Unwrapping the "Pass the Parcel" Deals - A Study of Value Creation in Secondary Buyouts

Sammanfattning: This thesis examines the economic rationale of secondary buyouts and whether they provide scope for operational value creation. We formulate a series of four hypotheses to investigate two distinct categories of value sources: i) growth and ii) efficiency. The sample constructed to test our hypotheses encompasses 85 secondary buyouts and 237 primary buyouts in Sweden over the period 2000-2018. Our findings suggest that secondary buyouts outperform their primary counterparts in terms of growth measures. We also find support to conclude that secondary buyouts exhibit higher levels of efficiency improvements in terms of EBITDA. Overall, our analysis suggests that secondary buyouts are not in any way subordinate primary buyouts in operational value creation.