Capital Structure and the Ex‐Dividend Day Return

Dan W. French, Paula L. Varson and Kenneth P. Moon

The Financial Review, 2005, vol. 40, issue 3, 361-379

Abstract: We apply an option‐pricing framework to the ex‐dividend behavior of common stocks. The framework explains the observed behavior of positive returns on the ex‐dividend day and predicts that ex‐dividend day returns will be higher for firms with greater financial leverage. Empirical testing supports the prediction. In contrast to prior studies, we find that dividend‐capture activity has no significant impact on ex‐dividend behavior, and we offer an explanation based on the importance of tick intervals.

Date: 2005
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6288.2005.00106.x

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:finrev:v:40:y:2005:i:3:p:361-379

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=0732-8516

Access Statistics for this article

The Financial Review is currently edited by Cynthia J. Campbell and Arnold R. Cowan

More articles in The Financial Review from Eastern Finance Association Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().