{"title":"Charity begins at the office: issuing cheap stock and stock options to employees and insiders before going public","authors":"John D. Finnerty","doi":"10.1108/mf-09-2023-0540","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<h3>Purpose</h3>\n<p>Press reports have indicated that firms frequently underprice restricted stock and employee stock options. I test for underpricing of stock and options.</p><!--/ Abstract__block -->\n<h3>Design/methodology/approach</h3>\n<p>I examined a sample of 5,333 private firm stock and option issuances between 1985 and 2017. I tested for underpricing using two approaches: assuming investors have no special market-timing ability and assuming instead they have perfect market-timing ability.</p><!--/ Abstract__block -->\n<h3>Findings</h3>\n<p>I find evidence of widespread stock and option underpricing by private firms before they go public reflecting large discounts that exceed reasonable compensation for lack of marketability. Unreported underpricing is more frequent in the last pre-IPO private equity transactions that offer the last opportunity to give such discounts before the stock is publicly traded, but the discounts are greater in the earlier pre-IPO transactions where unreported discounts are presumably tougher for the SEC to detect. Underpricing is still detected even when the actual DLOMs are tested against a benchmark that assumes investors have perfect market-timing ability.</p><!--/ Abstract__block -->\n<h3>Research limitations/implications</h3>\n<p>Firms frequently underprice restricted stock and employee stock options. Firms tend to underprice stock options more frequently than restricted stock, but restricted stock tends to be priced at deeper discounts when recipients are assumed not to have any special market-timing ability.</p><!--/ Abstract__block -->\n<h3>Practical implications</h3>\n<p>Private firms issue restricted stock and options as incentive compensation. Lowballing the valuation transfers wealth from outside stockholders to employees/insiders. Wealth transfers take place through the issuance of equity claims to employees/insiders before firms go public. I found that more than a quarter of the DLOMs exceed the theoretical maximum by, on average, between 16% (median) and 20% (mean). This finding raises two questions worthy of investigation. First, to what extent do the frequency and magnitude of DLOMs above the theoretical maximum depend on whether a board of directors obtains an independent appraisal of a stock’s fair market value? Second, if DLOMs above the theoretical maximum are observed even when the stock is independently appraised, how do appraisers justify such large DLOMs?</p><!--/ Abstract__block -->\n<h3>Social implications</h3>\n<p>The wealth transfers that take place through the issuance of equity claims to employees/insiders before firms go public benefit employees/insiders at the expense of outside shareholders.</p><!--/ Abstract__block -->\n<h3>Originality/value</h3>\n<p>My paper is the first to furnish evidence of widespread stock and option underpricing by private firms before they go public; demonstrate that the unreported underpricing is more frequent in the last pre-IPO private equity transactions that offer the last opportunity to give such discounts before the stock is publicly traded and show that the discounts are greater in the earlier pre-IPO transactions where unreported discounts are presumably tougher for the SEC to detect.</p><!--/ Abstract__block -->","PeriodicalId":18140,"journal":{"name":"Managerial Finance","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.9000,"publicationDate":"2024-09-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Managerial Finance","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1108/mf-09-2023-0540","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"BUSINESS, FINANCE","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Purpose
Press reports have indicated that firms frequently underprice restricted stock and employee stock options. I test for underpricing of stock and options.
Design/methodology/approach
I examined a sample of 5,333 private firm stock and option issuances between 1985 and 2017. I tested for underpricing using two approaches: assuming investors have no special market-timing ability and assuming instead they have perfect market-timing ability.
Findings
I find evidence of widespread stock and option underpricing by private firms before they go public reflecting large discounts that exceed reasonable compensation for lack of marketability. Unreported underpricing is more frequent in the last pre-IPO private equity transactions that offer the last opportunity to give such discounts before the stock is publicly traded, but the discounts are greater in the earlier pre-IPO transactions where unreported discounts are presumably tougher for the SEC to detect. Underpricing is still detected even when the actual DLOMs are tested against a benchmark that assumes investors have perfect market-timing ability.
Research limitations/implications
Firms frequently underprice restricted stock and employee stock options. Firms tend to underprice stock options more frequently than restricted stock, but restricted stock tends to be priced at deeper discounts when recipients are assumed not to have any special market-timing ability.
Practical implications
Private firms issue restricted stock and options as incentive compensation. Lowballing the valuation transfers wealth from outside stockholders to employees/insiders. Wealth transfers take place through the issuance of equity claims to employees/insiders before firms go public. I found that more than a quarter of the DLOMs exceed the theoretical maximum by, on average, between 16% (median) and 20% (mean). This finding raises two questions worthy of investigation. First, to what extent do the frequency and magnitude of DLOMs above the theoretical maximum depend on whether a board of directors obtains an independent appraisal of a stock’s fair market value? Second, if DLOMs above the theoretical maximum are observed even when the stock is independently appraised, how do appraisers justify such large DLOMs?
Social implications
The wealth transfers that take place through the issuance of equity claims to employees/insiders before firms go public benefit employees/insiders at the expense of outside shareholders.
Originality/value
My paper is the first to furnish evidence of widespread stock and option underpricing by private firms before they go public; demonstrate that the unreported underpricing is more frequent in the last pre-IPO private equity transactions that offer the last opportunity to give such discounts before the stock is publicly traded and show that the discounts are greater in the earlier pre-IPO transactions where unreported discounts are presumably tougher for the SEC to detect.
期刊介绍:
Managerial Finance provides an international forum for the publication of high quality and topical research in the area of finance, such as corporate finance, financial management, financial markets and institutions, international finance, banking, insurance and risk management, real estate and financial education. Theoretical and empirical research is welcome as well as cross-disciplinary work, such as papers investigating the relationship of finance with other sectors.