IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/corfin/v47y2017icp23-45.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Hedge funds in M&A deals: Is there exploitation of insider information?

Author

Listed:
  • Dai, Rui
  • Massoud, Nadia
  • Nandy, Debarshi K.
  • Saunders, Anthony

Abstract

This paper investigates trading patterns in target and acquirer firms prior to public announcement of M&A deals, a corporate event in which group based co-offence has been anecdotally documented. Our analysis differentiates whether such trading is primarily conducted by hedge funds with short-term investment horizons as opposed to other short horizon investors or hedge funds and institutional investors with long-term horizons, in both the equity and derivatives markets. Our results are consistent with exploitation of M&A deal related information prior to the deal's public announcement. In particular we find that the greater the likelihood of insider information leakage, the greater the short-term hedge fund holdings. We consider several alternative explanations, such as those related to the short-term hedge fund's skill in identifying profitable trades' ex-ante; our results seem inconsistent with such alternative explanations.

Suggested Citation

  • Dai, Rui & Massoud, Nadia & Nandy, Debarshi K. & Saunders, Anthony, 2017. "Hedge funds in M&A deals: Is there exploitation of insider information?," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 23-45.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:corfin:v:47:y:2017:i:c:p:23-45
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jcorpfin.2017.08.001
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0929119917301165
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jcorpfin.2017.08.001?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Boone, Audra L. & Harold Mulherin, J., 2008. "Do auctions induce a winner's curse? New evidence from the corporate takeover market," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(1), pages 1-19, July.
    2. Allen M. Poteshman, 2006. "Unusual Option Market Activity and the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 79(4), pages 1703-1726, July.
    3. Mark Mitchell & Todd Pulvino, 2001. "Characteristics of Risk and Return in Risk Arbitrage," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(6), pages 2135-2175, December.
    4. Brian J. Bushee & Theodore H. Goodman, 2007. "Which Institutional Investors Trade Based on Private Information About Earnings and Returns?," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 45(2), pages 289-321, May.
    5. Keown, Arthur J & Pinkerton, John M, 1981. "Merger Announcements and Insider Trading Activity: An Empirical Investigation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 36(4), pages 855-869, September.
    6. Schwert, G. William, 1996. "Markup pricing in mergers and acquisitions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(2), pages 153-192, June.
    7. Amihud, Yakov, 2002. "Illiquidity and stock returns: cross-section and time-series effects," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 5(1), pages 31-56, January.
    8. Charles Cao & Zhiwu Chen & John M. Griffin, 2005. "Informational Content of Option Volume Prior to Takeovers," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 78(3), pages 1073-1109, May.
    9. Andriy Bodnaruk & Massimo Massa & Andrei Simonov, 2009. "Investment Banks as Insiders and the Market for Corporate Control," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(12), pages 4989-5026, December.
    10. Gaspar, Jose-Miguel & Massa, Massimo & Matos, Pedro, 2005. "Shareholder investment horizons and the market for corporate control," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(1), pages 135-165, April.
    11. April Klein & Emanuel Zur, 2009. "Entrepreneurial Shareholder Activism: Hedge Funds and Other Private Investors," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 64(1), pages 187-229, February.
    12. Kaushik I. Amin & Charles M. C. Lee, 1997. "Option Trading, Price Discovery, and Earnings News Dissemination," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 14(2), pages 153-192, June.
    13. Clinton Free & Pamela R. Murphy, 2015. "The Ties that Bind: The Decision to Co†Offend in Fraud," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 32(1), pages 18-54, March.
    14. Meulbroek, Lisa K, 1992. "An Empirical Analysis of Illegal Insider Trading," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 47(5), pages 1661-1699, December.
    15. Robert M. Bushman & Abbie J. Smith & Regina Wittenberg‐Moerman, 2010. "Price Discovery and Dissemination of Private Information by Loan Syndicate Participants," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48(5), pages 921-972, December.
    16. Hsieh, Jim & Walkling, Ralph A., 2005. "Determinants and implications of arbitrage holdings in acquisitions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 77(3), pages 605-648, September.
    17. Chen, Xia & Harford, Jarrad & Li, Kai, 2007. "Monitoring: Which institutions matter?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(2), pages 279-305, November.
    18. Kosowski, Robert & Naik, Narayan Y. & Teo, Melvyn, 2007. "Do hedge funds deliver alpha? A Bayesian and bootstrap analysis," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(1), pages 229-264, April.
    19. repec:bla:jfinan:v:59:y:2004:i:4:p:1845-1876 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Edward I. Altman & Amar Gande & Anthony Saunders, 2010. "Bank Debt versus Bond Debt: Evidence from Secondary Market Prices," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 42(4), pages 755-767, June.
    21. G. William Schwert, 2000. "Hostility in Takeovers: In the Eyes of the Beholder?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(6), pages 2599-2640, December.
    22. DePamphilis, Donald & DePamphilis, Donald, 2009. "Mergers, Acquisitions, and Other Restructuring Activities," Elsevier Monographs, Elsevier, edition 5, number 9780123748782.
    23. Baker, Malcolm & Savasoglu, Serkan, 2002. "Limited arbitrage in mergers and acquisitions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(1), pages 91-115, April.
    24. Larcker, David F. & Lys, Thomas, 1987. "An empirical analysis of the incentives to engage in costly information acquisition : The case of risk arbitrage," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 111-126, March.
    25. Greenwood, Robin & Schor, Michael, 2009. "Investor activism and takeovers," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(3), pages 362-375, June.
    26. Bobae Choi & Kooyul Jung & Doowon Lee, 2015. "Trading Behavior Prior to Public Release of Analyst Reports: Evidence from Korea," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 32(1), pages 105-138, March.
    27. Massoud, Nadia & Nandy, Debarshi & Saunders, Anthony & Song, Keke, 2011. "Do hedge funds trade on private information? Evidence from syndicated lending and short-selling," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 99(3), pages 477-499, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Styliani Panetsidou & Angelos Synapis & Ioannis Tsalavoutas, 2022. "Price run-ups and insider trading laws under different regulatory environments," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 59(2), pages 601-639, August.
    2. Eliezer Fich & Viktoriya Lantushenko & Clemens Sialm, 2019. "Institutional Trading Around M&A Announcements," NBER Working Papers 25814, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Huang, Qiongyu & Zhang, Ruiyao & Li, Siyao & Li, Jingjing & Yao, Qiong, 2024. "The role of financial advisorʼs industry expertise in M&A quality: Evidence from goodwill impairment," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 89(PB), pages 216-231.
    4. Aleksanyan, Mark & Danbolt, Jo & Siganos, Antonios & Wu, Betty (H.T.), 2022. "I only fear when I hear: How media affects insider trading in takeover targets," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 67(C), pages 318-342.
    5. Papathanasiou, Spyros & Vasiliou, Dimitrios & Magoutas, Anastasios & Koutsokostas, Drosos, 2022. "Do hedge and merger arbitrage funds actually hedge? A time-varying volatility spillover approach," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 44(C).
    6. Marie Dutordoir & Evangelos Vagenas‐Nanos & Patrick Verwijmeren & Betty Wu, 2021. "A rundown of merger target run‐ups," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 50(2), pages 487-518, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Eliezer Fich & Viktoriya Lantushenko & Clemens Sialm, 2019. "Institutional Trading Around M&A Announcements," NBER Working Papers 25814, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Andrey Golubov & Dimitris Petmezas & Nickolaos G. Travlos, 2013. "Empirical mergers and acquisitions research: a review of methods, evidence and managerial implications," Chapters, in: Adrian R. Bell & Chris Brooks & Marcel Prokopczuk (ed.), Handbook of Research Methods and Applications in Empirical Finance, chapter 12, pages 287-313, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    3. Fich, Eliezer M. & Harford, Jarrad & Tran, Anh L., 2015. "Motivated monitors: The importance of institutional investors׳ portfolio weights," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(1), pages 21-48.
    4. Andriy Bodnaruk & Massimo Massa & Andrei Simonov, 2009. "Investment Banks as Insiders and the Market for Corporate Control," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(12), pages 4989-5026, December.
    5. Patrick Augustin & Menachem Brenner & Marti G. Subrahmanyam, 2019. "Informed Options Trading Prior to Takeover Announcements: Insider Trading?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 65(12), pages 5697-5720, December.
    6. Marie Dutordoir & Evangelos Vagenas‐Nanos & Patrick Verwijmeren & Betty Wu, 2021. "A rundown of merger target run‐ups," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 50(2), pages 487-518, June.
    7. Acharya, Viral V. & Johnson, Timothy C., 2010. "More insiders, more insider trading: Evidence from private-equity buyouts," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 98(3), pages 500-523, December.
    8. Augustin, Patrick & Brenner, Menachem & Grass, Gunnar & Subrahmanyam, Marti G., 2016. "How do insiders trade?," CFS Working Paper Series 541, Center for Financial Studies (CFS).
    9. Stefan Eichler & Dominik Maltritz, 2013. "An options-based approach to forecast competing bids: evidence for Canadian takeover battles," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(34), pages 4805-4819, December.
    10. Jason Hall & Matthew Pinnuck & Matthew Thorne, 2013. "Market risk exposure of merger arbitrage in Australia," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 53(1), pages 185-215, March.
    11. Choy, Siu Kai & Wei, Jason, 2012. "Option trading: Information or differences of opinion?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(8), pages 2299-2322.
    12. Arturo Bris, 2005. "Do Insider Trading Laws Work?," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 11(3), pages 267-312, June.
    13. Bittner, Christian & Fecht, Falko & Pala, Melissa & Saidi, Farzad, 2022. "Information transmission between banks and the market for corporate control," Discussion Papers 29/2022, Deutsche Bundesbank.
    14. Dasgupta, Amil & Fos, Vyacheslav & Sautner, Zacharias, 2021. "Institutional investors and corporate governance," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 112114, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    15. Vinay Patel, 2015. "Price Discovery in US and Australian Stock and Options Markets," PhD Thesis, Finance Discipline Group, UTS Business School, University of Technology, Sydney, number 27, July-Dece.
    16. Li, Lin & Tong, Wilson H.S., 2018. "Information uncertainty and target valuation in mergers and acquisitions," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 84-107.
    17. Najah Attig & Sean Cleary & Sadok El Ghoul & Omrane Guedhami, 2013. "Institutional Investment Horizons and the Cost of Equity Capital," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 42(2), pages 441-477, June.
    18. Renneboog, Luc & Vansteenkiste, Cara, 2019. "Failure and success in mergers and acquisitions," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 650-699.
    19. Ordu, Umut & Schweizer, Denis, 2015. "Executive compensation and informed trading in acquiring firms around merger announcements," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 260-280.
    20. Aktas, Nihat & de Bodt, Eric & Roll, Richard, 2010. "Negotiations under the threat of an auction," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 98(2), pages 241-255, November.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Short-term hedge funds; Information leakage; Insider information; Merger and acquisitions; Short-selling; Long target holdings;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • G30 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - General
    • G34 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Mergers; Acquisitions; Restructuring; Corporate Governance

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:corfin:v:47:y:2017:i:c:p:23-45. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jcorpfin .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.