The central question surrounding the IPO underpricing puzzle is why issuers are willing to sell their shares at a price that is less than what the market is willing to pay. This paper shows that a major reason why managers are willing to underprice shares at IPO is that they use options and stock grants to protect themselves from the dilution to their existing shares. Underpricing can have a la...

We study the underpricing of Chinese IPOs, using data of 308 flrm-commitment new issues. We flnd that underpricing can be explained in terms of a separating equilibrium under asymmetric information in which underpricing is a strategy for flrms to signal their value to investors. We show that bribery is an unlikely cause of the high IPO underpricing observed in the Chinese data. We also investig...

Underpricing in IPOs, which is the first day stock price return, is a significant cost to the issuers of raising capital. The money left on the table also attracts attention from different financial players such as institutional investors and big underwriters for its profits and commissions. This paper reviews two hypotheses for IPO underpricing, the general information asymmetry theory that ‘u...

We propose a new theory of IPO underpricing where the asymmetry of the underwriter’s incentives and presence of valuation uncertainty makes underpricing unavoidable. We show how the size of underpricing is defined by valuation uncertainty of the stock (“volatility”) and by the fee level. We quantify the relationship between level of underpricing and level of price volatility. We also show that ...

This paper analyses the determinants of underpricing of firms that went public on the Nouveau Marché between 1996 and 2000 and on the Neuer Markt between 1997 and 2000. Evidence suggests that firms that went public on the Nouveau Marché experienced lower underpricing than their counterparts that went public on the Neuer Markt. This difference in underpricing is partly explained by the different...

In this paper we examine the premarket underpricing phenomenon within a group of venture-backed and a group of non venture-backed initial public offerings (IPOs) using a stochastic frontier approach. Consistent with previous research, we find that venture-backed IPOs are managed by more reputable underwriters and are generally associated with less underwriter compensation. However, unlike other...

This paper examines how the difference in institutional environments constitutes differential IPO underpricing across countries. Using the Heritage Foundation’s Index of Economic Freedom (IEF) as a proxy for the heterogeneous institutional environment, and a sample of 3728 IPOs from 22 countries and regions over the period 1993–2014, we find that countries with higher economic freedom have sign...

This paper develops a theory of gradual sales and underpricing of shares in privatizations. Gradual sales and underpricing are strategic devices used by policymakers to signal commitment when the capital markets are unsure about the government's type and attempt to infer it from observed performance. The model establishes for which firms the use of underpricing is optimal. Further, in the conte...

The central question surrounding the IPO underpricing puzzle is why issuers are willing to sell their shares at a price that is less than what the market is willing to pay. This paper shows that a major reason why managers are willing to underprice shares at IPO is that they use options and stock grants to protect themselves from the dilution to their existing shares. Underpricing can have a la...

The underpricing of initial public offerings is a well-documented fact of empirical equity market research. Theories explain this underpricing with market imperfections. We study three empirically relevant IPO mechanisms under almost perfect market conditions in the laboratory: a stylized book building approach, a closed book auction, and an open book auction. We report underpricing in each of ...