Knowledge that Transforms

The optimal factor timing portfolio is equivalent to the stochastic discount factor. We propose and implement a method to characterize both empirically. Our approach imposes restrictions on the dynamics of expected returns, leading to an economically plausible SDF. Market-neutral equity factors are strongly and robustly predictable. Exploiting this predictability leads to substantial improvement in portfolio performance relative to static factor investing. The variance of the corresponding SDF is larger, is more variable over time, and exhibits different cyclical behavior than estimates ignoring this fact. These results pose new challenges for theories that aim to match the cross-section of stock returns.

Conventional estimates of the costs of taking liquidity in options markets are large. Nonetheless, options trading volume is high. We resolve this puzzle by showing that options price changes are predictable at high frequency, and many traders time executions by buying (selling) when the option fair value is close to the ask (bid). Effective spreads of traders who time executions are less than 40% of the size of conventional measures, and the overall average effective spread is one-quarter smaller than conventional estimates. Price impact measures are also affected. These findings alter conclusions about the after-cost profitability of options trading strategies.

We document that firms whose compensation peers experience weak say on pay votes reduce CEO compensation following those votes. Reductions reflect proxy adviser concerns about peers’ compensation contracts and are stronger when CEOs receive excess compensation, when they compete more closely with their weak-vote peers in the executive labor market, and when those peers perform well. Reductions occur following peers’ disclosures of revised pay and are proportional to those needed to retain firms’ relative positions in their peer groups. We conclude that the spillover effects of shareholder voting occur through both learning and compensation targeting channels.

Using daily advertising data, we analyze the short-term effects of advertising on investor attention and on financial market outcomes. Based on various investor attention proxies, we show that advertising positively affects attention. However, it has only little impact on turnover and liquidity. Most importantly, short-term stock returns are not significantly influenced by advertising. Further results suggest that previous findings of an economically significant positive relation between advertising and returns are due to reverse causality. Thus, the belief that stock prices can be temporarily inflated via advertising is misguided.

We examine empirically and theoretically the relation between firms’ risk and distance to consumers in a production network. We document two novel facts: firms farther away from consumers have higher risk premiums and higher exposure to aggregate productivity. We quantitatively explain these findings using a general equilibrium model featuring a multilayer production process. The economic force is “vertical creative destruction,” that is, positive productivity shocks to suppliers devalue customers’ assets-in-place, thereby lowering the cyclicality of downstream firms’ values. We show that vertical creative destruction varies with competition and firm characteristics and generates sizable cross-sectional differences in risk premiums.

We exploit the adoption of U.S. state-level labor protection laws to study the effect of employment protection on corporate investment rates and sales growth. We find that, following the adoption of these laws, capital expenditures as a percentage of book assets decrease, resulting in slower sales growth. Our findings are consistent with theories predicting that greater employment protection discourages investment by making projects more irreversible. Supporting this channel, following negative cash flow shocks, firms are less likely to downsize operations in states that have adopted these laws but more likely to downsize in states that have not adopted these laws.

Over the period 1980–2012, large U.S. commercial banks raise and retain less equity during credit expansions, which amplifies their leverage. The decrease in equity issuance is large relative to subsequent banking losses. I consider a variety of explanations for why banks resist raising equity and find evidence consistent with the diminishment of creditor market discipline due to government guarantees. I test this explanation by analyzing the removal of government guarantees to German Landesbank creditors and find that creditor market discipline and equity issuance increase. These findings help explain why banks resist raising equity, making financial distress more likely.

I document that dividend growth and returns on the aggregate U.S. stock market are more correlated with consumption growth in bad economic times. In a consumption-based asset pricing model with a generalized disappointment-averse investor and small, IID consumption shocks, this feature results in a realistic equity premium despite low risk aversion. The model is consistent with the main facts about stock market risk premiums inferred from equity index options, remains tightly parameterized, and allows for analytical solutions for asset prices. An extension with non-IID dynamics accounts for excess volatility and return predictability, while preserving the model’s consistency with option moments.

We examine the determinants of vertical acquisitions using product text linked to product vocabulary from input-output tables. We find that the innovation stage is important in understanding vertical integration. R&D-intensive firms are less likely to become targets of vertical acquisitions. In contrast, firms with patented innovation are more likely to sell to vertically related buyers. Firms’ R&D intensity is a more important deterrent to their vertical acquisitions when the provision of innovation incentives by potential acquirers is more difficult. The role of patents in fostering vertical acquisitions is more prevalent when potential buyers face a higher risk of holdup.

We explore the implications of ambiguity for the pricing of credit default swaps (CDSs). A model of heterogeneous investors with independent preferences for ambiguity and risk shows that, because CDS contracts are assets in zero net supply, the net credit risk exposure of the marginal investor determines the sign of the impact of ambiguity on CDS spreads. We find that ambiguity has an economically significant negative impact on CDS spreads, on average, suggesting that the marginal investor is a net buyer of credit protection. A 1-standard-deviation increase in ambiguity is estimated to decrease CDS spreads by approximately 6%.