The objective of this study is to examine whether analysts fully incorporate a nonproportionate algorithm of cost-change relative to revenue-change in forecasting earnings. We conjecture that the errors in analysts’ earnings forecasts made in the first month after the fiscal year-end are largely due to the errors in estimating expenses as a result of analysts’ use of a proportionate cost-change...

Relying on the well-established theoretical result that uncertainty has a common and an idiosyncratic component, we propose a new measure of earnings forecast uncertainty as the sum of dispersion among analysts and the variance of mean forecast errors estimated by a GARCH model. The new measure is based on both common and private information available to analysts at the time they make their for...

Recent studies find that stocks with higher dispersion of analysts’ earnings forecasts have lower future returns. The phenomenon is popularly interpreted as evidence that stock prices reflect optimism in the presence of differences of opinions and short-sales constraints. This paper shows that there is also a negative relationship between forecast dispersion and a firm’s unexpected future earni...

This study analyzes trends in analyst forecast properties from 1987 through 1998 in the United States and seven Pacific Rim countries: Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, and Thailand. Analyst forecast properties in the United States have become less dispersed, more accurate, and less optimistic during the sample period. Similar trends exist in Australia and New Zeala...

Prior studies evaluate the relative importance of the sources of value that financial analysts bring to the market based on the price impact of forecast revisions over the event time. We find that management earnings forecasts influence the timing and precision of analyst forecasts. More importantly, evidence suggests that prior studies’ finding of weaker (stronger) stock-price responses to for...

Investors and other contributors to stock exchange need a variety of tools, measures, and information in order to make decisions. One of the most common tools and criteria of decision makers is price-to earnings per share ratio. As a result, investors are in pursuit of ways to have a better assessment and forecast of price and dividends and get the highest returns on their investment. Previous ...

Quarterly earnings guidance — managers’ public forecasts of forthcoming earnings — is widespread yet highly controversial. A recent position paper by the CFA Institute and the Business Roundtable emphatically calls on managers to ‘‘end the practice of providing quarterly earnings guidance’’ (CFA Institute 2006, 2). Similarly, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce (2007) publicly implored managers to sto...