Firm size, a proxy for takeover deterrent, is measured as the natural log of total assets. Firm leverage is
measured as the ratio of total debt (short- and long-term debt) to assets. The market to book ratio, a proxy for
growth opportunities, is measured as (book value of assets minus book value of equity plus the market value
of equity) divided by book value of assets. The cash flow ratio is measured as earnings after interest, dividend,
and taxes, but before depreciation, divided by assets. The standard deviation of the firm’s cash flows, a proxy
for business conditions, is computed using the firm’s standard deviation of the cash flow ratio for the past ten
years. Net working capital to total assets, a proxy for liquidity, is the ratio of current assets net of cash minus
current liabilities divided by assets. The ratio of R&D to sales is used as a proxy for financial distress costs.
The ratios of capital expenditures to assets and acquisition to assets indicate whether managers attempt to
increase the size of their firms.4 Given a small number of extreme observations and to ensure that outliers are
not driving any of our results, we winsorize the variables cash to sales, leverage, market to book, cash flow to
assets, standard deviation of cash flow to assets, net working capital to assets, R&D to sales, capital
expenditures to assets, and acquisition to assets at the 0.5% level on each tail. Though not reported, we also
estimate all reported models using the unadjusted variables and find similar results.