The Benefits of Selective Disclosure: Evidence from Private Firms
75 Pages Posted: 6 Dec 2010 Last revised: 22 Mar 2017
Date Written: March 15, 2017
Abstract
Private firms’ ability to communicate confidentially with selected investors implies that valuation disagreements between firms and investors are larger at public firms than at private ones. Consistent with the notion that misvaluation concerns lead public firms to hoard cash to be able to optimize the timing of their equity issues, I show that small and medium public firms hold substantially more cash than similar-sized private ones. This difference is driven by public firms with high misvaluation exposure, which use their cash to avoid raising equity when they are hit by a cash flow shock and their equity is likely undervalued.
Keywords: Private companies; Selective disclosure; Corporate cash; Precautionary motives; Market timing; Share issuance; IPOs
JEL Classification: G32; L26; D22
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation
Do you have a job opening that you would like to promote on SSRN?
Recommended Papers
-
The Determinants and Implications of Corporate Cash Holdings
By Tim C. Opler, Lee Pinkowitz, ...
-
The Cash Flow Sensitivity of Cash
By Heitor Almeida, Murillo Campello, ...
-
Why Do U.S. Firms Hold so Much More Cash than They Used to?
By Thomas W. Bates, Kathleen M. Kahle, ...
-
Why Do U.S. Firms Hold so Much More Cash than They Used to?
By Thomas W. Bates, Kathleen M. Kahle, ...
-
Bank Lines of Credit in Corporate Finance: An Empirical Analysis
By Amir Sufi
-
Corporate Governance and Firm Cash Holdings
By Jarrad Harford, Sattar Mansi, ...
-
Corporate Financial Policy and the Value of Cash
By Michael W. Faulkender and Rong Wang
-
Is Cash Negative Debt? A Hedging Perspective on Corporate Financial Policies
By Heitor Almeida, Viral V. Acharya, ...