Real earnings management (REM) practices are related to subsequent stock returns. Specifically, stocks of firms with abnormally low (high) levels of operating cash flows underperform (outperform) in the subsequent year, whereas stocks of firms with abnormally low (high) levels of production...

Using idiosyncratic volatility as a proxy for arbitrage costs, the authors found that the highly publicized accrual and asset growth anomalies exist because of high barriers to arbitrage, occurring predominantly in the universe of stocks with higher arbitrage risks. Therefore, investors who seek...