Exchange Offers and Stock Swaps - New Evidence

Thomas E. Copeland and Won Heum Lee

Financial Management, 1991, vol. 20, issue 3

Abstract: Using data from the interval 1962-1984, we compare six explanations for exchange offers and swaps. Our empirical results are most consistent with the hypothesis that exchange offers are interpreted as signals about future cash flows. We find that leverage-increasing exchange offers result in decreases in systematic risk; increases in share-adjusted earnings, sales, and total assets; and that insider stock purchases increase shortly before the public announcement. Opposite results are found for leverage-decreasing exchange offers. In addition, leverage-increasing firms are one-tenth the size of leverage-decreasing firms and are more closely held. Separate cross-sectional regressions, first with the announcement day abnormal returns and then with changes in beta as dependent variables, also are consistent with the signalling hypothesis. Other than the signalling hypothesis, tax savings is the best among the remaining competing hypotheses. However, in cross-sectional tests using announcement returns as the dependent variable, the tax effect is significantly positive for a sample of 102 leverage-decreasing events. This single piece of evidence is inconsistent with the tax savings hypothesis.

Date: 1991
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

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:fma:fmanag:copeland91

Access Statistics for this article

Financial Management is currently edited by Bill Christie

More articles in Financial Management from Financial Management Association University of South Florida 4202 E. Fowler Ave. COBA #3331 Tampa, FL 33620. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Courtney Connors ( this e-mail address is bad, please contact ).