IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jfinan/v64y2009i5p2289-2325.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Driven to Distraction: Extraneous Events and Underreaction to Earnings News

Author

Listed:
  • DAVID HIRSHLEIFER
  • SONYA SEONGYEON LIM
  • SIEW HONG TEOH

Abstract

Recent studies propose that limited investor attention causes market underreactions. This paper directly tests this explanation by measuring the information load faced by investors. The investor distraction hypothesis holds that extraneous news inhibits market reactions to relevant news. We find that the immediate price and volume reaction to a firm's earnings surprise is much weaker, and post‐announcement drift much stronger, when a greater number of same‐day earnings announcements are made by other firms. We evaluate the economic importance of distraction effects through a trading strategy, which yields substantial alphas. Industry‐unrelated news and large earnings surprises have a stronger distracting effect.

Suggested Citation

  • David Hirshleifer & Sonya Seongyeon Lim & Siew Hong Teoh, 2009. "Driven to Distraction: Extraneous Events and Underreaction to Earnings News," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 64(5), pages 2289-2325, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jfinan:v:64:y:2009:i:5:p:2289-2325
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-6261.2009.01501.x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6261.2009.01501.x
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/j.1540-6261.2009.01501.x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Chambers, Ae & Penman, Sh, 1984. "Timeliness Of Reporting And The Stock-Price Reaction To Earnings Announcements," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(1), pages 21-47.
    2. Hong, Harrison & Torous, Walter & Valkanov, Rossen, 2007. "Do industries lead stock markets?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(2), pages 367-396, February.
    3. David Hirshleifer & SONYA SEONGYEON LIM & Siew Hong Teoh, 2004. "Disclosure to an Audience with Limited Attention," Game Theory and Information 0412002, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. David Hirshleifer, 2001. "Investor Psychology and Asset Pricing," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(4), pages 1533-1597, August.
    5. Loughran, Tim & Ritter, Jay R, 1995. "The New Issues Puzzle," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 50(1), pages 23-51, March.
    6. Francis, J & Pagach, D & Stephan, J, 1992. "The Stock-Market Response To Earnings Announcements Released During Trading Versus Nontrading Periods," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(2), pages 165-184.
    7. Brad M. Barber & Terrance Odean, 2000. "Trading Is Hazardous to Your Wealth: The Common Stock Investment Performance of Individual Investors," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(2), pages 773-806, April.
    8. Sims, Christopher A., 2003. "Implications of rational inattention," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(3), pages 665-690, April.
    9. Ikenberry, David & Lakonishok, Josef & Vermaelen, Theo, 1995. "Market underreaction to open market share repurchases," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(2-3), pages 181-208.
    10. Kewei Hou & Tobias J. Moskowitz, 2005. "Market Frictions, Price Delay, and the Cross-Section of Expected Returns," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 18(3), pages 981-1020.
    11. Peter Klibanoff & Owen Lamont & Thierry A. Wizman, 1998. "Investor Reaction to Salient News in Closed-End Country Funds," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 53(2), pages 673-699, April.
    12. Hirshleifer, David & Teoh, Siew Hong, 2003. "Limited attention, information disclosure, and financial reporting," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(1-3), pages 337-386, December.
    13. David Hirshleifer & Sonya S. Lim & Siew Hong Teoh, 2011. "Limited Investor Attention and Stock Market Misreactions to Accounting Information," The Review of Asset Pricing Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 1(1), pages 35-73.
    14. Grossman, Sanford J & Stiglitz, Joseph E, 1976. "Information and Competitive Price Systems," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 66(2), pages 246-253, May.
    15. Bernard, Vl & Thomas, Jk, 1989. "Post-Earnings-Announcement Drift - Delayed Price Response Or Risk Premium," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27, pages 1-36.
    16. Xavier Gabaix & David Laibson & Guillermo Moloche & Stephen Weinberg, 2006. "Costly Information Acquisition: Experimental Analysis of a Boundedly Rational Model," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(4), pages 1043-1068, September.
    17. Peng, Lin, 2005. "Learning with Information Capacity Constraints," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 40(2), pages 307-329, June.
    18. Brennan, Michael J & Jegadeesh, Narasimhan & Swaminathan, Bhaskaran, 1993. "Investment Analysis and the Adjustment of Stock Prices to Common Information," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 6(4), pages 799-824.
    19. Bagnoli, Mark & Clement, Michael & Watts, Susan G., 2005. "Around-the-Clock Media Coverage and the Timing of Earnings Announcements," Purdue University Economics Working Papers 1184, Purdue University, Department of Economics.
    20. Stefano DellaVigna & Joshua M. Pollet, 2007. "Demographics and Industry Returns," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(5), pages 1667-1702, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. David Hirshleifer & Sonya S. Lim & Siew Hong Teoh, 2011. "Limited Investor Attention and Stock Market Misreactions to Accounting Information," The Review of Asset Pricing Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 1(1), pages 35-73.
    2. David Hirshleife, 2015. "Behavioral Finance," Annual Review of Financial Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 7(1), pages 133-159, December.
    3. Lin, Mei-Chen & Wu, Chu-Hua & Chiang, Ming-Ti, 2014. "Investor attention and information diffusion from analyst coverage," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 235-246.
    4. Hirshleifer, David & Hsu, Po-Hsuan & Li, Dongmei, 2013. "Innovative efficiency and stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 107(3), pages 632-654.
    5. Yu, Miao & Hu, Xiaolu & Zhong, Angel, 2023. "Trade links and return predictability: The Australian evidence," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    6. Lee, Kuan-Hui & Wang, Shu-Feng, 2023. "Allocation of attention and the delayed reaction of stock returns to liquidity shock: Global evidence," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 421-444.
    7. Michaely, Roni & Rubin, Amir & Vedrashko, Alexander, 2016. "Are Friday announcements special? Overcoming selection bias," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(1), pages 65-85.
    8. Daniel, Kent & Hirshleifer, David & Teoh, Siew Hong, 2002. "Investor psychology in capital markets: evidence and policy implications," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(1), pages 139-209, January.
    9. Kent Daniel & David Hirshleifer & Lin Sun, 2020. "Short- and Long-Horizon Behavioral Factors [Financial intermediaries and the cross-section of asset returns]," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 33(4), pages 1673-1736.
    10. Stefano DellaVigna & Joshua M. Pollet, 2005. "Attention, Demographics, and the Stock Market," NBER Working Papers 11211, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Stefano DellaVigna, 2009. "Psychology and Economics: Evidence from the Field," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 47(2), pages 315-372, June.
    12. Wang, Weimin & (Frank) Wang, Xu, 2014. "Predicting earnings in a poor information environment," Journal of Contemporary Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 10(1), pages 46-58.
    13. Peng, Lin & Xiong, Wei, 2006. "Investor attention, overconfidence and category learning," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(3), pages 563-602, June.
    14. Zhu, Hui, 2014. "Implications of limited investor attention to customer–supplier information transfers," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 54(3), pages 405-416.
    15. Stefano Dellavigna & Joshua M. Pollet, 2009. "Investor Inattention and Friday Earnings Announcements," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 64(2), pages 709-749, April.
    16. Oh, Jong-Min, 2017. "Absorptive capacity, technology spillovers, and the cross-section of stock returns," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 85(C), pages 146-164.
    17. Lin Peng & Wei Xiong & Tim Bollerslev, 2007. "Investor Attention and Time‐varying Comovements," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 13(3), pages 394-422, June.
    18. Swasti Gupta‐Mukherjee & Ankur Pareek, 2020. "Limited attention and portfolio choice: The impact of attention allocation on mutual fund performance," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 49(4), pages 1083-1125, December.
    19. Ramos, Sofia B. & Latoeiro, Pedro & Veiga, Helena, 2020. "Limited attention, salience of information and stock market activity," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 92-108.
    20. Marco Di Maggio & Marco Pagano, 2018. "Financial Disclosure and Market Transparency with Costly Information Processing [Bargaining with incomplete information]," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 22(1), pages 117-153.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates

    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:bla:jfinan:v:64:y:2009:i:5:p:2289-2325. 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: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/afaaaea.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.