analysts does not offset the overall improvement in the information environment due to a break-up.

Suggested Citation

  • Bardong, Florian & Bartram, Söhnke M. & Yadav, Pradeep K., 2006. "The Effect of Corporate Break-ups on Information Asymmetry: A Market Microstructure Analysis," MPRA Paper 13155, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 26 Oct 2008.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:13155
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/13155/1/MPRA_paper_13155.pdf
    File Function: original version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Scholes, Myron & Williams, Joseph, 1977. "Estimating betas from nonsynchronous data," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 5(3), pages 309-327, December.
    2. Hasbrouck, Joel, 1991. "Measuring the Information Content of Stock Trades," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(1), pages 179-207, March.
    3. David Easley & Soeren Hvidkjaer & Maureen O'Hara, 2002. "Is Information Risk a Determinant of Asset Returns?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(5), pages 2185-2221, October.
    4. Karl B. Diether & Christopher J. Malloy & Anna Scherbina, 2002. "Differences of Opinion and the Cross Section of Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(5), pages 2113-2141, October.
    5. Grossman, Sanford J & Stiglitz, Joseph E, 1980. "On the Impossibility of Informationally Efficient Markets," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 70(3), pages 393-408, June.
    6. Huang, Roger D. & Stoll, Hans R., 1996. "Dealer versus auction markets: A paired comparison of execution costs on NASDAQ and the NYSE," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(3), pages 313-357, July.
    7. Habib, Michel A. & Johnsen, D. Bruce & Naik, Narayan Y., 1997. "Spinoffs and Information," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 6(2), pages 153-176, April.
    8. Easley, David & O'Hara, Maureen & Paperman, Joseph, 1998. "Financial analysts and information-based trade," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 1(2), pages 175-201, August.
    9. Madrigal, Vicente, 1996. "Non-fundamental Speculation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 51(2), pages 553-578, June.
    10. D'Avolio, Gene, 2002. "The market for borrowing stock," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2-3), pages 271-306.
    11. Lee, Charles M C & Shleifer, Andrei & Thaler, Richard H, 1991. "Investor Sentiment and the Closed-End Fund Puzzle," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(1), pages 75-109, March.
    12. Dlugosz, Jennifer & Fahlenbrach, Rudiger & Gompers, Paul & Metrick, Andrew, 2006. "Large blocks of stock: Prevalence, size, and measurement," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 12(3), pages 594-618, June.
    13. Maug, Ernst, 2002. "Insider trading legislation and corporate governance," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 46(9), pages 1569-1597, October.
    14. Glosten, Lawrence R. & Milgrom, Paul R., 1985. "Bid, ask and transaction prices in a specialist market with heterogeneously informed traders," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(1), pages 71-100, March.
    15. Admati, Anat R & Pfleiderer, Paul, 2000. "Forcing Firms to Talk: Financial Disclosure Regulation and Externalities," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 13(3), pages 479-519.
    16. Rafael La Porta & Florencio Lopez‐De‐Silanes & Andrei Shleifer & Robert Vishny, 2002. "Investor Protection and Corporate Valuation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(3), pages 1147-1170, June.
    17. Easley, David & Hvidkjaer, Soeren & O’Hara, Maureen, 2010. "Factoring Information into Returns," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 45(2), pages 293-309, April.
    18. Lakonishok, Josef & Lee, Inmoo, 2001. "Are Insider Trades Informative?," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 14(1), pages 79-111.
    19. Lee, Charles M C & Ready, Mark J, 1991. "Inferring Trade Direction from Intraday Data," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(2), pages 733-746, June.
    20. Lease, Ronald C & Masulis, Ronald W & Page, John R, 1991. "An Investigation of Market Microstructure Impacts on Event Study Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(4), pages 1523-1536, September.
    21. Leslie Boni & J. Chris Leach, 2002. "Supply contraction and trading protocol: an examination of recent changes in the U.S. Treasury market," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, pages 740-766.
    22. Davidson, Russell & MacKinnon, James G., 1993. "Estimation and Inference in Econometrics," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780195060119.
    23. Chordia, Tarun & Roll, Richard & Subrahmanyam, Avanidhar, 2000. "Commonality in liquidity," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(1), pages 3-28, April.
    24. Hasbrouck, Joel, 1991. "The Summary Informativeness of Stock Trades: An Econometric Analysis," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 4(3), pages 571-595.
    25. Bhushan, Ravi, 1989. "Collection of information about publicly traded firms : Theory and evidence," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 11(2-3), pages 183-206, July.
    26. Subrahmanyam, Avanidhar, 1991. "A Theory of Trading in Stock Index Futures," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 4(1), pages 17-51.
    27. Vijh, Anand M, 1994. "The Spinoff and Merger Ex-date Effects," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 49(2), pages 581-609, June.
    28. Kyle, Albert S, 1985. "Continuous Auctions and Insider Trading," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 53(6), pages 1315-1335, November.
    29. Bessembinder, Hendrik & Kaufman, Herbert M., 1997. "A cross-exchange comparison of execution costs and information flow for NYSE-listed stocks," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(3), pages 293-319, December.
    30. repec:bla:jfinan:v:59:y:2004:i:4:p:1553-1583 is not listed on IDEAS
    31. Huson, Mark R. & MacKinnon, Gregory, 2003. "Corporate spinoffs and information asymmetry between investors," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 9(4), pages 481-503, September.
    32. Cusatis, Patrick J. & Miles, James A. & Woolridge, J. Randall, 1993. "Restructuring through spinoffs*1: The stock market evidence," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(3), pages 293-311, June.
    33. Krishna Palepu, 1985. "Diversification strategy, profit performance and the entropy measure," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 6(3), pages 239-255, July.
    34. Daley, Lane & Mehrotra, Vikas & Sivakumar, Ranjini, 1997. "Corporate focus and value creation Evidence from spinoffs," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(2), pages 257-281, August.
    35. Admati, Anat R, 1985. "A Noisy Rational Expectations Equilibrium for Multi-asset Securities Markets," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 53(3), pages 629-657, May.
    36. Hasbrouck, Joel & Seppi, Duane J., 2001. "Common factors in prices, order flows, and liquidity," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(3), pages 383-411, March.
    37. Parrino, Robert, 1997. "Spinoffs and wealth transfers: The Marriott case," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(2), pages 241-274, February.
    38. Gordon M Phillips & Vojislav Maksimovic, 1999. "Do Conglomerate Firms Allocate Resources Inefficiently?," Working Papers 99-11, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    39. Krishnaswami, Sudha & Subramaniam, Venkat, 1999. "Information asymmetry, valuation, and the corporate spin-off decision," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(1), pages 73-112, July.
    40. Glosten, Lawrence R. & Harris, Lawrence E., 1988. "Estimating the components of the bid/ask spread," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(1), pages 123-142, May.
    41. Chris Veld & Yulia V. Veld‐Merkoulova, 2008. "An Empirical Analysis of the Stockholder‐Bondholder Conflict in Corporate Spin‐Offs," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 37(1), pages 103-124, March.
    42. Hasabrouck, Joel & Sofianos, George, 1993. "The Trades of Market Makers: An Empirical Analysis of NYSE Specialists," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 48(5), pages 1565-1593, December.
    43. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1997. "Industry costs of equity," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(2), pages 153-193, February.
    44. Bhushan, Ravi, 1989. "Firm characteristics and analyst following," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 11(2-3), pages 255-274, July.
    45. Stuart C. Gilson & Paul M. Healy & Christopher F. Noe & Krishna G. Palepu, 2001. "Analyst Specialization and Conglomerate Stock Breakups," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 39(3), pages 565-582, December.
    46. Robert Gertner & Eric Powers & David Scharfstein, 2002. "Learning about Internal Capital Markets from Corporate Spin‐offs," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(6), pages 2479-2506, December.
    47. Venkatesh, P C & Chiang, R, 1986. "Information Asymmetry and the Dealer's Bid-Ask Spread: A Case Study of Earnings and Dividend Announcements," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 41(5), pages 1089-1102, December.
    48. David S. Scharfstein, 1998. "The Dark Side of Internal Capital Markets II: Evidence from Diversified Conglomerates," NBER Working Papers 6352, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    49. Ross Levine & Sergio L. Schmukler, 2006. "Internationalization and Stock Market Liquidity," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 10(1), pages 153-187.
    50. Sattar A. Mansi & David M. Reeb, 2002. "Corporate Diversification: What Gets Discounted?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(5), pages 2167-2183, October.
    51. Fishe, Raymond P. H. & Robe, Michel A., 2004. "The impact of illegal insider trading in dealer and specialist markets: evidence from a natural experiment," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(3), pages 461-488, March.
    52. Brennan, Michael J. & Subrahmanyam, Avanidhar, 1995. "Investment analysis and price formation in securities markets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 361-381, July.
    53. Thomas J. Chemmanur & Imants Paeglis, 2001. "Why Issue Tracking Stock? Insights From A Comparison With Spin‐Offs And Carve‐Outs," Journal of Applied Corporate Finance, Morgan Stanley, vol. 14(2), pages 102-114, June.
    54. Desai, Hemang & Jain, Prem C., 1999. "Firm performance and focus: long-run stock market performance following spinoffs," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(1), pages 75-101, October.
    55. Jeffery S. Abarbanell & Brian J. Bushee & Jana Smith Raedy, 2003. "Institutional Investor Preferences and Price Pressure: The Case of Corporate Spin-Offs," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 76(2), pages 233-262, April.
    56. Brennan, Michael J & Jegadeesh, Narasimhan & Swaminathan, Bhaskaran, 1993. "Investment Analysis and the Adjustment of Stock Prices to Common Information," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 6(4), pages 799-824.
    57. Krishnaswami, Sudha & Spindt, Paul A. & Subramaniam, Venkat, 1999. "Information asymmetry, monitoring, and the placement structure of corporate debt," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(3), pages 407-434, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Bardong, Florian & Bartram, Söhnke M. & Yadav, Pradeep K., 2005. "Informed Trading, Information Asymmetry and Pricing of Information Risk: Empirical Evidence from the NYSE," MPRA Paper 13586, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 10 Oct 2008.
    2. Bardong, Florian & Bartram, Söhnke M. & Yadav, Pradeep K., 2007. "Are Short-sellers Different?," MPRA Paper 13585, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 16 Nov 2008.
    3. Jagjeev Dosanjh, 2017. "Exchange Initiatives and Market Efficiency: Evidence from the Australian Securities Exchange," PhD Thesis, Finance Discipline Group, UTS Business School, University of Technology, Sydney, number 1-2017, January-A.
    4. Chemmanur, Thomas J. & Liu, Mark H., 2011. "Institutional trading, information production, and the choice between spin-offs, carve-outs, and tracking stock issues," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 17(1), pages 62-82, February.
    5. repec:uts:finphd:34 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Ledenyov, Dimitri O. & Ledenyov, Viktor O., 2015. "Wave function method to forecast foreign currencies exchange rates at ultra high frequency electronic trading in foreign currencies exchange markets," MPRA Paper 67470, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Craig W. Holden & Stacey Jacobsen & Avanidhar Subrahmanyam, 2014. "The Empirical Analysis of Liquidity," Foundations and Trends(R) in Finance, now publishers, vol. 8(4), pages 263-365, December.
    8. Huson, Mark R. & MacKinnon, Gregory, 2003. "Corporate spinoffs and information asymmetry between investors," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 9(4), pages 481-503, September.
    9. Lamoureux, Christopher G. & Wang, Qin, 2015. "Measuring private information in a specialist market," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 92-119.
    10. Vayanos, Dimitri & Wang, Jiang, 2013. "Market Liquidity—Theory and Empirical Evidence ," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, in: G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Finance, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 1289-1361, Elsevier.
    11. Clarke, Jonathan E. & Fee, C. Edward & Thomas, Shawn, 2004. "Corporate diversification and asymmetric information: evidence from stock market trading characteristics," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 10(1), pages 105-129, January.
    12. Pascual, Roberto, 2000. "Adverse selection costs, trading activity and liquidity in the NYSE: an empirical analysis in a dynamic context," UC3M Working papers. Economics 7276, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Departamento de Economía.
    13. Gregory Bauer & Clara Vega, 2004. "The Monetary Origins of Asymmetric Information in International Equity Markets," Staff Working Papers 04-47, Bank of Canada.
    14. Gregory Connor & Lisa R. Goldberg & Robert A. Korajczyk, 2010. "Portfolio Risk Analysis," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 9224.
    15. A. Can Inci & Biao Lu & H. Nejat Seyhun, 2010. "Intraday Behavior of Stock Prices and Trades around Insider Trading," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 39(1), pages 323-363, March.
    16. Dmitri Boreiko & Maurizio Murgia, 2013. "European spin-offs Origin, value creation, and long-term performance," BEMPS - Bozen Economics & Management Paper Series BEMPS05, Faculty of Economics and Management at the Free University of Bozen.
    17. Lipson, Marc L. & Mortal, Sandra, 2007. "Liquidity and firm characteristics: Evidence from mergers and acquisitions," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 10(4), pages 342-361, November.
    18. Flannery, Mark J. & Kwan, Simon H. & Nimalendran, M., 2004. "Market evidence on the opaqueness of banking firms' assets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(3), pages 419-460, March.
    19. Murphy Jun Jie Lee, 2013. "The Microstructure of Trading Processes on the Singapore Exchange," PhD Thesis, Finance Discipline Group, UTS Business School, University of Technology, Sydney, number 4, July-Dece.
    20. Neal, Robert & Wheatley, Simon M., 1998. "Adverse selection and bid-ask spreads: Evidence from closed-end funds," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 1(1), pages 121-149, April.
    21. Pascual, Roberto, 2000. "Dynamic asymmetries in bid-ask responses to innovations in the trading process," UC3M Working papers. Economics 7271, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Departamento de Economía.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Spin-off; Divestiture; Information asymmetry;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading
    • G34 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Mergers; Acquisitions; Restructuring; Corporate Governance

    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:pra:mprapa:13155. 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: Joachim Winter (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfmunde.html .

    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.