The post-split increase in daily returns volatility is less for AMEX stocks than for NYSE stocks. The exchange trading location is a significant factor in explaining the volatility shift even after stock price and firm size are considered. Furthermore, when measured on a weekly basis, there is no increase in AMEX stocks' returns volatility. These results suggest that measurement errors created by bid-ask spreads and the 1/8 effect, and also one or more of the elements that make the NYSE different from the AMEX, explain why the estimated volatility of daily stock returns increases after the ex split date.

After the stock market crash of October 19, 1987, interest in nonlinear dynamics, especially deterministic chaotic dynamics, has increased in both the financial press and the academic literature. This has come about because the frequency of large moves in stock markets is greater than would be expected under a normal distribution. There are a number of possible explanations. A popular one is that the stock market is governed by chaotic dynamics. What exactly is chaos and how is it related to nonlinear dynamics? How does one detect chaos? Is there chaos in financial markets? Are there other explanations of the movements of financial prices other than chaos? The purpose of this paper is to explore these issues.

A positive slope of the yield curve is associated with a future increase in real economic activity: consumption (nondurables plus services), consumer durables, and investment. It has extra predictive power over the index of leading indicators, real short-term interest rates, lagged growth in economic activity, and lagged rates of inflation. It outperforms survey forecasts, both in-sample and out-of-sample. Historically, the information in the slope reflected, inter alia, factors that were independent of monetary policy, and thus the slope could have provided useful information both to private investors and to policy makers. THE FLATTENING OF THE yield curve in 1988 and its inversion in early 1989 have been interpreted by many business economists and financial analysts as evidence that a recession is imminent. Implicit in this interpretation is the presumption that a flattening of the yield curve predicts a drop in future spot interest rates and that these lower rates are associated with a lower level of real GNP. Recent empirical work on the term structure of interest rates confirms that changes in the slope of the yield curve predict the correct direction of future changes in spot rates, yet there is little empirical work on the predictability of changes in real economic activity.1 Indeed, given the near-random-walk empirical behavior of real GNP, a finding that the yield curve can predict future changes in real output would be very impressive.2 Predictability of changes in real output is associated with other equally important questions: How much extra information is there in the term

We compare three forms of common stock repurchases. Dutch-auction self-tender offers and open-market share repurchase programs are weaker signals of stock undervaluation than fixed-price self-tender offers. The price increase from buyback announcements is greater when insider wealth is at risk, greater following negative net-of-market stock returns, and unrelated to prior market returns. Buyback announcement returns are also increasing in the fraction of shares sought, which is consistent with both signalling and an upward-sloping supply curve for stock.

A positive slope of the yield curve is associated with a future increase in real economic activity: consumption (nondurables plus services), consumer durables, and investment. It has extra predictive power over the index of leading indicators, real short‐term interest rates, lagged growth in economic activity, and lagged rates of inflation. It outperforms survey forecasts, both in‐sample and out‐of‐sample. Historically, the information in the slope reflected, inter alia , factors that were independent of monetary policy, and thus the slope could have provided useful information both to private investors and to policy makers.

We compare three forms of common stock repurchases. Dutch‐auction self‐tender offers and open‐market share repurchase programs are weaker signals of stock undervaluation than fixed‐price self‐tender offers. The price increase from buyback announcements is greater when insider wealth is at risk, greater following negative net‐of‐market stock returns, and unrelated to prior market returns. Buyback announcement returns are also increasing in the fraction of shares sought, which is consistent with both signalling and an upward‐sloping supply curve for stock.

A positive slope of the yield curve is associated with a future increase in real economic activity: consumption (nondurables plus services), consumer durables, and investment. It has extra predictive power over the index of leading indicators, real short-term interest rates, lagged growth in economic activity, and lagged rates of inflation. It outperforms survey forecasts, both in-sample and out-of-sample. Historically, the information in the slope reflected, inter alia, factors that were independent of monetary policy and, thus, the slope could have provided useful information both to private investors and to policymakers.

The authors compare three forms of common stock repurchases. Dutch-auction self-tender offers and open-market share repurchase programs are weaker signals of stock undervaluation than fixed-price self-tender offers. The price increase from buyback announcements is greater when insider wealth is at risk, greater following negative net-of-market stock returns, and unrelated to prior market returns. Buyback announcement returns are also increasing in the fraction of shares sought, which is consistent with both signaling and an upward-sloping supply curve for stock.

This paper provides support for the certification role of venture capitalists in initial public offerings (IPOs). Consistent with the certification hypothesis, a comparison of venture capital backed IPOs with a control sample of nonventure capital backed IPOs from the 1983 through 1987 matched as closely as possible by industry and offering size indicates that venture capital backing results in significantly lower initial returns and gross spreads. In effect, the presence of venture capitalist in the issuing firms serves to lower the total costs of going public and to maximize the net proceeds to the offering firm. In addition, the authors document that venture capitalists retain a significant portion of their holdings in the firm after the IPOs.