The Impact of Voluntary Disclosures on Sell-Side Analyst Stock Recommendations: Australian Experience

Abstract

This paper investigates the impact of voluntary disclosures on sell-side analyst stock recommendations. It uses content analysis method to measure quality of information disclosures and emphasis on particular themes. The focus of this study is on changes in analyst recommendations and the new information disclosures that have been made public since the previous revision of recommendation. The proxies for voluntary disclosures are information released by firms via company announcements and associated media reports. The characteristics of these disclosures are examined to explore their impact on the changes in analystsÌ stock recommendations. Based on a sample of over 200 recommendation revisions of 40 listed Australian companies, the results suggest that voluntary disclosures do contribute to analyst stock revisions. The findings reveal that the quantity of disclosures is positively associated with the number of recommendation revisions, and that disclosures with favourable signals or with price-sensitive contents are significantly related to the direction and type of analyst revisions. In addition, disclosure of specific themes (e.g., dividend and product) in company announcements and news are significantly associated with the recommendation change. This has implications for both the formulation of accounting policies and the regulation of financial disclosure. Acknowledgements: The authors acknowledge the support of Thomson Financial in the conduct of this research through their provision of data from the Institutional Brokers Estimate System (I/B/E/S) service. This data has been provided as part of a broad academic program to encourage earnings expectation research. The authors acknowledge the helpful comments from participants at the BAA Annual Conference (2004), University of York.Thai takeovers, bidding firms, control portfolios, bootstrapped t-tests