The literature examining analyst activity assumes that access to management is valued by analysts and their employers. We propose a readily observable measure of access: how often an analyst is invited to be among the first to ask questions in the Q&A session of an earnings conference call....

We study the tournament behavior of sell-side analysts under proper timing and show that a strong non-monotonic relationship exists between analysts' relative forecasting performance early in the tournament and their later deviations from consensus. Given that the highest performers earn...

This paper addresses the questions whether European mutual fund managers rely on sell-side analyst information with respect to their investment decisions and whether this behavior impacts fund performance. Based on a sample of over 4,300 European mutual funds and around 1.2 million portfolio...

This paper examines the economic consequences of the initiation of governance analyst coverage. Governance analysts process, enhance, and disseminate governance-related information to capital market participants via, for example, governance reports and ratings. Using an exogenous shock in the...

Top sportsmen often refer to competition against other top sportsmen as a motivation to exert more effort. We examine whether a similar pattern exists among another group of top professionals – star analysts. Our evidence suggests that star analysts concentrate their efforts and generate...

In this article, the authors posit a quid pro quo in economic benefits between sell-side equity analysts and large hedge fund managers. They show that large hedge funds opportunistically trade one to four days prior to the publication of a recommendation change, a finding consistent with flow of...

We investigate the profitability persistence of the investment recommendations from analysts listed in four different star rankings, Institutional Investor magazine, StarMine's “Top Earnings Estimators” and “Top Stock Pickers”, and The Wall Street Journal, and show the predictive power...

We examine professional connections among executives and analysts formed through overlapping historical employment. Analysts with professional connections to coverage firms have more accurate earnings forecasts, and issue more informative buy and sell recommendations. These analysts are more...

The purpose of this study is to assess whether the analysts' activity is valuable for investors, i. e., whether the managers follow the analysts' forecasts and whether those who follow are able to achieve higher returns. We analyzed the behavior of investment fund managers in the Brazilian...

This paper investigates the effect of stable business relationships between brokerage firms and mutual funds on analyst recommendations. Although the amount of commission fees a brokerage firm receives is the primary factor affecting recommendation aggressiveness of the brokerage firm's...