We show that productivity at both the firm and employee (i.e., analyst and inventor) level temporarily declines upon announcements of takeover rumors that do not materialize. Such speculative news may hurt productivity because uncertainty and the threat of job loss cause anxiety, distraction, and reduced commitment among employees and managers. Consistently, we observe a more pronounced productivity dip for rumored targets and when the likelihood of job loss is higher. Firm performance mirrors these results. We find no indication of reverse causality. The evidence fosters our understanding of potential real effects of speculative financial news and the costs of takeover threats.

This study finds a positive, economically meaningful impact of generalist chief executive officers (CEOs) on shareholder value using 164 sudden deaths and 345 non-sudden exogenous turnovers. The higher a departing CEO’s general ability index (GAI), independently and relative to her successor, the lower is the abnormal stock return to turnover announcements. Returns reflect post-turnover changes in operating performance. Further, CEOs’ and successors’ GAIs are significantly positively related, but only for non-sudden turnovers. Consistently, for sudden deaths, we find positive stock returns to appointments of generalist successors. The results provide a market-based explanation for the generalist pay premium.