The Market Value Implications of Net Periodic Pension Cost Components

This paper examines whether market participants implicitly assign different coefficients to pension cost components when determining security prices. The major findings are: (1) The pension cost components’ coefficients generally differ from one another. As predicted, the transition asset amortization coefficient is lower than other pension coefficients, and is insignificantly different from zero. (2) Consistent with the market viewing pension-related income streams as less risky, the pension coefficients are generally larger than the nonpension coefficients. Additional specification tests permitting nonpension coefficients to vary with risk, tax-payer status, and industry membership, generally support the basic findings, although the significance levels are generally higher.