• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.20 no.12
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• pp.117-123
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• 2022

Purpose: This study investigates the relationship between earnings forecasts estimated from a cross-sectional earnings forecast model and firm characteristics such as firm size, sales volatility, and earnings volatility. Research design, data and methodology: The association between earnings forecasts and the aforementioned firm characteristics is examined using 214 firm-year observations with analyst following and 848 firm-year observations without analyst following for the period of 2011-2019. I estimate future earnings using a cross-sectional earnings forecast model, and then compare these model-based earnings forecasts with analysts' earnings forecasts in terms of forecast bias and forecast accuracy. The earnings forecast bias and accuracy are regressed on firm size, sales volatility, and earnings volatility. Results: For a sample with analyst following, I find that the model-based earnings forecasts are more accurate as the firm size is larger, whereas the analysts' earnings forecasts are less biased and more accurate as the firm size is larger. However, for a sample without analyst following, I find that the model-based earnings forecasts are more pessimistic and less accurate as firms' past earnings are more volatile. Conclusions: Although model-based earnings forecasts are useful for evaluating firms without analyst following, their accuracy depends on the firms' earnings volatility.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.6 no.4
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• pp.91-98
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• 2019

Dividend policy is an important business decision and is considered a channel to communicate a firm's performance to shareholders. Given the empirical findings that earnings quality significantly affects financial analysts' forecasting activities, it is predicted that higher earnings quality would positively influence forecast accuracy. Specifically, it is expected that financial analysts would forecast dividends more accurately for firms with higher earning quality. Unlike the research on financial analysts' earnings forecasts was heavily conducted, there is little study about financial analysts' dividend forecasts. This paper examines the effect of earnings quality on financial analysts' dividend forecast accuracy. We use a sample of South Korean firms for the period of 2011-2015 for multivariate regression. Earnings quality is measured by accruals quality and performance-adjusted discretionary accruals followed by prior studies. We first compare the accuracy between dividend forecasts and earnings forecasts using t-test and Wilcoxon singed-rank test. It is confirmed that financial analysts' dividend forecasts are more accurate than earnings forecasts in Korea. We find that financial analysts' dividend forecasts are more accurate for firms with higher earnings quality. We also find that the result is still valid after controlling for the accuracy of financial analysts' earnings forecasts. This confirms that earnings quality positively affects financial analysts' dividend forecasts.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.8 no.8
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• pp.647-658
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• 2021

Analysts' forecasts are important for providing useful guidance to investors, especially individual or small investors, and therefore it becomes critical to identify the elements which can potentially increase errors in analysts' forecasts. This study investigates potential factors which can lead to errors in forecasting by analysts, specifically in terms of the level and attributes of corporate earnings. Utilizing a sample of firms listed on the Korean stock markets, this study provides evidence that firms with more volatile and unpredictable earnings feature less accurate analyst forecasts. This study fills a void in the literature by conducting empirical tests for earnings attributes in terms of volatility and unpredictability that could potentially undermine the forecast accuracy. The negative association between the quality of earnings and forecast accuracy is more pronounced for firms with negative net income values. Additional analysis demonstrates that forecast accuracy is significantly lower for the fourth quarter than for other fiscal quarters and that fourth quarter earnings tend to be more volatile and unpredictable. This study contributes to the literature by providing new empirical evidence regarding the comprehensive effects of earnings quality and level on analysts' forecasting accuracy and further suggests potential factors contributing to the fourth quarter anomaly in analyst forecasts in terms of earnings attributes.

• The Korean Journal of Financial Management
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.31-62
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• 2010

This paper analyzes empirically how analysts' forecasts affected by ownership structure. This study examine a sample of 1,037~1,629 the analysts' forecasts of firms registered in Korean Stock Exchange in the period from 2000 to 2006. The empirical results are summarized as follows. First, from the analysis, companies which have higher major shareholder's holdings tend to increase earnings forecast errors and earnings forecast accuracy. Meanwhile, companies which have higher institution shareholder's holdings tend to decrease earnings forecast errors and earnings forecast accuracy. This result is in line with the view of previous works that companies with higher major shareholder's holdings look towards more of analysts' optimistic forecasts in order to maintain friendly relations with major shareholders. Because of analysts' private information use from major shareholders, earnings forecast accuracy is higher in high major shareholder's holdings firm than in high institution shareholder's holdings it. Second, this analysis is whether the minimal required selection condition of outside directors, audit committee adoption and audit quality affect the relation between ownership structure and analysts' forecasts. This result is that variables related corporate governance do not affect statically the relation between ownership structure and analysts' forecasts. The meanings of this paper is to suggest the positive relations between ownership structure and analysts' forecasts. After this, if analysts will notice forecasts of more many firms, capital market will be more efficient and this field works are plentiful. Also it will need monitoring systems not to distort market efficiency by analysts' dishonest forecasts.

• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
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• v.8 no.11
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• pp.363-372
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• 2017

This study analyzed how management earnings forecasts would have an effect on future earnings quality. The analysis period of study was from 2003 till 2009 (ofrom 2004 till 2011) based on variables of interest (dependent variables) and the annual data from a total of 475 companies that publicly announced manager's operating earnings forecasts among securities listing companies were used for analysis. As a result, first, it appeared that the more optimistic the manager's earnings forecasts were for the current term, the lower the future earnings quality was. Second, it was found that the lower the accuracy of the manager's earnings forecasts was for the current term, the lower the future earnings quality was. Such findings suggest that management earnings forecasts will be used for determining future earnings quality.

• Management & Information Systems Review
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• v.35 no.4
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• pp.213-227
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• 2016

This study examines the effects of managerial ability on information asymmetry. We use analyst forecast errors as a proxy for information asymmetry, because analysts are referred to as efficient users using firm-level data. The sample consists of 2,246 non-banking firm-years listed in Korea Stock Exchange(KOSPI) during the period 2000 to 2013. We measure managerial ability using DEA(Data Envelopment Analysis) following Demerjian et al.(2012). Using those measures, we examines the effects of managerial ability on analysts' earnings forecast errors and analysts' earnings forecast bias. The results of this study are as follows. First, we find that managerial ability are positively associated with analysts' earnings forecast accuracy. Second, we show that the firms with higher managerial ability tend to have lower the optimistic errors in analysts' earnings forecasts. This study could be useful for outside stakeholders to understand the importance of managerial ability.

• Journal of the Korean Data and Information Science Society
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• v.25 no.6
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• pp.1557-1567
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• 2014

In this paper, I propose a general hypothesis that after the enactment of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOA) financial statements convey more accurate and reliable corporate information to investors who in turn reflect such improvements in stock prices and test four practical hypotheses that simultaneously feature the degree of information asymmetry, forecast bias, and investor reaction to biased earnings information. The empirical results unanimously suggest that the post-SOA investors take advantage of the improvement in informational efficiency and accuracy and actively adjust for analyst forecast bias in earnings forecasts. The SOA indeed appears to achieve its primary goal of investor protection.

• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.207-215
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• 2018

In this study, targeting KOSPI and KOSDAQ listed companies, the relationship between the abnormal investment of companies and analyst earnings forecasts was empirically analyzed. The analysis period of this study spanned from 2003 to 2015 (with that of dependent variables spanning from 2004 to 2016) based on the variables of interest, and among the companies whose earnings per share forecasts were announced by financial analysts, the final sample of 4,917 companies/year that meets the research condition was selected as the target analysis. The results of the empirical analysis are as follows. First, it turned out that the more total abnormal investment, abnormal R&D and abnormal CAPEX investment, the more accurate were analyst earnings forecasts. Second, the more total abnormal investment, abnormal R&D, abnormal CAPEX investment, the more pessimistic analyst earnings forecasts tended to be. Further analysis has shown that these results came more from over investment groups than under investment groups. The results of this study are expected to make additional contributions to the existing studies in that the abnormal investment is considered as a determinant of analyst earnings forecasts.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.29-36
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• 2020

Stock price multiple is one of the most well-known equity valuation technique used to forecast equity price. It measures by multiplying "the ratio of stock price to a value driver" by a value driver. The value driver can be earning per share (EPS), sales or other financial measurements. The objective of price multiple technique is to evaluate the value of assets and compare how similar assets are priced in the market. Although stock price multiple technique is common in financial filed, studies on the application of the technique in Thailand is still limited. The present study is conducted to serve three major objectives. The first objective is to apply the technique to measure value of firms in banking sector in the Stock Exchange of Thailand. The second objective is to develop composite price multiple index to forecast equity prices. The third objective is to compare valuation accuracy of different value drivers of price multiple (i.e. EPS, Earnings Growth, Earnings Before Interest Taxes Depreciation and Amortization, Sales, Book Value and Composite Index) in forecasting equity prices. Results indicated that EPS is the most accurate value drivers of price multiple used to forecast equity price of firms in baking sector.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.45-54
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• 2019

This study examines whether auditors restrain the analysts' opportunistic behavior as reviewing the companies' interim reports. Analysts' forecasts show a walkdown pattern in which their optimism has decreased as the earnings announcement date has approached. At the beginning of the year, there is a lack of high-quality benchmark information that enables information users to judge the accuracy of analyst's earnings forecasts. Thus, early in the year, analysts are highly inspired to disseminate optimistic forecasts in order to gain manager's favor. In this study, we examine adequate benchmarks prevent analysts from disclosing optimistically biased forecasts. We conjecture that auditors' efforts might mitigate analysts' walkdown pattern. To test this hypothesis, we use data from Korea, where it is mandatory to disclose auditor's review hours. We find that the analyst forecast's walkdown decreases with the ratio as well as the number of audit hours. It implies that an auditor's effort in reviewing interim financial information has a monitoring function that reduces analysts' opportunistic optimism at the beginning of the year. We conjecture that the tendency will be more pronounced when BIG4 auditors review the interim reports. Consistent with the prediction, BIG4 auditors' interim review effort is more effective in suppressing the analysts' walkdown.