Analysts' Earnings Forecast, Recommendation and Target Price Revisions

Analysts' Earnings Forecast, Recommendation and Target Price Revisions
Author: Ronen Feldman
Publisher:
Total Pages:
Release: 2019
Genre:
ISBN:

This study examines the immediate and delayed market responses to revisions in analyst forecasts of earnings, target prices, and recommendations. Consistent with prior literature, revisions in earnings forecasts are positively and significantly associated with short-term market returns around the revisions. However, we show that short-term market returns around target price revisions and recommendation changes are even stronger. We also find superior future performance (return drift) for portfolios that use information from all three types of revisions to those using information from only one of the three types of revisions.

Financial Analysts' Forecasts and Stock Recommendations

Financial Analysts' Forecasts and Stock Recommendations
Author: Sundaresh Ramnath
Publisher: Now Publishers Inc
Total Pages: 125
Release: 2008
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1601981627

Financial Analysts' Forecasts and Stock Recommendations reviews research related to the role of financial analysts in the allocation of resources in capital markets. The authors provide an organized look at the literature, with particular attention to important questions that remain open for further research. They focus research related to analysts' decision processes and the usefulness of their forecasts and stock recommendations. Some of the major surveys were published in the early 1990's and since then no less than 250 papers related to financial analysts have appeared in the nine major research journals that we used to launch our review of the literature. The research has evolved from descriptions of the statistical properties of analysts' forecasts to investigations of the incentives and decision processes that give rise to those properties. However, in spite of this broader focus, much of analysts' decision processes and the market's mechanism of drawing a useful consensus from the combination of individual analysts' decisions remain hidden in a black box. What do we know about the relevant valuation metrics and the mechanism by which analysts and investors translate forecasts into present equity values? What do we know about the heuristics relied upon by analysts and the market and the appropriateness of their use? Financial Analysts' Forecasts and Stock Recommendations examines these and other questions and concludes by highlighting area for future research.

Determinants of Earnings Forecast Error, Earnings Forecast Revision and Earnings Forecast Accuracy

Determinants of Earnings Forecast Error, Earnings Forecast Revision and Earnings Forecast Accuracy
Author: Sebastian Gell
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 144
Release: 2012-03-26
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 3834939374

​Earnings forecasts are ubiquitous in today’s financial markets. They are essential indicators of future firm performance and a starting point for firm valuation. Extremely inaccurate and overoptimistic forecasts during the most recent financial crisis have raised serious doubts regarding the reliability of such forecasts. This thesis therefore investigates new determinants of forecast errors and accuracy. In addition, new determinants of forecast revisions are examined. More specifically, the thesis answers the following questions: 1) How do analyst incentives lead to forecast errors? 2) How do changes in analyst incentives lead to forecast revisions?, and 3) What factors drive differences in forecast accuracy?

Market Response to Revisions in Analysts' Future Years' Earnings Forecasts

Market Response to Revisions in Analysts' Future Years' Earnings Forecasts
Author: Gregory Alan Sommers
Publisher:
Total Pages: 194
Release: 2002
Genre:
ISBN:

Abstract: Questions have been raised in the business press and prior academic research about future years' earnings forecast credibility, particularly long-term growth. This paper documents the market response to revisions in analysts' earnings forecasts for the next year and long-term growth (collectively "future years' earnings"). First, I show there is information content in future years' earnings forecast revisions as evidenced by changes in return volatility and volume at their release. Second, there is a direct market response to the magnitudes of the revisions in the next years' earnings forecasts and to upward revisions in long-term growth forecasts as evidenced by the coefficient relating the unexpected returns to the unexpected portion of the revisions. Finally, I find that investors use the next year earnings forecasts interpret the expected persistence of current year earnings forecast revisions. This is evidenced by increases (decreases) in the coefficient relating unexpected returns to the current year earnings forecast revisions when the next year earnings forecast revision is in the same (opposite) direction. This study documents market response to future years' earnings forecast revisions and indicates that they affect how investors respond to the revisions in current year earnings forecasts.

Management Earnings Forecasts and Value of Analyst Forecast Revisions

Management Earnings Forecasts and Value of Analyst Forecast Revisions
Author: Yongtae Kim
Publisher:
Total Pages: 45
Release: 2014
Genre:
ISBN:

This study examines the stock-price reactions to analyst forecast revisions around earnings announcements to test whether pre-announcement forecasts reflect analysts' private information or piggybacking on confounding events and news. 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 forecast revisions in the period immediately after (before) the prior-quarter earnings announcement disappears once management earnings forecasts are controlled for. To the extent that management earnings forecasts are public disclosures, our results suggest that the importance of analysts' information discovery role documented in prior studies is likely to be overstated.

Delayed Price Reactions to Analysts' Recommendation Revisions

Delayed Price Reactions to Analysts' Recommendation Revisions
Author: Kotaro Miwa
Publisher:
Total Pages: 26
Release: 2016
Genre:
ISBN:

This study explores the reasons for the slow price reactions to analysts' recommendation revisions. We predict that analysts' recommendation revisions contain earnings-related information that is not incorporated in analysts' earnings forecasts and that the slow price reaction is attributable to a gradual incorporation of this earnings-related information into stock prices. We find that, consistent with our prediction, stocks with recommendation upgrades subsequently experience more upward earnings forecast revisions than stocks with recommendation downgrades, and that the differences in subsequent stock returns between upgraded and downgraded stocks is attributable to differences between subsequent earnings forecast (especially, FY2 earnings forecast) revisions.

Do Analysts Say Anything About Earnings Without Revising Their Earnings Forecasts?

Do Analysts Say Anything About Earnings Without Revising Their Earnings Forecasts?
Author: Philip G. Berger
Publisher:
Total Pages: 57
Release: 2016
Genre:
ISBN:

We identify a novel bias in analyst forecasts, after revision bias, which we identify by examining an analyst's reports after his final earnings forecast of the quarter. We document that (i) qualitative predictions from the text of reports, (ii) share price target revisions, and (iii) revisions to next quarter's earnings forecast predict error in the current quarter's earnings forecast. Market returns are slow to impound the information in qualitative predictions and share price target revisions. Analysts are more likely to disseminate positive news after the current quarter's final earnings forecast, consistent with analysts acting to maintain a beatable benchmark for managers. We argue our findings are consistent either with analysts acting to tip clients or with frictions limiting the frequency of quarterly forecast revisions. Our results demonstrate that the value of the current quarter's earnings forecast to managers and investors distorts the flow of information into the forecast.

Company Valuation and Information in Analyst Forecasts

Company Valuation and Information in Analyst Forecasts
Author: Daniel Kreutzmann
Publisher: Logos Verlag Berlin GmbH
Total Pages: 141
Release: 2010
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 3832525297

This thesis focuses on the three primitive value drivers of each company valuation model that is based on fundamental analysis: the discount rate, the expected future payoffs during the explicit forecasting period, and the terminal value at the end of the explicit forecasting period. While the first factor is analyzed theoretically by incorporating the government into the classical valuation framework, this thesis studies the other two factors by investigating forecasts made by professional investors, i.e. financial analysts. In the first part we show that the government's and the shareholders discount rate usually differ and analyze how the government's and shareholders different objectives lead to conflicts in the context of capital budgeting. The empirical part of this thesis shows that macroeconomic information is frequently used by financial analysts when updating their earnings expecations and that target price forecastsmade by financial analysts can be used to predict abnormal returns.