The Journal of Finance

The Journal of Finance publishes leading research across all the major fields of finance. It is one of the most widely cited journals in academic finance, and in all of economics. Each of the six issues per year reaches over 8,000 academics, finance professionals, libraries, and government and financial institutions around the world. The journal is the official publication of The American Finance Association, the premier academic organization devoted to the study and promotion of knowledge about financial economics.

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Do Stock Mergers Create Value for Acquirers?

Published: 05/20/2009   |   DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-6261.2009.01459.x

PAVEL G. SAVOR, QI LU

This paper finds support for the hypothesis that overvalued firms create value for long‐term shareholders by using their equity as currency. Any approach centered on abnormal returns is complicated by the fact that the most overvalued firms have the greatest incentive to engage in stock acquisitions. We solve this endogeneity problem by creating a sample of mergers that fail for exogenous reasons. We find that unsuccessful stock bidders significantly underperform successful ones. Failure to consummate is costlier for richly priced firms, and the unrealized acquirer‐target combination would have earned higher returns. None of these results hold for cash bids.

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