Graduation Year

2016

Document Type

Thesis

Degree

Ph.D.

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)

Degree Granting Department

Finance

Major Professor

Christos Pantzalis, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Daniel Bradley, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Jianping Qi, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Ninon Sutton, Ph.D.

Keywords

Lottery-type Stocks, Turn-of-the-month Effect, Gambling, Earnings Announcements, Seasoned Equity Offerings

Abstract

In the first essay titled “Monthly Cyclicality in Retail Investors’ Liquidity and Lottery-type Stocks at the Turn of the Month”, we find that the well-documented underperformance of lottery stocks masks a within-month cyclical pattern. Demand for lottery stocks increases at the turn of the month especially in areas whose demographic profile resembles that of the typical lottery-ticket buyers (i.e., gamblers) driving their prices higher at the turn of the month. This effect is particularly pronounced among firms located in areas whose demographic profile resembles that of the typical lottery-ticket buyer and propelled by the within-month cyclicality of local investors’ personal liquidity positions. A long-short investment strategy based on this cyclical pattern of lottery stocks performance yields gross abnormal returns of about 15% per year.

In the second essay titled “Lottery-type Stocks and Corporate Strategies at the Turn of the Month”, we test whether cyclical demand for lottery stocks by retail investors, that tends to peak at the turn-of-the-month (ToM), affects firms’ financial activities. Consistent with the notion that the peak in demand is driven by a propensity to gamble and is associated with inattention, we find underreaction to earnings news issued at the ToM by lottery-type firms located in areas with many gambling investors. We also find that the ToM also provides a window of opportunity for SEO issuing lottery-type firms. Such issuing firms may strategically choose to issue lottery-type stocks at the ToM to save the direct marketing costs because it flattens the elasticity of pre-offer demand curve.

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