IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/veecee/v20y2018i1p1-26.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The effect of company name fluency on venture investment decisions and IPO underpricing

Author

Listed:
  • Chien-Sheng Richard Chan
  • Haemin Dennis Park
  • Pankaj Patel

Abstract

We explore the influence of company name on pre-venture and post-success financing outcomes of new ventures. A company name could be linguistically fluent, that is whether a name appears to be realistic and familiar, or phonetically fluent, that is whether a name is pronounceable. These variations could lead to varying financing outcomes. We argue that pre-venture investors favor ventures with low linguistically fluent names because of their preference in investing in unique ventures and with high phonetically fluent names as such names could automatically elicit favorable impressions. In contrast, post-success investors may still favor investing in ventures with high phonetically fluent names, but are less influenced by linguistic fluency because they are less concerned about a venture’s uniqueness. Our predictions are supported by two studies.

Suggested Citation

  • Chien-Sheng Richard Chan & Haemin Dennis Park & Pankaj Patel, 2018. "The effect of company name fluency on venture investment decisions and IPO underpricing," Venture Capital, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 20(1), pages 1-26, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:veecee:v:20:y:2018:i:1:p:1-26
    DOI: 10.1080/13691066.2017.1334369
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/13691066.2017.1334369
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/13691066.2017.1334369?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. Jay R. Ritter & Ivo Welch, 2002. "A Review of IPO Activity, Pricing, and Allocations," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(4), pages 1795-1828, August.
    2. Manigart, Sophie & De Waele, Koen & Wright, Mike & Robbie, Ken & Desbrieres, Philippe & Sapienza, Harry J. & Beekman, Amy, 2002. "Determinants of required return in venture capital investments: a five-country study," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 17(4), pages 291-312, July.
    3. Parhankangas, Annaleena & Ehrlich, Michael, 2014. "How entrepreneurs seduce business angels: An impression management approach," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 29(4), pages 543-564.
    4. Hisrich, Robert D. & Jankowicz, A. D., 1990. "Intuition in venture capital decisions: An exploratory study using a new technique," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 5(1), pages 49-62, January.
    5. Chan, C.S. Richard & Park, Haemin Dennis, 2015. "How images and color in business plans influence venture investment screening decisions," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 30(5), pages 732-748.
    6. Samuel Kortum & Josh Lerner, 2000. "Assessing the Contribution of Venture Capital to Innovation," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 31(4), pages 674-692, Winter.
    7. Steven D. Dolvin & Mark K. Pyles, 2006. "Venture capitalist quality and IPO certification," Venture Capital, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 8(4), pages 353-371, April.
    8. Mollick, Ethan, 2014. "The dynamics of crowdfunding: An exploratory study," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 1-16.
    9. Xing, Xuejing & Anderson, Randy I. & Hu, Yan, 2016. "What׳s a name worth? The impact of a likeable stock ticker symbol on firm value," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 63-80.
    10. Franke, Nikolaus & Gruber, Marc & Harhoff, Dietmar & Henkel, Joachim, 2006. "What you are is what you like--similarity biases in venture capitalists' evaluations of start-up teams," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 21(6), pages 802-826, November.
    11. Dorn, Daniel, 2009. "Does Sentiment Drive the Retail Demand for IPOs?," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 44(1), pages 85-108, February.
    12. Lawrence M. Benveniste & Alexander Ljungqvist & William J. Wilhelm & Xiaoyun Yu, 2003. "Evidence of Information Spillovers in the Production of Investment Banking Services," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 58(2), pages 577-608, April.
    13. Laura Xiaolei Liu & Ann E. Sherman & Yong Zhang, 2014. "The Long-Run Role of the Media: Evidence from Initial Public Offerings," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 60(8), pages 1945-1964, August.
    14. Chan, Chien Sheng Richard & Park, Haemin Dennis, 2013. "The influence of dispositional affect and cognition on venture investment portfolio concentration," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 28(3), pages 397-412.
    15. Maxwell, Andrew L. & Jeffrey, Scott A. & Lévesque, Moren, 2011. "Business angel early stage decision making," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 26(2), pages 212-225, March.
    16. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1993. "Common risk factors in the returns on stocks and bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 3-56, February.
    17. Dean A. Shepherd, 1999. "Venture Capitalists' Assessment of New Venture Survival," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 45(5), pages 621-632, May.
    18. Xu, Bo & Zheng, Haichao & Xu, Yun & Wang, Tao, 2016. "Configurational paths to sponsor satisfaction in crowdfunding," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 69(2), pages 915-927.
    19. Jonah Berger & Chip Heath, 2007. "Where Consumers Diverge from Others: Identity Signaling and Product Domains," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 34(2), pages 121-134, June.
    20. Green, T. Clifton & Jame, Russell, 2013. "Company name fluency, investor recognition, and firm value," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(3), pages 813-834.
    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. Bendell, Bari L. & Kristal, Emma K., 2023. "Five naming strategies to help tell your organization’s story," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 66(3), pages 387-404.
    2. Mahmood, Ammara & Luffarelli, Jonathan & Mukesh, Mudra, 2019. "What's in a logo? The impact of complex visual cues in equity crowdfunding," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 41-62.
    3. Montone, Maurizio & van den Assem, Martijn J. & Zwinkels, Remco C.J., 2023. "Company name fluency and stock returns," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 39(C).

    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. Yang, Jialiang & Li, Yaokuang & Calic, Goran & Shevchenko, Anton, 2020. "How multimedia shape crowdfunding outcomes: The overshadowing effect of images and videos on text in campaign information," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 6-18.
    2. Chan, C.S. Richard & Parhankangas, Annaleena & Sahaym, Arvin & Oo, Pyayt, 2020. "Bellwether and the herd? Unpacking the u-shaped relationship between prior funding and subsequent contributions in reward-based crowdfunding," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 35(2).
    3. Andreas Hoegen & Dennis M. Steininger & Daniel Veit, 2018. "How do investors decide? An interdisciplinary review of decision-making in crowdfunding," Electronic Markets, Springer;IIM University of St. Gallen, vol. 28(3), pages 339-365, August.
    4. Chan, C.S. Richard & Park, Haemin Dennis & Huang, Julie Y. & Parhankangas, Annaleena, 2020. "Less is more? Evidence for a curvilinear relationship between readability and screening evaluations across pitch competition and crowdfunding contexts," Journal of Business Venturing Insights, Elsevier, vol. 14(C).
    5. Chan, C.S. Richard & Park, Haemin Dennis, 2015. "How images and color in business plans influence venture investment screening decisions," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 30(5), pages 732-748.
    6. Oo, Pyayt P. & Jiang, Lin & Sahaym, Arvin & Parhankangas, Annaleena & Chan, Richard, 2023. "Actions in words: How entrepreneurs use diversified and changing speech acts to achieve funding success," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 38(2).
    7. Alexandra Moritz & Walter Diegel & Joern Block & Christian Fisch, 2022. "VC investors’ venture screening: the role of the decision maker’s education and experience," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 92(1), pages 27-63, January.
    8. Mahmood, Ammara & Luffarelli, Jonathan & Mukesh, Mudra, 2019. "What's in a logo? The impact of complex visual cues in equity crowdfunding," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 41-62.
    9. Davis, Blakley C. & Hmieleski, Keith M. & Webb, Justin W. & Coombs, Joseph E., 2017. "Funders' positive affective reactions to entrepreneurs' crowdfunding pitches: The influence of perceived product creativity and entrepreneurial passion," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 90-106.
    10. C. S. Richard Chan & Annaleena Parhankangas, 2017. "Crowdfunding Innovative Ideas: How Incremental and Radical Innovativeness Influence Funding Outcomes," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 41(2), pages 237-263, March.
    11. Patzelt, Holger & zu Knyphausen-Aufseß, Dodo & Fischer, Heiko T., 2009. "Upper echelons and portfolio strategies of venture capital firms," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 24(6), pages 558-572, November.
    12. Cho, Jaemin & Lee, Jaeho, 2013. "The venture capital certification role in R&D: Evidence from IPO underpricing in Korea," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 23(C), pages 83-108.
    13. Chan, Chien Sheng Richard & Park, Haemin Dennis, 2013. "The influence of dispositional affect and cognition on venture investment portfolio concentration," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 28(3), pages 397-412.
    14. Berger, Marius & Hottenrott, Hanna, 2021. "Start-up subsidies and the sources of venture capital," Journal of Business Venturing Insights, Elsevier, vol. 16(C).
    15. Chen, Yangyang & Goyal, Abhinav & Veeraraghavan, Madhu & Zolotoy, Leon, 2020. "Terrorist attacks, investor sentiment, and the pricing of initial public offerings," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    16. Anton Miglo, 2023. "ICO vs. Equity Financing under Imperfect, Complex and Asymmetric Information," FinTech, MDPI, vol. 3(1), pages 1-23, December.
    17. Oehler, Andreas & Rummer, Marco & Smith, Peter N., 2004. "IPO Pricing and the Relative Importance of Investor Sentiment: Evidence from Germany," Discussion Papers 26, University of Bamberg, Chair of Finance.
    18. Andy Cosh & Douglas Cumming & Alan Hughes, 2009. "Outside Enterpreneurial Capital," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 119(540), pages 1494-1533, October.
    19. Chan, Yue-Cheong, 2014. "How does retail sentiment affect IPO returns? Evidence from the internet bubble period," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 235-248.
    20. Mojca Svetek, 2023. "The Role of Entrepreneurs’ Perceived Competence and Cooperativeness in Early-Stage Financing," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 47(6), pages 2047-2076, November.

    More about this item

    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:taf:veecee:v:20:y:2018:i:1:p:1-26. 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: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/TVEC20 .

    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.