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Journal of Corporate Finance Vol. 62 2020

Selling to buy: Asset sales and acquisitions

Christos P. Mavis1; Nathan P. McNamee2; Dimitris Petmezas1; Nickolaos G. Travlos3,1,4

1 University of Surrey · 2 Southern Utah University · 3 Alba Graduate Business School, The American College of Greece · 4 The American College of Greece

open access

Abstract

This study explores the impact of joint corporate asset restructuring decisions, where firms sell an asset in order to fund a subsequent acquisition (selling-to-buy). We find that firms with asset sales are associated with increased acquisition probability. The effect is more pronounced for financially constrained firms. We also show that, in addition to the established improved firm efficiency from focus-increasing asset sales, financially constrained firms obtain the necessary funds to conduct focus-increasing acquisitions, improving further their efficiency. This translates into both higher long-run operating performance and stock abnormal returns at the asset sale announcement.

DOI
10.1016/j.jcorpfin.2020.101587
Volume
62
Pages
101587
Language
en
Sources
bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex crossref

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