IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/inm/ormnsc/v63y2017i4p1214-1231.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Disagreement, Underreaction, and Stock Returns

Author

Listed:
  • Ling Cen

    (Department of Management, University of Toronto Scarborough, Ontario M1C 1A4, Canada; and Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario M5S 3E6, Canada)

  • K. C. John Wei

    (School of Accounting and Finance, Faculty of Business, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong)

  • Liyan Yang

    (Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario M5S 3E6, Canada; and Guanghua School of Management, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China)

Abstract

We explore analysts’ earnings forecast data to improve on one popular disagreement measure—the analyst forecast dispersion measure—proposed by Diether et al. [Diether KB, Malloy CJ, Scherbina A (2002) Differences of opinion and the cross section of stock returns. J. Finance 57:2113–2141]. Our analysis suggests that changes in the standard deviations of forecasted earnings can work as a complementary disagreement measure that is comparable across stocks and immune from other return-predictive information contained in the normalization scalars of analyst forecast dispersion measures. We also document evidence that the change-based disagreement measure predicts future cross-sectional returns significantly only when changes in the mean forecasts are negative. This finding suggests that the interaction between disagreement and underreaction to earnings news affects asset prices.

Suggested Citation

  • Ling Cen & K. C. John Wei & Liyan Yang, 2017. "Disagreement, Underreaction, and Stock Returns," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 63(4), pages 1214-1231, April.
  • Handle: RePEc:inm:ormnsc:v:63:y:2017:i:4:p:1214-1231
    DOI: 10.1287/mnsc.2015.2405
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2015.2405
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1287/mnsc.2015.2405?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Fama, Eugene F & French, Kenneth R, 1992. "The Cross-Section of Expected Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 47(2), pages 427-465, June.
    2. Ryan T. Ball, 2011. "Discussion of Why Do EPS Forecast Error and Dispersion Not Vary with Scale? Implications for Analyst and Managerial Behavior," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 49(2), pages 403-412, May.
    3. 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.
    4. Miller, Edward M, 1977. "Risk, Uncertainty, and Divergence of Opinion," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 32(4), pages 1151-1168, September.
    5. 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.
    6. 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.
    7. X. Frank Zhang, 2006. "Information Uncertainty and Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(1), pages 105-137, February.
    8. Sara B. Moeller & Frederik P. Schlingemann & René M. Stulz, 2007. "How Do Diversity of Opinion and Information Asymmetry Affect Acquirer Returns?," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 20(6), pages 2047-2078, November.
    9. Jiang, Hao & Sun, Zheng, 2014. "Dispersion in beliefs among active mutual funds and the cross-section of stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(2), pages 341-365.
    10. Harrison Hong & Jeremy C. Stein, 2003. "Differences of Opinion, Short-Sales Constraints, and Market Crashes," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 16(2), pages 487-525.
    11. Eugene F. Fama & Kenneth R. French, 2008. "Average Returns, B/M, and Share Issues," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 63(6), pages 2971-2995, December.
    12. Cohen, Randolph B. & Gompers, Paul A. & Vuolteenaho, Tuomo, 2002. "Who underreacts to cash-flow news? evidence from trading between individuals and institutions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2-3), pages 409-462.
    13. 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.
    14. Givoly, Dan & Lakonishok, Josef, 1980. "Financial analysts' forecasts of earnings : Their value to investors," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 4(3), pages 221-233, September.
    15. Newey, Whitney & West, Kenneth, 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.
    16. Chen, Joseph & Hong, Harrison & Stein, Jeremy C., 2002. "Breadth of ownership and stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2-3), pages 171-205.
    17. Carlin, Bruce I. & Longstaff, Francis A. & Matoba, Kyle, 2014. "Disagreement and asset prices," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(2), pages 226-238.
    18. Anna Scherbina, 2008. "Suppressed Negative Information and Future Underperformance," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 12(3), pages 533-565.
    19. Carhart, Mark M, 1997. "On Persistence in Mutual Fund Performance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(1), pages 57-82, March.
    20. 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.
    21. Foong Soon Cheong & Jacob Thomas, 2011. "Why Do EPS Forecast Error and Dispersion Not Vary with Scale? Implications for Analyst and Managerial Behavior," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 49(2), pages 359-401, May.
    22. Snehal Banerjee, 2011. "Learning from Prices and the Dispersion in Beliefs," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 24(9), pages 3025-3068.
    23. Jegadeesh, Narasimhan, 1990. "Evidence of Predictable Behavior of Security Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 45(3), pages 881-898, July.
    24. Goetzmann, William N. & Massa, Massimo, 2005. "Dispersion of opinion and stock returns," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 8(3), pages 324-349, August.
    25. Fama, Eugene F & MacBeth, James D, 1973. "Risk, Return, and Equilibrium: Empirical Tests," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 81(3), pages 607-636, May-June.
    26. 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.
    27. 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.
    28. Narasimhan Jegadeesh & Sheridan Titman, 2001. "Profitability of Momentum Strategies: An Evaluation of Alternative Explanations," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(2), pages 699-720, April.
    29. 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.
    30. Sris Chatterjee & Kose John & An Yan, 2012. "Takeovers and Divergence of Investor Opinion," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 25(1), pages 227-277.
    31. Nagel, Stefan, 2005. "Short sales, institutional investors and the cross-section of stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 78(2), pages 277-309, November.
    32. Chan, Louis K C & Jegadeesh, Narasimhan & Lakonishok, Josef, 1996. "Momentum Strategies," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 51(5), pages 1681-1713, December.
    33. Kent Daniel & Sheridan Titman, 2006. "Market Reactions to Tangible and Intangible Information," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(4), pages 1605-1643, August.
    34. Ronnie Sadka & Anna Scherbina, 2007. "Analyst Disagreement, Mispricing, and Liquidity," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(5), pages 2367-2403, October.
    35. Jegadeesh, Narasimhan & Titman, Sheridan, 1993. "Returns to Buying Winners and Selling Losers: Implications for Stock Market Efficiency," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 48(1), pages 65-91, March.
    36. J. Michael Harrison & David M. Kreps, 1978. "Speculative Investor Behavior in a Stock Market with Heterogeneous Expectations," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 92(2), pages 323-336.
    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. Liya Chu & Xue-Zhong He & Kai Li & Jun Tu, 2022. "Investor Sentiment and Paradigm Shifts in Equity Return Forecasting," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(6), pages 4301-4325, June.
    2. Bao, Wei & Guo, Shijun & Peng, Diefeng & Rao, Yulei, 2023. "Trading gap in holidays and price transmission: Evidence from cross-listed stocks on the A-share and H-share markets," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    3. Wang, Zhen & Sun, Lei & John Wei, K.C., 2020. "Does competition induce analyst effort? evidence from a natural experiment of broker mergers," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 119(C).
    4. Chen, Hong-Yi & Hsieh, Chia-Hsun & Lee, Cheng-Few, 2023. "Revisiting the momentum effect in Taiwan: The role of persistency," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    5. 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.
    6. Li Liu & Zhiyuan Pan & Yudong Wang, 2022. "Shrinking return forecasts," The Financial Review, Eastern Finance Association, vol. 57(3), pages 641-661, August.
    7. Sharma, Susan Sunila & Narayan, Paresh Kumar, 2022. "Technology shocks and stock returns: A long-term perspective," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 67-83.
    8. Li, Huijing & Li, Hong & Lu, Lei & Theocharides, George & Xiong, Xiong, 2020. "Macro disagreement and international options markets," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    9. Gao, Shenghao & Brockman, Paul & Meng, Qingbin & Yan, Xuemin, 2020. "Differences of opinion, institutional bids, and IPO underpricing," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 60(C).

    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. 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.
    2. Amit Goyal, 2012. "Empirical cross-sectional asset pricing: a survey," Financial Markets and Portfolio Management, Springer;Swiss Society for Financial Market Research, vol. 26(1), pages 3-38, March.
    3. Guo, Hui & Qiu, Buhui, 2014. "Options-implied variance and future stock returns," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 93-113.
    4. Turan G. Bali & Andriy Bodnaruk & Anna Scherbina & Yi Tang, 2018. "Unusual News Flow and the Cross Section of Stock Returns," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(9), pages 4137-4155, September.
    5. Jacobs, Heiko, 2015. "What explains the dynamics of 100 anomalies?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 65-85.
    6. Stefan Nagel, 2013. "Empirical Cross-Sectional Asset Pricing," Annual Review of Financial Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 5(1), pages 167-199, November.
    7. Chen, Tsung-Yu & Chao, Ching-Hsiang & Wu, Zhen-Xing, 2021. "Does the turnover effect matter in emerging markets? Evidence from China," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    8. Chen, Lin & Qin, Lu & Zhu, Hongquan, 2015. "Opinion divergence, unexpected trading volume and stock returns: Evidence from China," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 119-127.
    9. Qian, Xiaolin, 2014. "Small investor sentiment, differences of opinion and stock overvaluation," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 19(C), pages 219-246.
    10. 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.
    11. Nagel, Stefan, 2005. "Short sales, institutional investors and the cross-section of stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 78(2), pages 277-309, November.
    12. Zhiqi Cao & Wenfeng Wu, 2023. "Difference of opinion among investors versus analysts," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 63(2), pages 2347-2381, June.
    13. Xin Chen & Wei He & Libin Tao & Jianfeng Yu, 2023. "Attention and Underreaction-Related Anomalies," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(1), pages 636-659, January.
    14. Andrew Ang & Assaf A. Shtauber & Paul C. Tetlock, 2013. "Asset Pricing in the Dark: The Cross-Section of OTC Stocks," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 26(12), pages 2985-3028.
    15. Jiang, George J. & Zhu, Kevin X., 2017. "Information Shocks and Short-Term Market Underreaction," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 124(1), pages 43-64.
    16. Jang, Jeewon & Kang, Jangkoo, 2019. "Probability of price crashes, rational speculative bubbles, and the cross-section of stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 132(1), pages 222-247.
    17. Wu, Juan (Julie) & Zhang, Jianzhong (Andrew), 2019. "Short selling and market anomalies," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 46(C).
    18. Atilgan, Yigit & Bali, Turan G. & Demirtas, K. Ozgur & Gunaydin, A. Doruk, 2020. "Left-tail momentum: Underreaction to bad news, costly arbitrage and equity returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(3), pages 725-753.
    19. Mamdouh Medhat & Maik Schmeling, 2022. "Short-term Momentum," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 35(3), pages 1480-1526.
    20. Lin, Chaonan & Ko, Kuan-Cheng & Chen, Yu-Lin & Chu, Hsiang-Hui, 2016. "Information discreteness, price limits and earnings momentum," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 1-22.

    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:inm:ormnsc:v:63:y:2017:i:4:p:1214-1231. 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: Chris Asher (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/inforea.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.