IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ave/wpaper/402007.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Consistency of Dividend Signalling and Future Maturity Level:Evidence from UK Data

Author

Listed:
  • Carlos Martins

    (Universidade de Aveiro)

Abstract

This paper analyses the relation between dividends and the mature level of a firm, by using market-to-book ratio as a proxy for Tobin’s Q, and Tobin’s Q as a indicator of either existence of new positive NPV projects or maturity level reached. The existent theory argues that the dividend payment decision either conveys information regarding future earnings (Signalling Theory) or is based on an Agency Theory Problem, concerning both Managers-Shareholders and Shareholders-Debtholders relationships. Here, another dividend signalling power is partially found, as dividend changes in period t seem to indicate a tendency in high Q firms to became more mature in t+1. This relation was not found for low Q firms, indicating that already mature firms do not change their status after a dividend change.

Suggested Citation

  • Carlos Martins, 2007. "Consistency of Dividend Signalling and Future Maturity Level:Evidence from UK Data," Working Papers de Economia (Economics Working Papers) 40, Departamento de Economia, Gestão e Engenharia Industrial, Universidade de Aveiro.
    • Handle: RePEc:ave:wpaper:402007
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.ua.pt/egi/ReadObject.aspx?obj=11024
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Eugene F. Fama & Kenneth R. French, 2001. "Disappearing Dividends: Changing Firm Characteristics Or Lower Propensity To Pay?," Journal of Applied Corporate Finance, Morgan Stanley, vol. 14(1), pages 67-79, March.
    2. Smith, Clifford Jr. & Watts, Ross L., 1992. "The investment opportunity set and corporate financing, dividend, and compensation policies," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 263-292, December.
    3. Williams, Joseph, 1988. " Efficient Signalling with Dividends, Investment, and Stock Repurchase s," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 43(3), pages 737-747, July.
    4. Healy, Paul M. & Palepu, Krishna G., 1988. "Earnings information conveyed by dividend initiations and omissions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(2), pages 149-175, September.
    5. Stulz, ReneM., 1988. "Managerial control of voting rights : Financing policies and the market for corporate control," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(1-2), pages 25-54, January.
    6. Shleifer, Andrei & Vishny, Robert W, 1986. "Large Shareholders and Corporate Control," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(3), pages 461-488, June.
    7. Penman, Stephen H, 1983. "The Predictive Content of Earnings Forecasts and Dividends," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 38(4), pages 1181-1199, September.
    8. Gonedes, Nj, 1978. "Corporate Signaling, External Accounting, And Capital-Market Equilibrium - Evidence On Dividends, Income, And Extraordinary Items," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 16(1), pages 26-79.
    9. Jensen, Michael C. & Meckling, William H., 1976. "Theory of the firm: Managerial behavior, agency costs and ownership structure," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 3(4), pages 305-360, October.
    10. Michaely, Roni, 1991. "Ex-dividend Day Stock Price Behavior: The Case of the 1986 Tax Reform Act," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(3), pages 845-859, July.
    11. Aharony, Joseph & Swary, Itzhak, 1980. "Qtrly Dividend and Earnings Announcements and Stockholders' Returns: An Empirical Analysis," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 35(1), pages 1-12, March.
    12. Jensen, Michael C, 1986. "Agency Costs of Free Cash Flow, Corporate Finance, and Takeovers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(2), pages 323-329, May.
    13. Malcolm Baker & Jeffrey Wurgler, 2004. "A Catering Theory of Dividends," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 59(3), pages 1125-1165, June.
    14. Ofer, Aharon R & Thakor, Anjan V, 1987. "A Theory of Stock Price Responses to Alternative Corporate Cash Disbursement Methods: Stock Repurchases and Dividends," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 42(2), pages 365-394, June.
    15. Woolridge, J Randall, 1983. "Dividend Changes and Security Prices," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 38(5), pages 1607-1615, December.
    16. Watts, Ross, 1973. "The Information Content of Dividends," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 46(2), pages 191-211, April.
    17. Merton H. Miller & Franco Modigliani, 1961. "Dividend Policy, Growth, and the Valuation of Shares," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 34, pages 411-411.
    18. Ferris, Stephen P. & Sen, Nilanjan & Lim, Chee Yeow & Yeo, Gillian H. H., 2002. "Corporate focus versus diversification: the role of growth opportunities and cashflow," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 12(3), pages 231-252, July.
    19. Gustavo Grullon & Roni Michaely & Bhaskaran Swaminathan, 2002. "Are Dividend Changes a Sign of Firm Maturity?," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 75(3), pages 387-424, July.
    20. Benartzi, Shlomo & Michaely, Roni & Thaler, Richard H, 1997. "Do Changes in Dividends Signal the Future or the Past?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(3), pages 1007-1034, July.
    21. Poterba, James M & Summers, Lawrence H, 1984. "New Evidence that Taxes Affect the Valuation of Dividends," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 39(5), pages 1397-1415, December.
    22. Franklin Allen & Antonio E. Bernardo & Ivo Welch, 2000. "A Theory of Dividends Based on Tax Clienteles," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(6), pages 2499-2536, December.
    23. Fuller, Kathleen P., 2003. "The impact of informed trading on dividend signaling: a theoretical and empirical examination," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 9(4), pages 385-407, September.
    24. Miller, Merton H & Rock, Kevin, 1985. "Dividend Policy under Asymmetric Information," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 40(4), pages 1031-1051, September.
    25. Elton, Edwin J & Gruber, Martin J, 1970. "Marginal Stockholder Tax Rates and the Clientele Effect," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 52(1), pages 68-74, February.
    26. Andrew Benito & Garry Young, 2003. "Hard Times or Great Expectations? Dividend Omissions and Dividend Cuts by UK Firms," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 65(5), pages 531-555, December.
    27. DeAngelo, Harry & DeAngelo, Linda & Skinner, Douglas J., 1996. "Reversal of fortune Dividend signaling and the disappearance of sustained earnings growth," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(3), pages 341-371, March.
    28. Black, Fischer & Scholes, Myron, 1974. "The effects of dividend yield and dividend policy on common stock prices and returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 1(1), pages 1-22, May.
    29. Dann, Larry Y. & Masulis, Ronald W. & Mayers, David, 1991. "Repurchase tender offers and earnings information," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(3), pages 217-251, September.
    30. Rosenstein, Stuart & Wyatt, Jeffrey G., 1990. "Outside directors, board independence, and shareholder wealth," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 26(2), pages 175-191, August.
    31. Dhillon, Upinder S & Johnson, Herb, 1994. "The Effect of Dividend Changes on Stock and Bond Prices," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 49(1), pages 281-289, March.
    32. Myers, Stewart C., 1984. "Capital structure puzzle," Working papers 1548-84., Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Sloan School of Management.
    33. Asquith, Paul & Mullins, David W, Jr, 1983. "The Impact of Initiating Dividend Payments on Shareholders' Wealth," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 56(1), pages 77-96, January.
    34. Brickley, James A., 1983. "Shareholder wealth, information signaling and the specially designated dividend : An empirical study," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(2), pages 187-209, August.
    35. Pettit, R Richardson, 1976. "The Impact of Dividend and Earnings Announcements: A Reconciliation," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 49(1), pages 86-96, January.
    36. Michaely, Roni & Thaler, Richard H & Womack, Kent L, 1995. "Price Reactions to Dividend Initiations and Omissions: Overreaction or Drift?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 50(2), pages 573-608, June.
    37. Easterbrook, Frank H, 1984. "Two Agency-Cost Explanations of Dividends," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(4), pages 650-659, September.
    38. Sanford J. Grossman & Oliver D. Hart, 1980. "Takeover Bids, the Free-Rider Problem, and the Theory of the Corporation," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 11(1), pages 42-64, Spring.
    39. Myers, Stewart C, 1984. "The Capital Structure Puzzle," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 39(3), pages 575-592, July.
    40. Denis, David J. & Denis, Diane K. & Sarin, Atulya, 1994. "The Information Content of Dividend Changes: Cash Flow Signaling, Overinvestment, and Dividend Clienteles," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 29(4), pages 567-587, December.
    41. Stewart C. Myers, 1984. "Capital Structure Puzzle," NBER Working Papers 1393, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    42. John, Kose & Williams, Joseph, 1985. "Dividends, Dilution, and Taxes: A Signalling Equilibrium," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 40(4), pages 1053-1070, September.
    43. DeAngelo, Harry & DeAngelo, Linda, 1990. "Dividend Policy and Financial Distress: An Empirical Investigation of Troubled NYSE Firms," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 45(5), pages 1415-1431, December.
    44. Sudipto Bhattacharya, 1979. "Imperfect Information, Dividend Policy, and "The Bird in the Hand" Fallacy," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 10(1), pages 259-270, Spring.
    45. Lie, Erik, 2000. "Excess Funds and Agency Problems: An Empirical Study of Incremental Cash Disbursements," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 13(1), pages 219-247.
    46. Barclay, Michael J., 1987. "Dividends, taxes, and common stock prices : The ex-dividend day behavior of common stock prices before the income tax," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(1), pages 31-44, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Frankfurter, George M. & Wood, Bob Jr., 2002. "Dividend policy theories and their empirical tests," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 11(2), pages 111-138.
    2. Hussein Abedi Shamsabadi & Byung-Seong Min & Richard Chung, 2016. "Corporate governance and dividend strategy: lessons from Australia," International Journal of Managerial Finance, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 12(5), pages 583-610, October.
    3. Darakhshan Younis & Attiya Yasmin Javid, 2014. "Market Imperfections and Dividend Policy Decisions of Manufacturing Sector of Pakistan," PIDE-Working Papers 2014:99, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics.
    4. H.Kent Baker & Gary E. Powell & E.Theodore Veit, 2002. "Revisiting the dividend puzzle," Review of Financial Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 11(4), pages 241-261.
    5. Brav, Alon & Graham, John R. & Harvey, Campbell R. & Michaely, Roni, 2005. "Payout policy in the 21st century," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 77(3), pages 483-527, September.
    6. Kartal Demirg ne, 2015. "Determinants of Target Dividend Payout Ratio: A Panel Autoregressive Distributed Lag Analysis," International Journal of Economics and Financial Issues, Econjournals, vol. 5(2), pages 418-426.
    7. Roni Michaely & Stefano Rossi & Michael Weber & Michael Weber, 2017. "The Information Content of Dividends: Safer Profits, Not Higher Profits," CESifo Working Paper Series 6751, CESifo.
    8. Baker, H. Kent & Powell, Gary E. & Veit, E. Theodore, 2002. "Revisiting the dividend puzzle: Do all of the pieces now fit?," Review of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 11(4), pages 241-261.
    9. Blau, Benjamin M. & Fuller, Kathleen P., 2008. "Flexibility and dividends," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 14(2), pages 133-152, April.
    10. Renneboog, L.D.R. & Trojanowski, G., 2005. "Patterns in Payout Policy and Payout Channel Choice of UK Firms in the 1990s," Discussion Paper 2005-002, Tilburg University, Tilburg Law and Economic Center.
    11. Fairchild, Richard & Guney, Yilmaz & Thanatawee, Yordying, 2014. "Corporate dividend policy in Thailand: Theory and evidence," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 129-151.
    12. Basharat Khan & Qiujun Zhao & Amjad Iqbal & Irfan Ullah & Shahab Aziz, 2022. "Internal Dynamics of Dividend Policy in East-Asia: A Comparative Study of Japan and South Korea," SAGE Open, , vol. 12(2), pages 21582440221, April.
    13. Ijaz Ali & Ali Gohar & Omar Meharzi, 2017. "Why do Firms Change Their Dividend Policy?," International Journal of Economics and Financial Issues, Econjournals, vol. 7(3), pages 411-422.
    14. du Jardin, Philippe & Séverin, Eric, 2011. "Dividend policy," MPRA Paper 44382, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    15. Eva Liljeblom & Sabur Mollah & Patrik Rotter, 2015. "Do dividends signal future earnings in the Nordic stock markets?," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 44(3), pages 493-511, April.
    16. James, Hui & Benson, Bradley W. & Wu, Chen (Ken), 2017. "Does CEO ownership affect payout policy? Evidence from using CEO scaled wealth-performance sensitivity," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 65(C), pages 328-345.
    17. Sadaf Anwar & Shveta Singh & P. K. Jain, 2017. "Impact of Cash Dividend Announcements: Evidence from the Indian Manufacturing Companies," Journal of Emerging Market Finance, Institute for Financial Management and Research, vol. 16(1), pages 29-60, April.
    18. Luís Krug Pacheco & Clara Raposo, 2009. "ON the TIMING of INITIAL STOCK REPURCHASES," Working Papers de Gestão (Management Working Papers) 06, Católica Porto Business School, Universidade Católica Portuguesa.
    19. Ham, Charles G. & Kaplan, Zachary R. & Leary, Mark T., 2020. "Do dividends convey information about future earnings?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 136(2), pages 547-570.
    20. Paul McGuinness & Kevin Lam & João Vieito, 2015. "Gender and other major board characteristics in China: Explaining corporate dividend policy and governance," Asia Pacific Journal of Management, Springer, vol. 32(4), pages 989-1038, December.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Dividend Signalling; Mature Firms; Signalling Theory; Payout Policy.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G35 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Payout Policy
    • C63 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Mathematical Methods; Programming Models; Mathematical and Simulation Modeling - - - Computational Techniques

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:ave:wpaper:402007. 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: Marta Ferreira Dias (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/deavept.html .

    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.