Does intellectual capital disclosure in analysts' reports vary by firm characteristics?

In this paper, we explore how Australian sell-side financial analysts contribute to the supply of intellectual capital (IC) information in the capital market. Toward this end, we examine how types and semantic properties of IC disclosures in analyst reports vary by a number of firm-specific characteristics likely to be associated with voluntary corporate disclosure. Consistent with our expectations, we find that the uncertainty associated with forecasting firm's earnings and the IC intensity of the industry in which the firm operates are associated positively with the extent as well as several semantic properties of IC disclosure in analyst reports. Highlighting that IC disclosure in analyst reports is not always a function of the extent of IC disclosed by firm, we find a statistically significant but negative association between firm profitability and the extent and certain semantic properties of IC disclosure in analyst reports. Firm size was significantly and positively associated with only the extent of forward-looking IC disclosure. Of the three categories of IC, only relation capital disclosure varied with any of the explanatory variables. Our findings highlight the importance of analyst reports as an IC communication media that could complement corporate communications of IC not only for firms disclosing less IC information voluntarily but also for those firms known to disclose more.     

Analysts’ Perceptions of Intellectual Capital Information

This study is based on a survey of 324 financial analysts in Japan. The survey concerns analysts’ perceptions of intellectual capital (IC) information and its links to the evaluation of companies. The value relevance of and the access to IC‐related information reveals a large gap on many items. The analysis further shows that the lack of access to information hampers analysts’ use of IC in their evaluation of companies, particularly in their use of human capital measures. Attitudes towards more disclosure and standardisation are mainly driven by perceptions of what generates value in companies.     

Information about bank intangibles,analyst information intermediation,and the role of knowledge and social forces in the ‘market for information’

Although developments in the sell-side analyst literature have revealed the role of intellectual capital (IC) in analysts’ work, the whole information intermediation progress of IC remains a “black box”. This paper develops an analyst information intermediation model, illustrating how ‘soft’ information changes through analyst acquisition, processing and disclosure of information. Bourdieu’s ideas of habitus, field and capital are used to develop our explanation of the analyst information intermediation model. We argue that the combination of empirical evidence and theoretical explanation provides a new and more comprehensive way to improve understanding of the role of analysts within knowledge and social contexts.     

Book Review

This paper investigates the role of intellectual capital information (ICI) in sell-side analysts’ fundamental analysis and valuation of companies. Using in-depth semi-structured interviews, it penetrates the black box of analysts’ valuation decision-making by identifying and conceptualising the mechanisms and rationales by which ICI is integrated within their valuation decision processes. We find that capital market participants are not ambivalent to ICI, and ICI is used: (1) to form analysts’ perceptions of the overall quality, strengths and future prospects of companies; (2) in deriving valuation model inputs; (3) in setting price targets and making investment recommendations; and (4) as an important and integral element in analyst–client communications. We show that: there is a ‘pecking order’ of mechanisms for incorporating ICI in valuations, based on quantifiability; IC valuation is grounded in valuation theory; there are designated entry points in the valuation process for ICI; and a number of factors affect analysts’ ICI use in valuation. We also identify a need to redefine ‘value-relevant’ ICI to include non-price-sensitive information; acknowledge the boundedness and contextuality of analysts’ rationality and motives of their ICI use; and the important role of analyst–client meetings for ICI communication.     

The use of intellectual capital information in investment decisions: An empirical study using analyst reports

Do financial analysts convey intellectual capital information in their recommendations? This study of a sample of analyst reports on large, listed Spanish companies provides some evidence on the question. Analysts usually report information regarding a company's strategy, customers, and processes; they less often provide information about research, development, and innovation. When controlling for endogeneity, we find that certain firm characteristics appear to influence the use of intellectual capital information. Analysts use this information in the case of highly profitable companies. The results also show a significant effect of growth opportunities on intellectual capital disclosure by financial analysts.     

衍生工具应用能改善资本市场信息环境吗？——基于分析师预测行为的视角

本文通过文本搜索获得企业衍生工具运用情况,在此基础上研究了企业衍生工具应用对分析师跟踪和预测信息结构的影响,并且进一步区分了明星分析师和非明星分析师预测行为的差异。研究结果表明,企业运用衍生工具会导致分析师跟踪数量显著减少,公共信息精度下降,从而对资本市场信息环境产生负面影响。但是,进一步我们发现分析师跟踪数量的减少和公共信息精度的下降是由非明星分析师所致,明星分析师跟踪数量和公共信息精度没有显著变化,私有信息精度反而增加;而非明星分析师跟踪数量显著减少,公共信息精度明显下降。本文的结论有助于我们进一步理解衍生工具应用对资本市场信息环境的影响,以及分析师在信息传递中的作用机制。     

Corporate reporting of intellectual capital: Evidence from UK companies

This paper reports the results of an empirical investigation into the intellectual capital reporting practices of UK companies in four distinct sectors. It differs from prior intellectual capital reporting studies in that it analyses a wide range of corporate reports for their intellectual capital content. It finds major differences between the elements of intellectual capital reported in each sector studied. The study also finds that a range of different types of corporate reports were used for communicating intellectual capital information, and that the annual reports were not a good proxy for the proportion of disclosures across all corporate reports analysed in this study.     

The Appraisal of Ordinary Shares by Investment Analysts in the UK and Germany

This paper reports the findings of a two-country survey of the approaches to and information used by investment analysts. It examines the changes in the ordinary share appraisal approaches adopted by UK analysts over the past decade, and investigates the differences between British and German analysts in share appraisal methods, goals and information sources. The principal findings are that (i) deregulation and the introduction of new technology to the UK market has had little impact on the equity appraisal approach employed by analysts other than the greater reliance placed on personal contact with companies, and (ii) UK analysts are no more ‘short-termist’ than their German counterparts in assessing ordinary shares.     

Audit quality and properties of analysts’ information environment

We consider how audit quality impacts sell‐side analysts’ information environment. Using the method outlined by Barron et al., we examine whether higher audit quality is associated with differences in the weight analysts place on common information relative to private information, as well as the extent to which audit quality separately impacts the precision of analysts’ private and common information. Our results show that, in instances where analysts revise their earnings forecasts for year t+1 shortly after the release of year t earnings, higher audit quality results in analysts placing more weight on public information. The precision of private (as well as public) information is improved. These results extend our understanding of how audit quality impacts on attributes of analysts’ forecasts and provides support for the argument that audit quality has important capital market implications.     

Dissemination of information for investors at corporate Web sites

We extend the limited prior research on Internet financial reporting by providing insights into dissemination of two types of financial information at corporate Web sites. One type consists of reports that already have been filed with the SEC (i.e. required filings). The second type is all other (voluntary) information for investors. In doing so we investigate whether Web-based dissemination of both types of data can be explained by theories of incentives to voluntarily disclose information via more traditional means such as meetings or conference calls with analysts. We use regression analysis to test hypotheses that link the variation in the information disseminated through corporate Web sites to factors thought to influence voluntary disclosure of financial information. Presence of required items is significantly associated only with size and a proxy for information asymmetry, while voluntary information item disclosure is associated with variables proxying for size, information asymmetry, demand for external capital, and companies’ traditional disclosure reputations. Our results confirm that incentives motivating initial voluntary disclosure also explain the subsequent dissemination of voluntary material.     

How do financial analysts implement the Sum-of-the-Parts (SOTP) valuation framework?

In this study, we investigate how financial analysts implement the Sum-of-the-Parts (SOTP) valuation framework. Although SOTP constitutes a popular valuation approach among sophisticated practitioners and investors, it is mostly ignored by researchers and academics. We adopt a structured content analysis of 265 equity research reports written by 33 investment brokerage houses for 140 UK-based firms. We find that analysts typically use EBITDA multiples to implement SOTP. Furthermore, financial analysts are more likely to consider SOTP the dominant or preferred valuation model in their report. We show that managers disclose a greater quantity of segmental information if their firms are considered difficult to analyze and value by investors and creditors, thereby decreasing the information asymmetry with their capital providers. In specific circumstances, we document that financial analysts identify more segments in their SOTP analysis compared to the reportable segments in the firms' annual reports based on IFRS 8. We argue that the financial analysts' choice to employ a greater number of segments in their SOTP models might be primarily driven by their effort to support their reports' optimistic target prices. Finally, although SOTP seems theoretically ideal to estimate the value of a multi-segment firm, we do not find empirical evidence to support the hypothesis that SOTP significantly outperforms a full-blown Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) model, when the latter is used separately to value the company as a whole.     

Does the Scope of the Sell‐Side Analyst Industry Matter? An Examination of Bias,Accuracy, and Information Content of Analyst Reports

We examine changes in the scope of the sell‐side analyst industry and whether these changes impact information dissemination and the quality of analysts’ reports. Our findings suggest that changes in the number of analysts covering an industry impact analyst competition and have significant spillover effects on other analysts’ forecast accuracy, bias, report informativeness, and effort. These spillover industry effects are incremental to the effects of firm level changes in analyst coverage. Overall, a more significant sell‐side analyst industry presence has positive externalities that can result in better functioning capital markets.     

Do Corporate Governance Analysts Matter? Evidence from the Expansion of Governance Analyst Coverage

T his 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 United Kingdom, I find that an increase in governance analyst coverage results in increased governance quality, improved liquidity, increased financial analyst following, and improved investor breadth. These findings are consistent with governance analysts creating value for firms via monitoring, information dissemination/production, and investor recognition.     

Mandatory CSR disclosure and analyst forecast properties: Evidence from a quasi-natural experiment in China

Based on a quasi-natural experiment that mandates a subset of listed firms to issue standalone corporate social responsibility (CSR) reports, we examine whether mandatory CSR disclosure improves analysts’ information environment. We focus on two properties of analysts’ earnings forecasts: forecast error and forecast dispersion. We find that the mandatory issuance of standalone CSR reports is related to less forecast error and less dispersed forecasts, and the effect varies with the firm-level information environment and province-level marketization. Additional tests show that the improvement in forecast properties is mainly driven by CSR reports that i) are of high quality and ii) contain more long-term-oriented information than other CSR reports. Our findings provide evidence that mandatory CSR disclosure plays an important informational role for financial analysts.     

Tagging the triggers: an empirical analysis of information events prompting sell-side analyst reports

In order to fulfill their function as information intermediaries in capital markets, sell-side equity analysts regularly issue updated forecasts on the stocks they cover. Quite often, the publication of (revised) analysts’ reports is subject to certain trigger events such as the publication of annual figures or the announcement of an upcoming merger. In this exploratory study, we develop a two-step procedure to identify the core events that trigger the release of analysts’ reports on companies that constitute the Dow Jones EuroSTOXX50 index during the three-year period from 2004 to 2006. These can be grouped into Financial Disclosures, Corporate Management, Corporate Strategy, Business Activity, Operating Environment and Share. The results suggest that sell-side analysts attach great importance to non-financial information events when transforming their earnings estimates into valuation forecasts and stock recommendations. Additionally, we link the information events identified as reasons of issuance to the summary measures disclosed in the reports in order to investigate the relationship between the report trigger and associated analyst reaction. Our findings indicate that the forecasting activity of sell-side analysts is greatly influenced by forward-looking statements made by management, strategy-related news flow, and non-company-specific information relating to the covered firm’s operating environment.     

高铁能提升分析师盈余预测的准确度吗?——来自上市公司的证据

本文搜集了2006-2016年中国201个地级市高铁开通的情况,并匹配了A股1,244家上市公司的面板数据,利用双重差分(DID)模型,研究了高铁开通对证券分析师盈余预测的影响。研究结果显示:高铁通车之后,分析师盈余预测的精准度显著提升,分歧度和乐观度显著下降。进一步考察高铁发挥作用的内在机制,发现高铁开通显著增加了对沿线公司进行实地调研的分析师数量及人均调研次数。高铁开通对分析师盈余预测的影响存在异质性,影响主要体现在信息处理成本较低的企业、公司治理水平较好的企业以及分析师面临买方压力较小的企业中。动态地来看,高铁开通对分析师盈余预测的影响主要体现在通车两年以后。此外,在利用工具变量法、控制飞机出行以减少内生性问题之后,上述结论仍稳健。这说明高铁的开通改善了资本市场的信息环境,使得分析师能够更好地扮演信息中介的角色。文章较早研究了高铁开通对分析师盈余预测的影响,揭示了高铁在金融市场的信息传导效应。     

Is Working Capital Information Useful for Financial Analysts? Evidence from China

Financial analysts are important information intermediaries in the capital market. This study investigates whether information about working capital management is useful for financial analysts of Chinese firms. With a sample of listed companies from 2004 to 2014, we find that the efficiency of working capital management is positively associated with the number of analyst following and analyst forecast accuracy, and negatively associated with analyst forecast dispersion. Specifically, when the cash conversion cycle becomes longer, number of analyst following and the accuracy of their mean forecasts decrease, while the forecast dispersion increases. The findings of this study indicate a potential mechanism through which information about working capital management is incorporated in stock price in emerging markets such as China.     

Does the classification of intangibles matter? An equivalence testing

Many studies confirm that intangibles have future economic benefits included in them. This study examined whether analysts consider intangibles to be similar in economic value, regardless of the accounting treatment assigned to them. It conducted four experiments by providing 26 analysts with future earnings potentials, and asking them to forecast stock prices for three companies over three firms’ continuous years. One firm had an internally produced brand, the second company had a bought brand, and the third firm had an internally produced brand and bought brands. These three firms were used in four forecasting environments designed for this study. Each forecasting environment constituted an experiment. Each forecasting environment differed, with capital market information specific to each firm. Provided with this information, the analysts forecast stock prices for the three firms in each of the four experiments. Comparing the forecast stock prices, the study found that the two brand classes had similar influence on analysts’ stock pricing forecasts, to infer them as equivalent in economic value, in each of the four forecasting environments.     

Chaebol-affiliated analysts: Conflicts of interest and market responses

Some Korean business groups, or chaebols, have a large stake in securities firms that issue analysts’ reports on their member companies. This structure is unique in that industrial companies and securities firms are affiliated and operate within the same group. We investigate the informational content of earnings forecasts, stock recommendations and target prices made by the chaebol-affiliated analysts, using data collected between 2000 and 2008. The chaebol analysts tend to make more optimistic earnings forecasts for the member companies. The mean EPS forecast error (5.36%) of the affiliated analysts for the same chaebol company are significantly larger than that (3.23%) of other chaebol and independent analysts. The chaebol analysts also assign better recommendations by almost one level and set target prices 2.5% higher to the member companies after controlling for company and analyst characteristics. These results are consistent with the hypothesis that chaebol analysts’ reports are biased by conflicts of interest. Stock market reactions do not differ in response to announcements of stock recommendations issued by affiliated vs. non-affiliated analysts. This suggests that capital markets do not recognize the conflicts of interest inherent in chaebol analysts’ reports.