How Do Earnings Numbers Relate to Stock Returns? A Review of Classic Accounting Research with Updated Evidence

2004 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 263-286 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. Craig Nichols ◽  
James M. Wahlen
Keyword(s):  
Stock Returns ◽  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Financial Reporting ◽  
Academic Research ◽  
Cash Flows ◽  
Share Prices ◽  
Earnings Information ◽  
Post Earnings Announcement Drift ◽  
Using Data ◽  
The Impact

An extensive body of academic research in accounting develops theory and empirical evidence on the relation between earnings information and stock returns. This literature provides important insights for understanding the relevance of financial reporting. In this article, we summarize the theory and evidence on how accounting earnings information relates to firms' stock returns, particularly for the benefit of students, practitioners, and others who may not yet have been exposed to this literature. In addition, we present new empirical evidence on the relation between earnings and returns by replicating and extending three classic studies using data from 1988 through 2002. Specifically, we first demonstrate the relation between earnings changes and stock returns, replicating Ball and Brown (1968), and we compare that relation to the relation between changes in cash flows from operations and stock returns. Second, we demonstrate the impact of earnings persistence on stock returns, extending findings from studies such as Kormendi and Lipe (1987), and highlighting the effects of differences in persistence across earnings increases and decreases. Third, we provide evidence to assess the efficiency with which the capital markets impound quarterly earnings information into share prices, showing that the post-earnings-announcement-drift results of Bernard and Thomas (1989) extend to recent data.

Discretionary Risk Disclosures

2003 ◽  
Vol 78 (2) ◽  
pp. 449-469 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bjorn N. Jorgensen ◽  
Michael T. Kirschenheiter
Keyword(s):  
Stock Returns ◽  
Risk Premium ◽  
Voluntary Disclosure ◽  
Cash Flows ◽  
Share Price ◽  
Risk Disclosure ◽  
Share Prices ◽  
Ex Post ◽  
Partial Disclosure ◽  
Future Cash Flows

We model managers' equilibrium strategies for voluntarily disclosing information about their firm's risk. We consider a multifirm setting in which the variance of each firm's future cash flow is uncertain. A manager can disclose, at a cost, this variance before offering the firm for sale in a competitive stock market with risk-averse investors. In our partial disclosure equilibrium, managers voluntarily disclose if their firm has a low variance of future cash flows, but withhold the information if their firm has highly variable future cash flows. We establish how the manager's discretionary risk disclosure affects the firm's share price, expected stock returns, and beta, within the framework of the Capital Asset Pricing Model. We show that whereas one manager's discretionary disclosure of his firm's risk does not affect other firms' share prices, it does affect the other firms' betas. Also, we demonstrate that a disclosing firm has lower risk premium and beta ex post than a nondisclosing firm. Finally, we show that ex ante, the expected risk premium and expected beta of each firm are higher under a mandatory risk disclosure regime than in the partial disclosure equilibrium that arises under a voluntary disclosure regime.

scholarly journals The Impact of CSR on the Capital Structure of High-Tech Companies in Poland

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (10) ◽  
pp. 5467
Author(s):  
Barbara Grabinska ◽  
Dorota Kedzior ◽  
Marcin Kedzior ◽  
Konrad Grabinski
Keyword(s):  
Capital Structure ◽  
Financial Reporting ◽  
Academic Research ◽  
Debt Financing ◽  
High Tech ◽  
High Tech Industry ◽  
Reporting Practices ◽  
Csr Reporting ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Capital Structure

So far, CSR’s role in the high-tech industry is not fully explained by academic research, especially concerning the most burdensome obstacle to firms’ growth: acquiring debt financing. The paper aims to solve this puzzle and investigate whether young high-tech companies can attract more debt by engaging in CSR activity. To address the high-tech industry specificity, we divided CSR-reporting practice into three broad categories: employee, social, and environmental and analyzed their impact on the capital structure. Our sample consists of 92 firm-year observations covering the period 2014–2018. Using a regression method, we found out that only employee CSR plays a statistically significant role in shaping capital structure. We did not find evidence for the influence of the other types of CSR-reporting practices. The results suggest that employees are the key resource of high-tech companies, and, for this reason, they are at the management’s focus. This fact is visible at the financial reporting level and, as we interpret results, is also considered by credit providers. In a more general way, our results suggest that firms tend to choose CSR based on the importance of crucial resources.

scholarly journals Revised Malaysian Shariah Screening: Its Impact on Islamic Capital Market

2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 17
Author(s):  
Fauzias Mat Nor ◽  
Amir Shaharuddin ◽  
Ainulashikin Marzuki ◽  
Nur Ainna Ramli
Keyword(s):  
Stock Returns ◽  
Capital Market ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Advisory Council ◽  
Qualitative Assessment ◽  
Financial Ratio ◽  
Share Prices ◽  
Fund Managers ◽  
Event Study Method ◽  
The Impact

Shariah Advisory Council (SAC) of Securities Commission (SC) formulated a new revised Shariah screening methodology of two-tier quantitative assessment for activity-based screening benchmarks and the newly- formulated financial ratio benchmarks, while the qualitative assessment remains the same. The revised methodology is an effort to expand the Islamic capital market’s (ICM) international reach which is in line with the SC objectives. The objective of this paper is to examine the impact of the recent announcement of new changes in the Shariah screening methodology by the Malaysian Securities Commission on the share prices of the affected companies and Islamic capital market. We use an event study method to see if the changes have a significant reaction from the market, specifically, from investors and fund managers. On the announcement date, that is, on 29 November 2013, 158 non-Shariah compliant stocks were removed from the previous list of Shariah compliant stock that was issued in May 2013 and 16 stocks were added to the approved list. Out of 158 non-Shariah compliant stocks, only 137 stocks are available for the analysis. For the new Shariah compliant stocks, only 16 stocks are included in the sample. We find an immediate but short lived negative impact on the stock returns towards the deletion, but none towards the addition of new stocks to the Shariah index. However, the announcement has no significant impact on the overall return of the FBM Emas Shariah index.

scholarly journals The effect of the level of indebtedness on the earnings information content stemming from the mandatory IFRS adoption

2016 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 12
Author(s):  
Hela Turki ◽  
Senda Wali ◽  
Younes Boujelbene
Keyword(s):  
Information Asymmetry ◽  
Information Content ◽  
Financial Reporting ◽  
Forecast Error ◽  
Financial Analysts ◽  
Forecast Dispersion ◽  
Earnings Information ◽  
Ifrs Adoption ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Impact

<p>This paper examines the impact of IFRS / IAS (International Financial Reporting Standards / International Accounting Standards) mandatory adoption on the earning's information content apprehended by the level of information asymmetry and whether this impact differs from one company to another with regard to its level of indebtedness. The information asymmetry is measured by the properties of financial analysts’ forecasts (error and dispersion).This study is conducted over 11 years from 2002 to 2012 by taking as a sample all the companies that belong to the CAC all tradable indexes. The results show a significant effect of these international's standards on financial analysts' forecasts, which stress informational content improvement. In addition, high level of indebtedness associated with IFRS adoption reduces forecast dispersion. By contrast, low level of indebtedness associated with IFRS adoption reduces forecast error.</p>

scholarly journals The extent of compliance with FRS 101 standard: Malaysian evidence

2017 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 87-115 ◽  
Author(s):  
Azhar Abdul Rahman ◽  
Mohd Diah Hamdan
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Governance ◽  
Financial Reporting ◽  
Audit Committee ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Corporate Compliance ◽  
Financial Reporting Standards ◽  
Compliance Level ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Analysis Models ◽  
The Impact

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate Malaysian companies’ compliance with mandatory accounting standards. Specifically, this study examines the efficacy of agency-related mechanisms on the degree of compliance with Financial Reporting Standards (FRS) 101, Presentation of Financial Statements. It so proceeds by focussing on corporate governance parameters (board characteristics and ownership structure) and other firm characteristics. Design/methodology/approach Using data drawn from a sample of 105 Malaysian companies listed on the ACE market in 2009, the authors employ multiple regression analysis models to establish whether selected corporate governance and company-specific characteristics (proxying for agency-related mechanisms) are related to the degree of disclosure compliance. Findings The results indicate that the overall disclosure compliance is high (92.5 per cent). Furthermore, only firm size is positively associated with the degree of compliance. The other variables, those consisting of board independence, audit committee independence, CEO duality, the extent of outside blockholders’ ownership and leverage, do not show any significant relationship with the degree of compliance. Research limitations/implications This study focusses on only one accounting standard (FRS 101) that is mandatory in Malaysia. FRS 101 is both structured and rigid, leaving no room for companies to conceal any particular information. The sample of Malaysian companies selected is restricted to those listed only on the ACE market. As such, the results cannot be generalised to every company in Malaysia. Practical implications These results have important implications for policy makers because they suggest that whilst agency-related mechanisms may motivate compliance with mandatory standards, full compliance may be unattainable without regulations. Originality/value This is the only study in Malaysia to investigate the impact of regulatory requirements on corporate compliance level by companies listed on the new ACE market, which was introduced by the Bursa Malaysia in August 2009. This study contributes to the literature by examining the effects of both company-specific characteristics (such as company size, company age, liquidity, etc.) and corporate governance parameters on the degree of corporate compliance with mandatory disclosure, simultaneously, in contrast with prior studies which have examined them in isolation.

Corporate disclosure and foreign share ownership: empirical evidence from African countries

2015 ◽  
Vol 57 (5) ◽  
pp. 417-444
Author(s):  
Godfred A. Bokpin ◽  
Zangina Isshaq ◽  
Eunice Stella Nyarko
Keyword(s):  
Financial Reporting ◽  
Corporate Disclosure ◽  
Statistical Relation ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Listed Firms ◽  
Share Ownership ◽  
Using Data ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Corporate Disclosures

Purpose – The study aims to seeks to ascertain the impact of corporate disclosure on foreign equity ownership. Corporate disclosures are important to for stock markets because it is an activity that mitigates information differences between company insiders and outsiders. Design/methodology/approach – Corporate disclosures assume an even greater important when company outsiders are not domiciled in the same country as the company and the company insiders. In this study, the relation between foreign share ownership and corporate disclosures using data on Ghana, Kenya and Nigeria is examined. Findings – The consistent results in this study are that foreign share ownership is positively related to firm size. A negative relation, however, between foreign share ownership and corporate disclosure is found, but this turns out to be related to disclosures about ownership, while disclosures on financial reporting and board management have a positive and insignificant statistical relation taking into account unobserved country, time and firm effects. Further analysis shows that corporate disclosures are very persistent and negatively related to lag foreign share ownership. No consistent statistical relation is found between disclosure and market-to-book values as a proxy for investment opportunities. It is recommended to African-listed firms to pursue adoption of high-quality financial reporting standards and to increase their reporting on board management. The study also recommends that the African Government weighs the benefits of detailed ownership disclosures. Originality/value – The study utilises frontier market data to complement existing literature on how corporate disclosure and transparency influences foreign investors decision to invest in Africa.

Capital Gains Taxes and Stock Return Volatility

2013 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-31 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhonglan Dai ◽  
Douglas A. Shackelford ◽  
Harold H. Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Stock Returns ◽  
Stock Return ◽  
Cash Flows ◽  
Capital Gains ◽  
Return Volatility ◽  
Capital Gains Tax ◽  
Tax Rate ◽  
Stock Return Volatility ◽  
Capital Gains Taxes ◽  
The Impact

ABSTRACT This paper presents an empirical investigation of the impact of capital gains taxes on stock return volatility. We predict that the more stock returns are subject to capital gains taxation, the greater the increase in return volatility following a capital gains tax rate cut due to reduced risk-sharing in firms' cash flows between shareholders and the government. Consistent with this prediction, we find larger increases in the return volatility for more appreciated stocks than for less appreciated stocks and for non-dividend-paying stocks than for dividend-paying stocks after both 1978 and 1997 capital gains tax rate reductions. The findings imply that capital gains taxes convey a heretofore overlooked benefit of lower stock return volatility.

scholarly journals Post-Earnings Announcement Drift in Greece

2015 ◽  
Vol 18 (03) ◽  
pp. 1550019 ◽  
Author(s):  
William Forbes ◽  
George Giannopoulos
Keyword(s):  
Financial Reporting ◽  
Stock Prices ◽  
Stock Exchange ◽  
International Financial Reporting Standards ◽  
Reporting Standards ◽  
Earnings Announcement ◽  
Financial Reporting Standards ◽  
Post Earnings Announcement Drift ◽  
Athens Stock Exchange ◽  
The Impact

This paper presents evidence regarding the post-earnings announcement drift (PEAD) anomaly for the Greek market in the years 2000–2006 (covering earnings announcements in the years 2001–2007). The impact of the introduction of International Financial Reporting Standards on the size and prevalence of the PEAD anomaly is examined. Unlike recent evidence for the US market we find PEAD to be alive and well, and of growing importance in our Greek sample. It may be the adoption of international financial reporting standards (IFRS) has served to reduce earnings predictability in Greece and thus enhance PEAD in the Athens stock exchange (ASE) market. This contrasts strongly with US evidence that the post-earnings-announcement drift anomaly is now waning as more efficient markets and smarter, fundamentals-based, traders arbitrage its impact on stock prices.

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