In this dissertation, I study two topics in corporate finance. The first two chapters are under the similar theme in which I focus on the interaction between firms' financial policies and M&A activities. The third chapter considers the efficiency issue of managerial labor markets. First, I construct three measures of real asset liquidity and find that firms' ability to sell assets (real asset liquidity) affects corporate liquidity management. Specifically, firms with higher real asset liquidity hold less cash. The benefits of increased ability to sell assets are stronger for riskier firms. Second, we study the leverage dynamics around mergers and document that managers' expected length of post-merger integration period affects their choice of method of payment for deals and firms' capital structure during immediate post-merger years. We find that managers who expect a longer integration duration are more likely to finance deals with equity instead of debt. Also, firms tend to remain lower leveraged during the immediate post-merger if the remaining integration is expected to be long. Finally, using a sample of over 60,000 firm-years from 1990-2007, we find that CEOs are evaluated using relative-to-industry performance in both the external and internal labor market.
","abstract_html":"<p>In this dissertation, I study two topics in corporate finance. The first two chapters are under the similar theme in which I focus on the interaction between firms' financial policies and M&A activities. The third chapter considers the efficiency issue of managerial labor markets. First, I construct three measures of real asset liquidity and find that firms' ability to sell assets (real asset liquidity) affects corporate liquidity management. Specifically, firms with higher real asset liquidity hold less cash. The benefits of increased ability to sell assets are stronger for riskier firms. Second, we study the leverage dynamics around mergers and document that managers' expected length of post-merger integration period affects their choice of method of payment for deals and firms' capital structure during immediate post-merger years. We find that managers who expect a longer integration duration are more likely to finance deals with equity instead of debt. Also, firms tend to remain lower leveraged during the immediate post-merger if the remaining integration is expected to be long. Finally, using a sample of over 60,000 firm-years from 1990-2007, we find that CEOs are evaluated using relative-to-industry performance in both the external and internal labor market.</p>","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Huang, Jing"],"institution":null,"degree_name":"Ph.D.","degree_level":"Campus Access Dissertation","degree_discipline":"Moore School of Business","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Sergey Tsyplakov"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2012,"date_issued":"2012-01-01T08:00:00Z","date_published":"2012-01-01T08:00:00Z","updated_at":"2026-07-24T04:38:31Z","subjects":["Business","Business Administration, Management, and Operations","capital structure","cash holdings","ceo hiring/turnover","post-merger integration","real asset liquidity","relative performance evaluation"],"languages":[],"rights":["© 2012, Jing Huang"],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/etd/458","outbound_label":"Repository record","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Sergey Tsyplakov"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Huang, Jing"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Moore School of Business"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Campus Access Dissertation"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Ph.D."]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["Business","Business Administration, Management, and Operations","capital structure","cash holdings","ceo hiring/turnover","post-merger integration","real asset liquidity","relative performance evaluation"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["© 2012, Jing Huang"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/etd/458"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description.abstract","label":"Abstract","values":["In this dissertation, I study two topics in corporate finance. The first two chapters are under the similar theme in which I focus on the interaction between firms' financial policies and M&A activities. The third chapter considers the efficiency issue of managerial labor markets. First, I construct three measures of real asset liquidity and find that firms' ability to sell assets (real asset liquidity) affects corporate liquidity management. Specifically, firms with higher real asset liquidity hold less cash. The benefits of increased ability to sell assets are stronger for riskier firms. Second, we study the leverage dynamics around mergers and document that managers' expected length of post-merger integration period affects their choice of method of payment for deals and firms' capital structure during immediate post-merger years. We find that managers who expect a longer integration duration are more likely to finance deals with equity instead of debt. Also, firms tend to remain lower leveraged during the immediate post-merger if the remaining integration is expected to be long. Finally, using a sample of over 60,000 firm-years from 1990-2007, we find that CEOs are evaluated using relative-to-industry performance in both the external and internal labor market.
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