The Journal of Finance

doi: 10.1111/j.1540-6261.2001.tb00848.xpmid: N/A

doi: 10.1111/j.1540-6261.2001.tb00847.xpmid: N/A

doi: 10.1111/j.1540-6261.2001.tb00843.xpmid: N/A

Claus, James; Thomas, Jacob

doi: 10.1111/0022-1082.00384pmid: N/A

ABSTRACT The returns earned by U.S. equities since 1926 exceed estimates derived from theory, from other periods and markets, and from surveys of institutional investors. Rather than examine historic experience, we estimate the equity premium from the discount rate that equates market valuations with prevailing expectations of future flows. The accounting flows we project are isomorphic to projected dividends but use more available information and narrow the range of reasonable growth rates. For each year between 1985 and 1998, we find that the equity premium is around three percent (or less) in the United States and five other markets.

Whited, Toni M.

doi: 10.1111/0022-1082.00385pmid: N/A

ABSTRACT Diversified conglomerates are valued less than matched portfolios of pure‐play firms. Recent studies find that this diversification discount results from conglomerates' inefficient allocation of capital expenditures across divisions. Much of this work uses Tobin's q as a proxy for investment opportunities, therefore hypothesizing that q is a good proxy. This paper treats measurement error in q. Using a measurement‐error consistent estimator on the sorts regressions in the literature, I find no evidence of inefficient allocation of investment. The results in the literature appear to be artifacts of measurement error and of the correlation between investment opportunities and liquidity.

Lamont, Owen A.; Polk, Christopher

doi: 10.1111/0022-1082.00386pmid: N/A

ABSTRACT Diversified firms have different values from comparable portfolios of single‐segment firms. These value differences must be due to differences in either future cash flows or future returns. Expected security returns on diversified firms vary systematically with relative value. Discount firms have significantly higher subsequent returns than premium firms. Slightly more than half of the cross‐sectional variation in excess values is due to variation in expected future cash flows, with the remainder due to variation in expected future returns and to covariation between cash flows and returns.

Smith, Brian F.; Turnbull, D. Alasdair S.; White, Robert W.

doi: 10.1111/0022-1082.00387pmid: N/A

ABSTRACT This paper directly tests the hypothesis that upstairs intermediation lowers adverse selection cost. We find upstairs market makers effectively screen out information‐motivated orders and execute large liquidity‐motivated orders at a lower cost than the downstairs market. Upstairs markets do not cannibalize or free ride off the downstairs market. In one‐quarter of the trades, the upstairs market offers price improvement over the limit orders available in the consolidated limit order book. Trades are more likely to be executed upstairs at times when liquidity is lower in the downstairs market.

Benartzi, Shlomo

doi: 10.1111/0022-1082.00388pmid: N/A

ABSTRACT About a third of the assets in large retirement savings plans are invested in company stock, and about a quarter of the discretionary contributions are invested in company stock. From a diversification perspective, this is a dubious strategy. This paper explores the role of excessive extrapolation in employees' company stock holdings. I find that employees of firms that experienced the worst stock performance over the last 10 years allocate 10.37 percent of their discretionary contributions to company stock, whereas employees whose firms experienced the best stock performance allocate 39.70 percent. Allocations to company stock, however, do not predict future performance.

Jarrow, Robert A.; Yu, Fan

doi: 10.1111/0022-1082.00389pmid: N/A

ABSTRACT Motivated by recent financial crises in East Asia and the United States where the downfall of a small number of firms had an economy‐wide impact, this paper generalizes existing reduced‐form models to include default intensities dependent on the default of a counterparty. In this model, firms have correlated defaults due not only to an exposure to common risk factors, but also to firm‐specific risks that are termed “counterparty risks.” Numerical examples illustrate the effect of counterparty risk on the pricing of defaultable bonds and credit derivatives such as default swaps.

Ball, Clifford A.; Chordia, Tarun

doi: 10.1111/0022-1082.00390pmid: N/A

ABSTRACT Stocks and other financial assets are traded at prices that lie on a fixed grid determined by the minimum tick size. Observed prices and quoted spreads do not correspond to the equilibrium prices and true spreads that would exist in a market with no minimum tick size. Using Monte Carlo Markov Chain methods, this paper estimates the equilibrium prices and true spreads. For large stocks, most of the quoted spread is attributable to the rounding of prices and the adverse selection component is small. The true spread and the adverse selection component are greater for mid‐sized stocks.