This paper examines the evolution of productivity in U.S. manufacturing plants from 1963 to 1992. We define a vintage effect as the change in productivity of recent cohorts of new plants relative to earlier cohorts of new plants, and a survival effect as the change in productivity of a particular cohort of surviving plants as it ages. Both factors contribute to industry productivity growth, but play offsetting roles in determining a cohort's relative position in the productivity distribution. Recent cohorts enter with higher productivity than earlier entrants did, whereas surviving cohorts show productivity increases as they age. These two effects roughly offset each other, however, so there is a rough convergence in productivity across cohorts in 1992 and 1987.

Managers can decide to reduce a warrant's exercise price. A reduction in exercise price can induce exercise (a conversion-forcing reduction) or not (a long-term reduction). Conversion-forcing firms show an abnormal return of −1.53% on the announcement day but they perform well over the three years following the announcement. This finding suggests that the funds raised from warrant exercise are invested in profitable projects. Long-term reductions show an abnormal return of −1.15% on the announcement day. These firms also perform well following the reduction, which suggests that the lower exercise price restores managerial incentives.

How important are cross-stock common factors in the price discovery/liquidity provision process in equity markets? We investigate two aspects of this question for the 30 Dow stocks. First, using principal components and canonical correlation analyses we find that both returns and order flows are characterized by common factors. Commonality in the order flows explains roughly two-thirds of the commonality in returns. Second, we examine variation and common covariation in various liquidity proxies and market depth (trade impact) coefficients. Liquidity proxies such as the bid–ask spread and bid–ask quote sizes help explain time variation in trade impacts. The common factors in these liquidity proxies are, however, relatively small.

This study examines whether rates of information flow differ between trading and non-trading periods, and whether the variances of pricing errors differ at the open and close of trading. The approach improves on existing methods by allowing for correlation between pricing errors and information flow, and by conducting inferences at the individual security level. The daytime rate of information flow is about seven times the overnight rate, and the variances of pricing errors at the open are not different from those at the close of trading. This evidence differs from existing results based on return variance ratios.

Buying recent winners and shorting recent losers guarantees time-varying factor exposures in accordance with the performance of common risk factors during the ranking period. Adjusted for this dynamic risk exposure, momentum profits are remarkably stable across subperiods of the entire post-1926 era. Factor models can explain 95% of winner or loser return variability, but cannot explain their mean returns. Momentum strategies which base winner or loser status on stock-specific return components are more profitable than those based on total returns. Neither industry effects nor cross-sectional differences in expected returns are the primary cause of the momentum phenomenon.

This paper extracts both the implied default recovery ratio and the risk-neutral default probability term structure for Russian Federation and Republic of Argentina US dollar Eurobonds during the 1998 Russian default crisis. This crisis provides a unique window into the impact of changing default probabilities and recovery ratio assumptions on credit-sensitive sovereign bond prices. For the Russian Eurobonds, the sample paths suggest a two-phase crisis revaluation. Shifts in default probabilities account for most of the initial price collapse. Marked decreases in the implied default recovery ratio dominate the second phase. Investors never cut their recovery value assumptions for Argentine debt.

This paper investigates the determination and consequences of organizational changes (OC) in a panel of British and French establishments. Organizational changes include the decentralization of authority, delayering of managerial functions, and increased multitasking. We argue that OC and skills are complements. We offer support for the hypothesis of “skill-biased” organizational change with three empirical findings. First, organizational changes reduce the demand for unskilled workers in both countries. Second, OC is negatively associated with increases in regional skill price differentials (a measure of the relative supply of skill). Third, OC leads to greater productivity increases in establishments with larger initial skill endowments. Technical change is also complementary with human capital, but the effects of OC is not simply due to its correlation with technological change but has an independent role.