| Abstract: |
Firms conduct SEOs to resolve a near-term liquidity squeeze, and not primarily
to exploit market timing opportunities. Without the SEO proceeds, 62.6% of
issuers would have insufficient cash to implement their chosen operating and
non-SEO financing decisions the year after the SEO. Although the SEO decision
is positively related to a firm's market-to-book (M/B) ratio and prior excess
stock return and negatively related to its future excess return, these
relations are economically immaterial. For example, a 150% swing in future net
of market stock returns (from a 75% gain to a 75% loss over three years)
increases by only 1% the probability of an SEO in the immediately prior year.
Strikingly, most firms with quintessential "market timer" characteristics fail
to issue stock and a non-trivial number of mature firms do issue stock, with
current and former dividend payers raising more than half of all issue
proceeds. |