An analysis of about 300000 earnings forecasts, created by 18000 individual forecasters for earnings of over 300 S&P listed firms, shows that these forecasts are predictable to a large extent using a statistical model that includes publicly available information. When we focus on the...

This paper examines the effect of the mandatory adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) by the European Union on financial analysts' information environment. To control for the effect of confounding concurrent events, we use a control sample of firms that had already...

Prior international accounting studies have examined mainly the supply side of analyst research. Specific trading rights and financial reporting systems in China provide a unique opportunity to test both demand and supply factors of analyst information. For shares traded only by less-informed...

Investors, regulators, academics, and researchers all emphasize the importance of financial statement comparability. However, an empirical construct of comparability is typically not specified. In addition, little evidence exists on the benefits of comparability to users. This study attempts to...

This study examines the effect of the readability of firm written communication on the behavior of sell-side financial analysts. Using a measure of the readability of corporate 10-K filings, we document that analyst following, the amount of effort incurred to generate their reports, and the...

We examine the extent to which analysts who participate in earnings conference calls by asking questions possess superior private information relative to analysts who do not ask questions. Using a large sample of earnings conference call transcripts over the period 2002 to 2005, we find that...

We analyze whether analysts sacrifice forecast accuracy for informativeness by examining: (1) the association between analysts' deviations from management guidance and earnings management; (2) the effect of the deviations on analyst forecast accuracy; and (3) the effect of the deviations on...

Despite the importance of sell-side financial analysts as information intermediaries in the capital market, little is known about how managerial equity ownership associates with their information environment. Using Barron, Kim, Lim and Stevens' (1998) framework of measuring information...

We analyze the quality of forward-looking information in the management reports (MR) of listed German corporations and the impact of differences in that quality on analysts' behaviour. For several years, German corporations are bounded to provide forward-looking information separately for the...

We argue that financial analysts can be viewed as participants of two tournaments (the “All-star” tournament and the intrafirm tournament) and examine whether analysts are incentivized by the tournament compensation structure. Using data from 1991 to 2007, we find that interim losers are...