Prior work on cash reserves in the U.S. provides mixed evidence on whether shareholders should be concerned about large reserves. For example, Opler et al. (1999) find that the transitional probabilities out of the high cash group were slow, suggesting that managers hold cash as part of a precautionary motive. Similarly, Mikkelson and Partch (2003) find that persistent extreme cash holdings do not lead to poor performance and do not represent conflicts of interests between managers and shareholders, evidence consistent with cash reserves enhancing firm value. Alternatively, Harford (1999) suggests that there is reason for shareholders to be concerned about managers’ stewardship of large pools of internal funds. He shows that cash-rich firms are more likely to make acquisitions and their acquisitions are more likely to be value-decreasing. More broadly, Dittmar and Mahrt-Smith (2006) document that shareholders assign a lower value to an additional dollar of cash reserves when agency problems are likely to be greater at the firm.