If you bind the event through mootools' addEvent function your event handler will get a fixed (augmented) event passed as the parameter. It will always contain the preventDefault() method.
Try out this fiddle to see the difference in event binding. http://jsfiddle.net/pFqrY/8/
// preventDefault always works
$("mootoolsbutton").addEvent('click', function(event) {
alert(typeof(event.preventDefault));
});
// preventDefault missing in IE
<button
id="htmlbutton"
onclick="alert(typeof(event.preventDefault));">
button</button>
For all jQuery users out there you can fix an event when needed. Say that you used HTML onclick=".." and get a IE specific event that lacks preventDefault(), just use this code to get it.
e = $.event.fix(e);
After that e.preventDefault(); works fine.