Prior literature demonstrates that an increased trading activity of a fi rm's stock is associated with abnormal future stock returns (the high-volume return premium) and interprets this phenomenon as evidence that increased visibility generates reductions in cost of capital. Motivated by this...

We provide the first large-scale study of the performance of expected-return proxies (ERPs) internationally. Analyst-forecast-based ICCs are sparsely populated and not robustly associated with future returns. Earnings-model-forecast-based ICCs are well-populated, but are unreliable outside the...

The implied cost of capital (ICC), the internal rate of return that equates speculative stock price to discounted expected future dividends, includes a mispricing-driven component in addition to expected return. The estimated relation of a mispricing-associated factor (X) with ICC is thus a...

We investigate the change in the aggregate earnings-returns relation from negative to positive. We first identify a gradual structural break around the second quarter of 1991. We then find evidence of three contributing factors to the change in the relation. They are: i) an increase in the...

There is a logical bound on the time-series variability of analyst forecasts; when variability exceeds this bound it must be caused by something besides statistically rational forecasting. We document occurrences of excessively volatile analyst forecasts and show that they influence investment...

Financial crises are typically marked by substantial increases in ambiguity where prices appear to decouple from fundamentals. Consistent with ambiguity-based asset pricing theories, we find that ambiguity concerns are more severe for firms with higher pre-crisis earnings volatility, causing...

This study uses U.S. closed-end funds to investigate whether the realized component of fair value earnings conveys information about future fund and benchmark market performance and whether the market impounds this predictive information into fund share prices. We find that the realized...

This study examines the effect of option volume relative to stock volume (O/S) on market response to earnings surprises. The market reaction per unit of earnings surprise is lower for firms that have high O/S prior to earnings announcement than for firms with low O/S prior to earnings...

This paper examines the effect of income smoothing on information uncertainty, stock returns, and cost of equity. I show that income smoothing through both total accruals and discretionary accruals tends to reduce firms' information uncertainty, as measured by stock return volatility, analyst...

We outline a framework in which accounting “valuation anchors" could be connected to expected stock returns. Under two general conditions, expected log returns is a log- linear function of a valuation (market value-to-accounting) multiple and the expected growth in the valuation anchor. We...