What's in a name.com?: The effects of '.com' name changes on stock prices and trading activity

This paper uses a market signaling perspective to examine investor reaction s to firm announcements of name changes to include '.com.' Finns that chang e their name as a purely cosmetic technique are contrasted to those that em ploy other strategic investments. Results show that announcements of '.com' name changes are associated with significant increases in stock prices and trading activity. Furthermore, the magnitude of investor reactions is sign ificantly larger when name changes are accompanied by other strategies. Cop yright (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.