Essays on trademarks

The PhD thesis focus on trademarks. Trademarks are one type of intellectual property right which is very common and popular among rms across the entire economy, but have received so far little attention by academic researchers. Their primarily function is to distinguish the goods or services provided by the trademark's owner from those provided by its competitors: on the one hand the goodor service on top of which the trademark is applied becomes immediately recognizable by consumers; on the other hand, it protects the owner from competitors using its brand illegally. In my work I rely on the most comprehensive dataset on trademarks available at present and analyze the impact of trademarks on rm performance in the very short run (overnight) and in the long run. The thesis is divided into three chapters: the rst chapter summarizes the existing literature on trademarks, the second chapter analyses the impact of weaker trademark protection on stock market returns overnight, the third chapter measures the impact of stronger trademark protection on rm's prots, innovation and market share in the long run.