People often forget and sometimes fantasize. This paper reports a large-scale experiment on memory errors and their relation to preferential traits including time preference, attitudes toward risk and ambiguity, and psychological characteristics such as anticipatory feelings. We observe systematic incidences of false memory in favor of positive events and positive amnesia in forgetting past negative events. Both positive delusion and positive confabulation significantly relate to present bias, but this is not the case for positive amnesia. In an intraperson, multiple-self model, we demonstrate that positive false memory, rather than selective amnesia, serves to enhance confidence in one’s future self in equilibrium, thereby accounting for our experimental findings.

We examine the motives behind the share repurchase decisions of initial public offering (IPO) firms by studying the stock and operating performance after the IPO date. We find that IPO firms that announce repurchases within 3years of IPO dates exhibit poorer long-run abnormal operating performance than other IPO firms. These IPO firms also experience poorer stock return performance and downward analyst forecast revisions. Moreover, these firms show intensive insider selling transactions after the IPO date. These results for IPO announcing repurchase firms are consistent with the misleading hypothesis, which suggests that these IPO firms mislead investors by announcing repurchases as false signals.

Using changes in the MSCI Standard Country Indices for 29 countries between 1998 and 2001, we document that stock returns and volumes exhibit “index effects” in international markets similar to those detected by the studies of US stocks. The stocks added to the indices experience a sharp rise in prices after the announcement and a further rise during the period preceding the actual change, though part of the gain is lost after the actual change date. The stocks that are deleted from the indices, on the other hand, witness a steady and marked decline in their prices. Trading volumes increase significantly and remain at high levels after the change date for the added stocks. There are also considerable cross-country variations in these effects. Tests using data on various measures reflecting the different hypotheses fail to turn up any evidence in support of information effects. Our evidence appears to be more supportive of the downward sloping demand curve hypothesis. There is some evidence of price-pressure and mild evidence of liquidity effect, particularly in Japan and UK.

By focusing on the price and trading volume movements around the ex-days of shareholder perks, we investigate whether and how investors value shareholder perks. Using comprehensive shareholder perks data from Japan, we demonstrate a significant price decline for stocks with shareholder perks around ex-days, as an evidence that shareholder perks are valuable for investors. We also show that heterogeneous preference for shareholder perks among investors leads to active trading around the ex-day. A price drop larger than the estimated cost of shareholder perks implies that gift giving is welfare increasing, providing a new insight into the long-standing debate on whether gift giving creates welfare gain or loss. This study also provides empirical findings that are consistent with behavioral model of mental accounting, which posits that receiving a gift-in-kind rather than cash or gift cards is utility increasing for consumers.

Issues related to low-balling of initial year audit fees and the resultant impact on audit quality have received significant attention from regulators in many countries. Using 9,684 observations from China during the years 2002–2011, we find that there is a significant initial year audit fee discount following an audit firm change when both of the signing audit partners are different from the prior year. The evidence is mixed if one or both of the signing partners from the prior year also moves with the client to the new audit firm. We find evidence of audit fee discounting in our analysis of fee levels, but not in our analysis of changes in audit fees from the prior year. Sanctions for problem audits and greater earnings management are more likely when there is an audit firm change that involves two new signing partners together with initial year audit fee discounting.