Publications

Journal Article

Financial analysts act as crucial conduits of information between firms and stakeholders. However, comparatively little is known about how these information intermediaries evaluate the believability and importance of corporate disclosures.

The authors argue that a firm’s level of managerial discretion, or latitude of executive action, acts as a cue for financial analysts, which helps them interpret and respond to voluntary management earnings forecasts.

The study provides strong, robust evidence that financial analysts find management forecasts significantly less believable in low-discretion than in high-discretion environments, and therefore tend to be much less responsive to these forecasts.

The authors also show that managerial discretion is especially impactful on analysts’ responses in those circumstances where analysts are typically most uncertain about how to interpret management forecasts.