Latent class analysis of IPOs in the Nordics

Abstract

We examine how the offer size of initial public offerings (IPOs) and the market return on their issue date are related to the pricing of 314 IPOs issued by firms in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden at the one-day, one-week and four-week horizons using latent class analysis, which is a structural equation methodology. We identify four latent classes at each time horizon, where classes (i)-(ii) include a greater number of IPOs: (i) large-sized and underpriced IPOs; (ii) small-sized and overpriced IPOs; (iii) small-sized and severely underpriced IPOs; and (iv) large-sized IPOs that are overpriced at the one-day horizon but underpriced at the four-week horizon. The market returns are normal in latent classes (i)-(iii) and weak in class (iv). Approximately half of the IPOs in the technology sector are in the latent class with small-sized and overpriced IPOs, and most of the IPOs in the class with small-sized and severely underpriced IPOs are in the healthcare sector. Finally, the underpricing of IPOs is not corrected after one or four weeks of trading. Instead, the mean return and the standard deviation of returns increase with the time horizon.