This paper examines the choice between two rights-preserving issue methods of seasoned equity offers in the UK as well as the factors determining the offer price and stock market announcement reactions. Firstly, equity issues in the UK are underwritten for different reasons than in other countries. Only severely financially distressed companies choose not to underwrite their share offer. Second, the average announcement reaction to non-underwritten issues is much more negative than to underwritten issues. This contrasts sharply with the results found in other countries, such as the US. Third, underwritten rights issues experience a negative announcement return whereas the share price reaction to underwritten open offers is positive. The choice of issue method and the subsequent announcement reaction are explained by directors' and institutional investors' interests, growth opportunities, stock market uncertainty and liquidity in the market for rights.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
Publisher Info
Paper provided by Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research in its series Discussion Paper with number
93.
References listed on IDEAS Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.: