Analysts herding: when does sentiment matter? |
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Authors: | Natividad Blasco Pilar Corredor Elena Ferrer |
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Institution: | 1. Department of Accounting and Finance, University of Zaragoza, Zaragoza, Spain;2. Department of Business Administration, Public University of Navarre and INARBE, Pamplona, Spain |
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Abstract: | Herding among analysts emerges when analysts give priority to their peers’ opinions instead of their own beliefs or information. Some circumstances may enhance or restrain this type of behaviour. We postulate that market sentiment is one of them. This article analyses the effect that investor sentiment may have on analysts’ herding behaviour in the U.K. Our results suggest that ‘easy situations’ such as analysing easy-to-value securities and releasing optimistic information at times of high market sentiment clearly reduce herding practices, whereas herding clearly increases in difficult situations when analysts have to release negative information at moments of high investor sentiment. |
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Keywords: | Herding investor sentiment analyst forecasts hard-to-value firms behavioural finance |
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