Knowledge that Transforms

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Thoroughly modern and analytical, this new, applications-oriented text offers a solid foundation in all major investment topics, including security analysis and portfolio theory Complete coverage of such current, highinterest topics as options and futures is provided Special sections in each chapter feature the practical aspects as well as the international dimensions of topics under discussion Available Now.

This paper demonstrates that refunding discounted debt represents a form of tax arbitrage that is profitable to taxpaying corporations when the present value of the additional tax shields, created through the refunding, exceeds the sum of the present value of the overall increase in pre-tax debt service requirements, after-tax transaction costs, and any tax incurred on the gain. The paper contrasts the factors that give rise to profitable opportunities to refund high-coupon debt and discounted debt. It also shows that, of the analytical approaches previously suggested for calculating the net advantage of refunding discounted debt, discounting the change in after-tax debt service payments at the after-tax cost of money for the refunding issue is the only one consistent with preserving debt service parity.

While the value of listing equity securities has been researched extensively, no studies have examined the market reaction to the decision to list corporate debt. Since the listing of corporate bonds on the major exchanges is a significant corporate activity, this study examines the impact of bond listing on shareholder wealth. Using a variety of possible announcement dates as well as cumulative abnormal returns between dates, no detectable market reaction to debt listing is found. Therefore, the listing of corporate bonds does not appear to be valued by the common shareholders of those same firms.

The advance of the theory of contingent claim pricing has made it possible to model and analyze very complex financial claims. When the value of the firm can be represented as a contingent claim, then the firm's optimal financial policy can be determined with only a slight modification in standard solution techniques for contingent claims. In this paper, stochastic control theory is used to determine a dynamic investment policy for the valuemaximizing firm. The value of future, stochastic economic rents (i.e., the net present value of the firm), and the firm's optimal investment policy must reflect a rational reaction on behalf of its competitors. A computationally efficient methodology is presented for solving the simultaneous investment-valuation problem for an n-firm game.

Previous anomaly research may have misinterpreted corrected, for the market index, mean returns on small firms. Assuming mean-variance preferences, it is shown theoretically that corrected mean returns (i.e., market line deviations) are not indicative of the relative desirability of increasing the proportional investment in small firms. The correct improvement criterion is derived and estimated. Tests indicate that the value-weighted market index is not significantly improved with greater weight on small firms, in the average month. When seasonality is considered, the observed performance improvements due to small or large firms are significant in some months, but the required portfolio position is unclear. If a case exists for a small firm anomaly in January, it probably exists in other months and it also exists for large firms. It is doubtful whether such an anomalous stock market exists.

This article examines the interest rate risk characteristics of a general class of floating rate securities, which includes Chance's securities as a special case. The calculation of duration for Chance's securities is zero, as it should be. Securities in the broader class can have durations that are negative or longer than the period of time that must elapse before the payments can reflect changes in market interest rates. The effect on duration of changes in the parameters of the function relating interest rate shocks to the payments and changes in the slope of the term structure are examined.

This note shows that, appearances to the contrary, the lower bounds on the price of a call option obtained by Levy and by Ritchken are identical, and that this common bound is never inferior to the lower bound obtained by Perrakis and Ryan.

It is shown that the existing tax law with its incomplete tax-loss offset will often lead to leasing contracts being advantageous to firms. This result obtains even if firms are in the same tax bracket and have the same probability of having positive taxable income.

This paper explores the effects of mergers on the investment incentives of the levered firm and on levered firm value. Under a fairly broad set of assumptions, it is shown that most firm combinations “improve” investment incentives, bringing about a reduction in the agency costs of underinvestment associated with risky debt. The effect of the merger on debt and equity claim values is also explored. If not properly anticipated, the merger may create a wealth transfer from equity holders to bondholders. Such a wealth transfer includes, but is not limited to, the “coinsurance effect.”