Brand Capital and Stock Price Crash Risk

We examine the relationship between brand capital and stock price crash risk. Crash risk, defined as the negative skewness in the distribution of returns for individual stocks, captures asymmetry in risk, and has important implications for investment choices and risk management. Using a sample of 39,685 publicly listed U.S. firm-year observations covering 1975 to 2018, we show that brand capital is significantly and negatively related to crash risk. We also use an advanced machine learning approach and confirm that brand capital is a strong predictor of future stock price crashes. Our cross-sectional analyses show that this negative relationship is more evident for subsamples with transitory poor earnings performance or persistent good earnings performance, greater corporate tax avoidance, and weak corporate governance structures. The results survive numerous robustness tests, including the use of alternative measures of brand capital, crash risk, and several endogeneity tests. In sum, our findings are consistent with agency theory, suggesting that high levels of brand capital expose firms to investor and customer scrutiny, which reduces managerial opportunistic behavior that may include the accumulation and concealment of negative information. This paper was accepted by Karl Diether, finance.

Insiders’ Foreknowledge of Earnings Results and Rule 10b5-1 Sales Trades

This article investigates the source of 10b5-1 plan insiders’ superior trade performance. Specifically, this article examines whether insiders trade on their private information about the firm’s future earnings performance through 10b5-1 sell trades and the features of 10b5-1 plan trades that are exploited to achieve superior trade performance. I find strong evidence that insiders use 10b5-1 plans to sell stock before disappointing earnings results. However, there is no evidence of earnings management around 10b5-1 sales, consistent with insiders’ good trade timing deriving from their foreknowledge about unfavorable earnings news rather than their ability to influence the timing and recognition of earnings performance. Restricting the sample to insiders who trade both before and after the implementation of Rule 10b5-1, I find that these insiders traded aggressively on earnings information even in the pre-10b5-1 era, but then shifted aggressive trading into 10b5-1 plans after the availability of planned trading, implying an unintended consequence of Rule 10b5-1. Finally, I document that strategic 10b5-1 trades tend to be infrequent, irregularly timed, close to the plan initiation date, and executed during traditional earnings blackout periods, revealing problematic features within 10b5-1 plans.

Investor Beliefs Revision In The Multiple Benchmark Accounting Information

Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menguji efektivitas dari pengungkapan informasi akuntansi multiple benchmark terhadap revisi keyakinan investor dalam memprediksi kinerja laba masa depan. Desain penelitian yang digunakan adalah eksperimen laboratorium 2x2 full factorial within subject. Subjek yang digunakan dalam penelitian ini adalah 20 orang mahasiswa Program Doktor Ilmu Ekonomi Universitas Hasanuddin yang diproksikan sebagai investor. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa ketika investor memeroleh informasi laba transitory bernilai positif investor cenderung melakukan revisi atas prediksi laba yang dilakukan berdasarkan informasi tambahan (management guidance). Hal tersebut ditunjukkan adanya perbedaan yang signifikan antara prediksi laba sebelum dan setelah diberikan informasi tambahan. Sedangkan, ketika investor memeroleh informasi laba transitory bernilai negatif, menunjukkan hasil yang sebaliknya. Investor cenderung memprediksi kinerja laba masa depan tidak jauh berbeda dari keyakinan awalnya. Hal ini menunjukkan adanya keterpatokan terhadap nilai awal yang menyebabkan investor mengalami bias heuristik anchoring-adjustment.This study aims to examine the effectiveness of the disclosure of multiple benchmark accounting information on the investor's belief revision in predicting future earnings performance. The research design used laboratory experiments 2x2 full factorial within-subject. The subjects used in this study were 20 students of the Doctoral Program in Economics, Hasanuddin University who were proxied as investors. The results show that when investors obtain information on temporary earnings is positive, investors tend to revise earning predictions based on additional information (management guidance). This is indicated by the significant difference between earnings predictions before and after additional information is provided. Meanwhile, when investors get information about negative temporary earnings, the results show the opposite. Investors tend to predict future earnings performance that is not much different from their initial beliefs. This shows the existence of a set of initial values that cause investors to experience anchoring-adjustment heuristic bias.

CEO Turnover and Accounting Earnings: The Role of Earnings Persistence

Although earnings persistence should have a nontrivial impact on chief executive officer (CEO) turnover decisions, prior studies have paid little attention to the role of earnings persistence in CEO turnover decisions. This study examines the effect of earnings persistence on the sensitivity (i.e., the negative relation) of CEO turnover to earnings performance. First, we find that the sensitivity of forced CEO turnovers to earnings performance is greater when earnings are more persistent. We also show that among numerous earnings attributes, earnings persistence is the most direct and dominant attribute in explaining CEO turnover-earnings sensitivity. Further, when the effect of earnings persistence on CEO compensation-earnings sensitivity is weak, the effect of earnings persistence on CEO turnover-earnings sensitivity is stronger, suggesting that the executive discipline system substitutes for the compensation system when earnings persistence is neglected by compensation policies. Overall, our findings suggest that earnings persistence plays a crucial role in CEO turnover decisions by elevating the board’s knowledge on the future performance implications of current earnings. Finally, the role of persistence is even more crucial when it is neglected by executive compensation policies. This paper was accepted by Shiva Rajgopal, accounting.

Earnings Shortfalls and Strategic Profit Allocations in Segment Reporting

SYNOPSIS I examine whether firms strategically classify earnings components when reporting bad earnings news. Specifically, I examine whether firms reporting small earnings shortfalls allocate profits across their business segments in a manner that understates the future implications and within-firm drivers of disappointing earnings performance. I find that firms reporting small earnings shortfalls transfer profits toward segments in which profit rates are more informative for firm value and away from segments that operate in industries with higher frequencies of bad earnings news. In addition, I find that shortfall shifting initially tempers negative market responses to shortfall news, but pricing effects reverse in the months following shortfall announcements. My findings suggest that firms strategically classify earnings components when reporting small earnings shortfalls and that strategic classifications temporarily affect the pricing of shortfall news. Data Availability: Data are available from public sources identified in this paper.

Earnings Management and Performance of IPO Firms: Evidence from India

Disclosure through corporate annual reports is intended to enhance transparency and reduce information asymmetry during public issues. Ritter (1991) revealed that there is something fishy in the financial reports of the companies coming out with public issues. Earnings management has been recognised as a foremost contributor to such misleading financial reports. The short term overperformance of initial public offerings (IPO) of companies increases the expectations of potential investors and leads to a subsequent decline of performance in long run leaving the investors in distraught. The observed phenomenon is omnipresent and thus affects the investors across the globe. The present article empirically investigates the presence of earnings management in IPOs in India. The study is based on Modified Jones Model, the best known model to measure accruals earnings management. Preliminary results exhibit that earnings management in Indian IPOs is much higher than in developed countries. The study further discovers that the earnings performance of IPO companies is abnormally higher in IPO year as compared with post-offer period. Both the results taken together reinforce that post-issue earnings performance is a derivation of issue year earnings management in India.

Tone Concavity around Expected Earnings

ABSTRACT We examine whether the relationship between managerial tone and earnings performance depends on the performance of the firm relative to earnings expectations. Using both annual changes in earnings and the difference between realized earnings and analyst consensus forecasts, we find evidence of “tone concavity” around earnings expectations. Specifically, the covariance between managerial tone and earnings performance is positive when earnings are below expectations, but negative when earnings meet or exceed expectations. We interpret our results to suggest that managers downplay positive changes in earnings to attenuate future growth expectations. We also find that tone concavity is significantly attenuated by managers' career concerns and accounting conservatism, but unrelated to litigation risk. Our results indicate that the effect of earnings performance on disclosure tone is complex and reflects managers' incentives to manage expectations.