Why firms adopt antitakeover arrangements

Description

"Firms going public have increasingly been incorporating antitakeover provisions in their IPO charters, while shareholders of existing companies have increasingly been voting in opposition to such charter provisions. This paper identifies possible explanations for this empirical pattern. Specifically, I analyze explanations based on (1) the role of antitakeover arrangements in encouraging founders to break up their initial control blocks, (2) efficient private benefits of control, (3) agency problems among pre-IPO shareholders, (4) agency problems between pre-IPO shareholders and their IPO lawyers, (5) asymmetric information between founders and public investors about the firm's future growth prospects, and (6) bounded attention and imperfect pricing at the IPO stage"--National Bureau of Economic Research web site.

Subjects

Series Statement

• NBER working paper series ;
• working paper 10190
• Working paper series (National Bureau of Economic Research : Online) ;
• working paper no. 10190.

Links

• http://papers.nber.org/papers/W10190
• URL