IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jbfina/v182y2026ics0378426625001979.html

Investor disagreement and state-dependent mispricing: New evidence on the analyst dispersion anomaly

Author

Listed:
  • Xu, Zhiwei
  • Yang, Yinan
  • Zhang, Teng

Abstract

This study provides strong evidence that the analyst dispersion anomaly (i.e., higher analyst forecast dispersion predicting lower future returns) exhibits a state-dependent pattern: the negative dispersion-return relation is evident only among stocks with high investor optimism but attenuates or even reverses among stocks with high investor pessimism. Reduced investor risk aversion and binding short-sale constraints amplify the anomaly under the condition of high investor optimism. These findings together align with Atmaz and Basak’s (2018) theory that disagreement combined with expectation biases causes mispricing. Alternative mechanisms, including managerial strategic disclosure, intertemporal hedging demand, credit risk, and analyst self-censorship,fail to subsume this conditional pattern. We also show that several other well-known measures of disagreement exhibit a similar state-dependent property. Overall, this study provides novel insights into the mechanisms driving the dispersion anomaly.

Suggested Citation

  • Xu, Zhiwei & Yang, Yinan & Zhang, Teng, 2026. "Investor disagreement and state-dependent mispricing: New evidence on the analyst dispersion anomaly," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 182(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jbfina:v:182:y:2026:i:c:s0378426625001979
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jbankfin.2025.107577
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378426625001979
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jbankfin.2025.107577?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Yen-Cheng Chang & Alexander Ljungqvist & Kevin Tseng, 2023. "Do Corporate Disclosures Constrain Strategic Analyst Behavior?," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 36(8), pages 3163-3212.
    2. Ge, Li & Lin, Tse-Chun & Pearson, Neil D., 2016. "Why does the option to stock volume ratio predict stock returns?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(3), pages 601-622.
    3. Chuan-Yang Hwang & Yuan Li, 2018. "Analysts’ Reputational Concerns, Self-Censoring, and the International Dispersion Effect," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(5), pages 2289-2307, May.
    4. Harrison Hong & Jeremy C. Stein, 2007. "Disagreement and the Stock Market," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 21(2), pages 109-128, Spring.
    5. Miller, Edward M, 1977. "Risk, Uncertainty, and Divergence of Opinion," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 32(4), pages 1151-1168, September.
    6. Jose A. Scheinkman & Wei Xiong, 2003. "Overconfidence and Speculative Bubbles," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 111(6), pages 1183-1219, December.
    7. Tsao, Shou-Min & Lu, Hsueh-Tien & Keung, Edmund C., 2016. "Voluntary monthly earnings disclosures and analyst behavior," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 37-49.
    8. Karl B. Diether & Christopher J. Malloy & Anna Scherbina, 2002. "Differences of Opinion and the Cross Section of Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(5), pages 2113-2141, October.
    9. Joel F. Houston & Baruch Lev & Jennifer Wu Tucker, 2010. "To Guide or Not to Guide? Causes and Consequences of Stopping Quarterly Earnings Guidance," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 27(1), pages 143-185, March.
    10. Thomas R. Palfrey & Stephanie W. Wang, 2012. "Speculative Overpricing in Asset Markets With Information Flows," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 80(5), pages 1937-1976, September.
    11. Kewei Hou & Chen Xue & Lu Zhang, 2015. "Editor's Choice Digesting Anomalies: An Investment Approach," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 28(3), pages 650-705.
    12. Dmitriy Muravyev & Neil D. Pearson & Joshua M. Pollet, 2025. "Anomalies and Their Short‐Sale Costs," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 80(6), pages 3639-3694, December.
    13. Melissa Porras Prado & Pedro A. C. Saffi & Jason Sturgess, 2016. "Ownership Structure, Limits to Arbitrage, and Stock Returns: Evidence from Equity Lending Markets," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 29(12), pages 3211-3244.
    14. Leland, Hayne E, 1994. "Corporate Debt Value, Bond Covenants, and Optimal Capital Structure," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 49(4), pages 1213-1252, September.
    15. Varian, Hal R, 1985. "Divergence of Opinion in Complete Markets: A Note," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 40(1), pages 309-317, March.
    16. Barinov, Alexander, 2013. "Analyst Disagreement and Aggregate Volatility Risk," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 48(6), pages 1877-1900, December.
    17. Amihud, Yakov, 2002. "Illiquidity and stock returns: cross-section and time-series effects," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 5(1), pages 31-56, January.
    18. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 2015. "A five-factor asset pricing model," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(1), pages 1-22.
    19. Han, Yufeng & Huang, Dashan & Huang, Dayong & Zhou, Guofu, 2022. "Expected return, volume, and mispricing," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(3), pages 1295-1315.
    20. Adem Atmaz & Suleyman Basak, 2018. "Belief Dispersion in the Stock Market," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 73(3), pages 1225-1279, June.
    21. Kent Daniel & Alexander Klos & Simon Rottke, 2023. "The Dynamics of Disagreement," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 36(6), pages 2431-2467.
    22. Meng Gao & Jiekun Huang & Itay Goldstein, 2020. "Informing the Market: The Effect of Modern Information Technologies on Information Production," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 33(4), pages 1367-1411.
    23. Meng Gao & Jiekun Huang & Itay GoldsteinEditor, 2020. "Informing the Market: The Effect of Modern Information Technologies on Information Production," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 33(4), pages 1367-1411.
    24. David Veenman & Patrick Verwijmeren, 2022. "The Earnings Expectations Game and the Dispersion Anomaly," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(4), pages 3129-3149, April.
    25. Graham, John R. & Harvey, Campbell R. & Rajgopal, Shiva, 2005. "The economic implications of corporate financial reporting," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(1-3), pages 3-73, December.
    26. Marco Ottaviani & Peter Norman Sørensen, 2015. "Price Reaction to Information with Heterogeneous Beliefs and Wealth Effects: Underreaction, Momentum, and Reversal," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(1), pages 1-34, January.
    27. Andrew Ang & Robert J. Hodrick & Yuhang Xing & Xiaoyan Zhang, 2006. "The Cross‐Section of Volatility and Expected Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(1), pages 259-299, February.
    28. Sami Keskek & Lynn Rees & Wayne B. Thomas, 2013. "Earnings Announcements, Differences of Opinion and Management Guidance," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(7-8), pages 769-795, September.
    29. Barinov, Alexander, 2018. "Stocks with extreme past returns: Lotteries or insurance?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 129(3), pages 458-478.
    30. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1993. "Common risk factors in the returns on stocks and bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 3-56, February.
    31. Yen‐Cheng Chang & Pei‐Jie Hsiao & Alexander Ljungqvist & Kevin Tseng, 2022. "Testing Disagreement Models," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 77(4), pages 2239-2285, August.
    32. Berkman, Henk & Dimitrov, Valentin & Jain, Prem C. & Koch, Paul D. & Tice, Sheri, 2009. "Sell on the news: Differences of opinion, short-sales constraints, and returns around earnings announcements," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(3), pages 376-399, June.
    33. Geert Bekaert & Eric C. Engstrom & Nancy R. Xu, 2022. "The Time Variation in Risk Appetite and Uncertainty," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(6), pages 3975-4004, June.
    34. Stephanie Wang, 2012. "Speculative Overpricing in Asset Markets with Information Flows," Working Paper 489, Department of Economics, University of Pittsburgh, revised Jan 2012.
    35. Paul Fischer & Chongho Kim & Frank Zhou, 2022. "Disagreement about fundamentals: measurement and consequences," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 27(4), pages 1423-1456, December.
    36. Carlin, Bruce I. & Longstaff, Francis A. & Matoba, Kyle, 2014. "Disagreement and asset prices," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(2), pages 226-238.
    37. Kent Daniel & David Hirshleifer & Lin Sun, 2020. "Short- and Long-Horizon Behavioral Factors," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 33(4), pages 1673-1736.
    38. Mitchell A. Petersen, 2009. "Estimating Standard Errors in Finance Panel Data Sets: Comparing Approaches," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(1), pages 435-480, January.
    39. Anna Scherbina, 2008. "Suppressed Negative Information and Future Underperformance," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 12(3), pages 533-565.
    40. Huang, Dashan & Li, Jiangyuan & Wang, Liyao, 2021. "Are disagreements agreeable? Evidence from information aggregation," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 141(1), pages 83-101.
    41. Orie E. Barron & Mary Harris Stanford & Yong Yu, 2009. "Further Evidence on the Relation between Analysts' Forecast Dispersion and Stock Returns," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 26(2), pages 329-357, June.
    42. Avramov, Doron & Chordia, Tarun & Jostova, Gergana & Philipov, Alexander, 2009. "Dispersion in analysts' earnings forecasts and credit rating," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(1), pages 83-101, January.
    43. Whitney Newey & Kenneth West, 2014. "A simple, positive semi-definite, heteroscedasticity and autocorrelation consistent covariance matrix," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 33(1), pages 125-132.
    44. Carhart, Mark M, 1997. "On Persistence in Mutual Fund Performance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(1), pages 57-82, March.
    45. repec:oup:revfin:v:29:y:2016:i:12:p:3211-3244. is not listed on IDEAS
    46. Daniel, Kent, et al, 1997. "Measuring Mutual Fund Performance with Characteristic-Based Benchmarks," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(3), pages 1035-1058, July.
    47. Engelberg, Joseph & McLean, R. David & Pontiff, Jeffrey, 2020. "Analysts and anomalies," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(1).
    48. Borochin, Paul & Yang, Jie, 2017. "The effects of institutional investor objectives on firm valuation and governance," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(1), pages 171-199.
    49. Stambaugh, Robert F. & Yu, Jianfeng & Yuan, Yu, 2012. "The short of it: Investor sentiment and anomalies," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 104(2), pages 288-302.
    50. S. P. Kothari & Susan Shu & Peter D. Wysocki, 2009. "Do Managers Withhold Bad News?," Journal of Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 47(1), pages 241-276, March.
    51. Alok Kumar & Mehrshad Motahari & Richard J. Taffler, 2024. "Skewness Sentiment and Market Anomalies," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 70(7), pages 4328-4356, July.
    52. Nittai K. Bergman & Sugata Roychowdhury, 2008. "Investor Sentiment and Corporate Disclosure," Journal of Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 46(5), pages 1057-1083, December.
    53. repec:bla:jfinan:v:59:y:2004:i:5:p:1957-1978 is not listed on IDEAS
    54. Han, Yufeng & Lu, Yueliang (Jacques) & Xu, Weike & Zhou, Guofu, 2024. "Mispricing and Anomalies: An Exogenous Shock to Short Selling from JGTRRA," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    55. Benjamin Golez & Ruslan Goyenko, 2022. "Disagreement in the Equity Options Market and Stock Returns," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 35(3), pages 1443-1479.
    56. Kim, Jun Sik & Ryu, Doojin & Seo, Sung Won, 2014. "Investor sentiment and return predictability of disagreement," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 166-178.
    57. Joel F. Houston & Baruch Lev & Jennifer Wu Tucker, 2010. "To Guide or Not to Guide? Causes and Consequences of Stopping Quarterly Earnings Guidance," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 27(1), pages 4-4, March.
    58. Qiang Cheng & Kin Lo, 2006. "Insider Trading and Voluntary Disclosures," Journal of Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 44(5), pages 815-848, December.
    59. Gao, Xin & Wang, Ying, 2023. "Mining the Short Side: Institutional Investors and Stock Market Anomalies," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 58(1), pages 392-418, February.
    60. Jon A. Garfinkel, 2009. "Measuring Investors' Opinion Divergence," Journal of Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 47(5), pages 1317-1348, December.
    61. Yu, Jialin, 2011. "Disagreement and return predictability of stock portfolios," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 99(1), pages 162-183, January.
    62. Grinblatt, Mark & Han, Bing, 2005. "Prospect theory, mental accounting, and momentum," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 78(2), pages 311-339, November.
    63. Mamdouh Medhat & Maik Schmeling, 2022. "Short-term Momentum," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 35(3), pages 1480-1526.
    64. Choy, Siu Kai & Wei, Jason, 2012. "Option trading: Information or differences of opinion?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(8), pages 2299-2322.
    65. Boehme, Rodney D. & Danielsen, Bartley R. & Sorescu, Sorin M., 2006. "Short-Sale Constraints, Differences of Opinion, and Overvaluation," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 41(2), pages 455-487, June.
    66. Andrew Bird & Stephen A Karolyi & Thomas G Ruchti & Phong Truong, 2021. "More is Less: Publicizing Information and Market Feedback [Illiquidity and stock returns: cross-section and time-series effects]," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 25(3), pages 745-775.
    67. Scott Richardson & Siew Hong Teoh & Peter D. Wysocki, 2004. "The Walk†down to Beatable Analyst Forecasts: The Role of Equity Issuance and Insider Trading Incentives," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 21(4), pages 885-924, December.
    68. Alexander David, 2008. "Heterogeneous Beliefs, Speculation, and the Equity Premium," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 63(1), pages 41-83, February.
    69. Min, Byoung-Kyu & Qiu, Buhui & Roh, Tai-Yong, 2022. "What drives the dispersion anomaly?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 138(C).
    70. Kent Daniel & David Hirshleifer & Lin Sun, 2020. "Short- and Long-Horizon Behavioral Factors," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 33(4), pages 1673-1736.
    71. Ronnie Sadka & Anna Scherbina, 2007. "Analyst Disagreement, Mispricing, and Liquidity," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(5), pages 2367-2403, October.
    72. Huynh, Thanh D. & Xia, Ying, 2021. "Climate Change News Risk and Corporate Bond Returns," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 56(6), pages 1985-2009, September.
    73. Cheolbeom Park, 2005. "Stock Return Predictability and the Dispersion in Earnings Forecasts," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 78(6), pages 2351-2376, November.
    74. J. Michael Harrison & David M. Kreps, 1978. "Speculative Investor Behavior in a Stock Market with Heterogeneous Expectations," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 92(2), pages 323-336.
    75. Robert F. Stambaugh & Jianfeng Yu & Yu Yuan, 2015. "Arbitrage Asymmetry and the Idiosyncratic Volatility Puzzle," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 70(5), pages 1903-1948, October.
    76. Ling Cen & Hai Lu & Liyan Yang, 2013. "Investor Sentiment, Disagreement, and the Breadth--Return Relationship," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(5), pages 1076-1091, May.
    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. Zhang, Teng & Li, Jiaqi & Xu, Zhiwei, 2024. "Speculative trading, stock returns and asset pricing anomalies," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 61(C).
    2. Andreou, Panayiotis C. & Kagkadis, Anastasios & Philip, Dennis & Tuneshev, Ruslan, 2018. "Differences in options investors’ expectations and the cross-section of stock returns," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 315-336.
    3. Turan G. Bali & Luca Del Viva & Menatalla El Hefnawy & Lenos Trigeorgis, 2024. "Value Uncertainty," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 70(7), pages 4548-4563, July.
    4. Huang, Dashan & Li, Jiangyuan & Wang, Liyao, 2021. "Are disagreements agreeable? Evidence from information aggregation," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 141(1), pages 83-101.
    5. Jorida Papakroni, 2018. "The dispersion anomaly and analyst recommendations," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 50(3), pages 861-896, April.
    6. Gao, George P. & Lu, Xiaomeng & Song, Zhaogang & Yan, Hongjun, 2019. "Disagreement beta," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 96-113.
    7. Junjun Ma & Xindan Li & Lei Lu & Weixing Wu & Xiong Xiong, 2022. "Individual investors' dispersion in beliefs and stock returns," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 51(3), pages 929-953, September.
    8. Han, Yufeng & Huang, Dashan & Huang, Dayong & Zhou, Guofu, 2022. "Expected return, volume, and mispricing," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(3), pages 1295-1315.
    9. Hillert, Alexander & Jacobs, Heiko & Müller, Sebastian, 2018. "Journalist disagreement," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 57-76.
    10. Xin Chen & Wei He & Libin Tao & Jianfeng Yu, 2023. "Attention and Underreaction-Related Anomalies," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(1), pages 636-659, January.
    11. Sophia Zhengzi Li & Zeyao Luan, 2025. "News-based investor disagreement and stock returns," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 30(3), pages 2312-2375, September.
    12. Akbas, Ferhat & Boehmer, Ekkehart & Jiang, Chao & Koch, Paul D., 2022. "Overnight returns, daytime reversals, and future stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 145(3), pages 850-875.
    13. Yen‐Cheng Chang & Pei‐Jie Hsiao & Alexander Ljungqvist & Kevin Tseng, 2022. "Testing Disagreement Models," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 77(4), pages 2239-2285, August.
    14. David Veenman & Patrick Verwijmeren, 2022. "The Earnings Expectations Game and the Dispersion Anomaly," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(4), pages 3129-3149, April.
    15. Sun, Kaisi & Wang, Hui & Zhu, Yifeng, 2023. "Salience theory in price and trading volume: Evidence from China," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 38-61.
    16. Wang, Jianqiu & Wu, Ke & Pan, Jiening & Jiang, Ying, 2023. "Disagreement, speculation, and the idiosyncratic volatility," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 232-250.
    17. Y. Eser Arisoy & Turan G. Bali & Yi Tang, 2024. "Investor Regret and Stock Returns," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 70(11), pages 7537-7558, November.
    18. Kim, Soonho & Na, Haejung, 2020. "Earnings information, arbitrage constraints, and the forecast dispersion anomaly," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 35(C).
    19. Lin, Chaonan & Chen, Hong-Yi & Ko, Kuan-Cheng & Yang, Nien-Tzu, 2021. "Time-dependent lottery preference and the cross-section of stock returns," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 272-294.
    20. Min, Byoung-Kyu & Qiu, Buhui & Roh, Tai-Yong, 2022. "What drives the dispersion anomaly?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 138(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    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:eee:jbfina:v:182:y:2026:i:c:s0378426625001979. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jbf .

    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.