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Corporate Twitter use and cost of equity capital

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  • Al Guindy, Mohamed

Abstract

This paper investigates whether firms that communicate information on social media have a lower cost of equity capital. Using a hand-collected dataset comprising the full universe of all firms listed on the NYSE, AMEX and NASDAQ since the inception of Twitter, I show that firms that use Twitter have a lower cost of equity capital. Furthermore, firms that face the greatest information asymmetries; namely, smaller companies, companies with few analyst followings, and companies with the least institutional holdings, benefit particularly from tweeting financial information. For identification, I employ a difference-in-difference analysis based on the staggered adoption of Twitter, and a propensity score match (PSM) of tweeting and non-tweeting firms.

Suggested Citation

  • Al Guindy, Mohamed, 2021. "Corporate Twitter use and cost of equity capital," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:corfin:v:68:y:2021:i:c:s092911992100047x
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jcorpfin.2021.101926
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    3. Gopalakrishnan, Balagopal & Jacob, Joshy & Srivastava, Jagriti, 2022. "Fishing in muddy waters: Mergers and acquisitions during uncertainty," IIMA Working Papers WP 2022-09-02, Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, Research and Publication Department.
    4. Christophe J. GODLEWSKI & Katarzyna BYRKA-KITA & Renata GOLA & Jacek CYPRYJANSKI, 2022. "Silence is not golden anymore? Social media activity and stock market valuation in Europe," Working Papers of LaRGE Research Center 2022-04, Laboratoire de Recherche en Gestion et Economie (LaRGE), Université de Strasbourg.
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Social media; Twitter; Information asymmetry; Cost of capital; Disclosure; Textual analysis;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading
    • G30 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - General

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