IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/rfinst/v36y2023i2p409-449..html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Value of Differing Points of View: Evidence from Financial Analysts’ Geographic Diversity

Author

Listed:
  • William C Gerken
  • Marcus O Painter
  • Itay Goldstein

Abstract

Using satellite imagery of retail firms’ parking lots to measure time-varying local firm-specific performance, we document that analysts incorporate local information into their forecasts. Analysts rely more on local signals when less firm-wide information is available. This incorporation of noisy local firm information has firm-level implications. Examining across industries, we find causal evidence that geographic concentration of analysts increases consensus forecast errors and decreases firm liquidity. These effects are stronger for harder-to-value stocks. The market values geographic firm information, as the abnormal return around forecast revisions is higher for analysts who cover a firm from a unique location.

Suggested Citation

  • William C Gerken & Marcus O Painter & Itay Goldstein, 2023. "The Value of Differing Points of View: Evidence from Financial Analysts’ Geographic Diversity," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 36(2), pages 409-449.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:rfinst:v:36:y:2023:i:2:p:409-449.
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/rfs/hhac033
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lauren Cohen & Andrea Frazzini & Christopher Malloy, 2010. "Sell‐Side School Ties," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 65(4), pages 1409-1437, August.
    2. X. Frank Zhang, 2006. "Information Uncertainty and Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(1), pages 105-137, February.
    3. Hirshleifer, David & Levi, Yaron & Lourie, Ben & Teoh, Siew Hong, 2019. "Decision fatigue and heuristic analyst forecasts," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 133(1), pages 83-98.
    4. Froot, Kenneth & Kang, Namho & Ozik, Gideon & Sadka, Ronnie, 2017. "What do measures of real-time corporate sales say about earnings surprises and post-announcement returns?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 125(1), pages 143-162.
    5. Kothari, S. P. & Sloan, Richard G., 1992. "Information in prices about future earnings : Implications for earnings response coefficients," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(2-3), pages 143-171, August.
    6. Itay Goldstein & Wei Jiang & G Andrew Karolyi, 2019. "To FinTech and Beyond," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 32(5), pages 1647-1661.
    7. Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh & Laura Veldkamp, 2009. "Information Immobility and the Home Bias Puzzle," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 64(3), pages 1187-1215, June.
    8. Edward L. Glaeser & Glenn Ellison, 1999. "The Geographic Concentration of Industry: Does Natural Advantage Explain Agglomeration?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(2), pages 311-316, May.
    9. Green, T. Clifton & Jame, Russell & Markov, Stanimir & Subasi, Musa, 2014. "Access to management and the informativeness of analyst research," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(2), pages 239-255.
    10. Bryan Kelly & Alexander Ljungqvist, 2012. "Testing Asymmetric-Information Asset Pricing Models," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 25(5), pages 1366-1413.
    11. Gennaro Bernile & Alok Kumar & Johan Sulaeman, 2015. "Home away from Home: Geography of Information and Local Investors," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 28(7), pages 2009-2049.
    12. David Hirshleifer & Ben Lourie & Thomas G Ruchti & Phong Truong, 2021. "First Impression Bias: Evidence from Analyst Forecasts [Biased beliefs, asset prices, and investment: a structural approach]," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 25(2), pages 325-364.
    13. Dasgupta, Sudipto & Cen, Ling & Chang, Yuk Ying, 2022. "Do Analysts Learn from Each Other? Evidence from Analysts’ Location Diversity," CEPR Discussion Papers 15057, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    14. Tim Loughran & Jay Ritter, 2004. "Why Has IPO Underpricing Changed Over Time?," Financial Management, Financial Management Association, vol. 33(3), Fall.
    15. Ed Dehaan & Joshua Madsen & Joseph D. Piotroski, 2017. "Do Weather‐Induced Moods Affect the Processing of Earnings News?," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(3), pages 509-550, June.
    16. Christina Zhu, 2019. "Big Data as a Governance Mechanism," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 32(5), pages 2021-2061.
    17. Lawrence D. Brown & Andrew C. Call & Michael B. Clement & Nathan Y. Sharp, 2015. "Inside the “Black Box” of Sell‐Side Financial Analysts," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 53(1), pages 1-47, March.
    18. Harrison Hong & Marcin Kacperczyk, 2010. "Competition and Bias," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 125(4), pages 1683-1725.
    19. Merkley, Kenneth & Michaely, Roni & Pacelli, Joseph, 2020. "Cultural diversity on Wall Street: Evidence from consensus earnings forecasts," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(1).
    20. O'Brien, Patricia C. & Tan, Hongping, 2015. "Geographic proximity and analyst coverage decisions: Evidence from IPOs," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(1), pages 41-59.
    21. Jarrad Harford & Feng Jiang & Rong Wang & Fei Xie, 2019. "Analyst Career Concerns, Effort Allocation, and Firms’ Information Environment," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 32(6), pages 2179-2224.
    22. García, Diego & Norli, Øyvind, 2012. "Geographic dispersion and stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 106(3), pages 547-565.
    23. Christopher J. Malloy, 2005. "The Geography of Equity Analysis," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(2), pages 719-755, April.
    24. Alan Crane & Kevin Crotty, 2020. "How Skilled Are Security Analysts?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 75(3), pages 1629-1675, June.
    25. Jacob Boudoukh & Ronen Feldman & Shimon Kogan & Matthew Richardson, 2019. "Information, Trading, and Volatility: Evidence from Firm-Specific News," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 32(3), pages 992-1033.
    26. Jung Koo Kang & Lorien Stice‐Lawrence & Yu Ting Forester Wong, 2021. "The Firm Next Door: Using Satellite Images to Study Local Information Advantage," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 59(2), pages 713-750, May.
    27. Kumar, Alok, 2009. "Hard-to-Value Stocks, Behavioral Biases, and Informed Trading," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 44(6), pages 1375-1401, December.
    28. Itay Goldstein & Liyan Yang, 2015. "Information Diversity and Complementarities in Trading and Information Acquisition," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 70(4), pages 1723-1765, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jan Hanousek Jr. & Jan Hanousek & Konstantin Sokolov, 2023. "X Bots and Earnings Announcements," MENDELU Working Papers in Business and Economics 2023-92, Mendel University in Brno, Faculty of Business and Economics.
    2. Gasparini, Matteo, 2023. "Are financial markets pricing the net zero carbon transition? A reconsideration of the carbon premium," INET Oxford Working Papers 2023-23, Institute for New Economic Thinking at the Oxford Martin School, University of Oxford.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. T. Bourveau & A. Garel & P. Peter Joos & A. Petit-Romec, 2024. "When attention is away, analysts misplay: distraction and analyst forecast performance," Post-Print hal-03844012, HAL.
    2. Blankespoor, Elizabeth & deHaan, Ed & Marinovic, Iván, 2020. "Disclosure processing costs, investors’ information choice, and equity market outcomes: A review," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(2).
    3. Li, Fengfei & Lin, Chen & Lin, Tse-Chun, 2021. "Salient anchor and analyst recommendation downgrade," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 69(C).
    4. Jin, Han & Mazouz, Khelifa & Wu, Yuliang & Xu, Bin, 2023. "Can star analysts make superior coverage decisions in poor information environment?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).
    5. Lin Peng & Siew Hong Teoh & Yakun Wang & Jiawen Yan, 2022. "Face Value: Trait Impressions, Performance Characteristics, and Market Outcomes for Financial Analysts," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(2), pages 653-705, May.
    6. Jennie Bai & Massimo Massa, 2021. "Is Human-Interaction-based Information Substitutable? Evidence from Lockdown," NBER Working Papers 29513, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Kumar, Alok & Rantala, Ville & Xu, Rosy, 2022. "Social learning and analyst behavior," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(1), pages 434-461.
    8. Cooney, John W. & Madureira, Leonardo & Singh, Ajai K. & Yang, Ke, 2015. "Social ties and IPO outcomes," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 129-146.
    9. Xie, Lingmin & Chen, Zhian & Li, Donghui & Tan, Hongping, 2022. "Foreign analysts and managerial investment learning from stock markets," Journal of Multinational Financial Management, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    10. Dasgupta, Sudipto & Cen, Ling & Chang, Yuk Ying, 2022. "Do Analysts Learn from Each Other? Evidence from Analysts’ Location Diversity," CEPR Discussion Papers 15057, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    11. Qiang Cheng & Fei Du & Xin Wang & Yutao Wang, 2016. "Seeing is believing: analysts’ corporate site visits," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 21(4), pages 1245-1286, December.
    12. Serkan Karadas & Jorida Papakroni, 2019. "Local predictive ability of analyst recommendations," Review of Financial Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 37(3), pages 351-371, July.
    13. Chen, Xin, 2021. "Lunar eclipses, analyst sentiment, and earnings forecasts: Evidence from China," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 1007-1024.
    14. Umit Ozmel & Deniz Yavuz & Tim Trombley & Ranjay Gulati, 2020. "Interfirm Ties Between Ventures and Limited Partners of Venture Capital Funds: Performance Effects in Financial Markets," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 31(3), pages 698-719, May.
    15. Stanimira Milcheva & Yildiray Yildirim & Bing Zhu, 2021. "Distance to Headquarter and Real Estate Equity Performance," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 63(3), pages 327-353, October.
    16. Bradley, Daniel & Gokkaya, Sinan & Liu, Xi & Xie, Fei, 2017. "Are all analysts created equal? Industry expertise and monitoring effectiveness of financial analysts," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(2), pages 179-206.
    17. Li, Frank Weikai & Mukherjee, Abhiroop & Sen, Rik, 2021. "Inside brokers," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 141(3), pages 1096-1118.
    18. Felipe Cortes & Francisco Marcet, 2023. "Analysts’ Connections and M&A Outcomes," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(7), pages 4108-4133, July.
    19. Andrade, Sandro C. & Bian, Jiangze & Burch, Timothy R., 2013. "Analyst Coverage, Information, and Bubbles," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 48(5), pages 1573-1605, October.
    20. Daniel Bradley & Connie X. Mao & Chi Zhang, 2022. "Does Analyst Coverage Affect Workplace Safety?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(5), pages 3464-3487, May.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • G41 - Financial Economics - - Behavioral Finance - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making in Financial Markets

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:oup:rfinst:v:36:y:2023:i:2:p:409-449.. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Oxford University Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/sfsssea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.