TY  - JOUR
AU  - Ritter,Jay
AU  - Welch,Ivo
TI  - A Review of IPO Activity, Pricing, and Allocations
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 8805
PY  - 2002
Y2  - February 2002
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w8805
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w8805.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Jay Ritter
Department of Finance
School of Business
University of Florida
P.O. Box 117168
Gainsville, FL 32611-7168
Tel: 352/846-2837
E-Mail: jay.ritter@cba.ufl.edu

Ivo Welch
Anderson School at UCLA (C519)
110 Westwood Place (951481)
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1482
E-Mail: ivo.welch@anderson.ucla.edu
AB  - We review the theory and evidence on IPO activity: why firms go public, why they reward first-day investors with considerable underpricing, and how IPOs perform in the long run. Our perspective on the literature is three-fold: First, we believe that many IPO phenomena are not stationary. Second, we believe research into share allocation issues is the most promising area of research in IPOs at the moment. Third, we argue that asymmetric information is not the primary driver of many IPO phenomena. Instead, we believe future progress in the literature will come from non-rational and agency conflict explanations. We describe some promising such alternatives.
ER  -