Investors are often concerned that managers might hide negative information in filings. With advances in textual analysis and widespread document availability, individuals can now easily search for phrases that might be red flags indicating questionable behavior. We examine the impact of 13...

Form S-1 is the first SEC filing in the initial public offering (IPO) process. The tone of the S-1, in terms of its definitiveness in characterizing the firm's business strategy and operations, should affect investors' ability to value the IPO. We find that IPOs with high levels of uncertain...

Defining and measuring readability in the context of financial disclosures becomes important with the increasing use of textual analysis and the SEC's plain English initiative. We propose defining readability as the effective communication of valuation relevant information. The Fog Index — the...

Public companies in the United States are required to file annual reports (Form 10-K) that, among other things, disclose the risk factors that might negatively affect the price of their stock. The risk of a pandemic was well known before the current crisis and we now know the impact for...

Do investors quickly and rationally react to the content of oil-related news articles revealing supply and demand information? Our paper creates a novel keyword list of 130 oil-related words and modifiers that enable investors/researchers to measure the information content of oil stories. We...

Previous research uses negative word counts to measure the tone of a text. We show that word lists developed for other disciplines misclassify common words in financial text. In a large sample of 10 Ks during 1994 to 2008, almost three-fourths of the words identified as negative by the widely...

Using data from the SEC's EDGAR server log, we examine the consumption of financial information in filings from 2003 through 2012. The EDGAR filings represent a first-source database for investors doing fundamental research on stock valuations. The magnitude of daily EDGAR requests for 10-Ks is...

Current measures of bank distress find marginal value in predictive variables beyond a capital adequacy ratio and tend to miss extreme events impacting the entire sector. Our paper advocates a new proxy for bank distress: sentiment measures from banks' annual reports. After controlling for...

We create a database of company codes of ethics from firms listed on the Standard amp; Poor's 500 Index and, separately, a sample of small firms. The SEC believes that ldquo;ethics codes do, and should, vary from company to company.rdquo; Using textual analysis techniques, we measure the extent...

In October 1998, the SEC implemented a rule requiring firms to use plain English in their prospectus filings. In addition to the rule, the SEC encouraged the use of plain English in all filings and communication with shareholders. Did the SEC rule significantly impact managers' disclosure style?...