Temporal Focus and Analyst Scrutiny: Evidence from Earnings Conference Calls

Using the setting of earnings conference calls, this paper investigates the temporal focus of management presentation during those calls, i.e., the extent to which managers allocate their discussions to future firm prospects relative to past firm performance. I find a negative association between firms' past performance and the future focus of management presentation. Moreover, the association is less negative for firms with more long-term investors and is more negative for firms with high litigation risk. Additionally, I find that the temporal focus of management presentation is positively associated with that of analyst questions. I also find that managers' future focus is positively associated with the number of analysts following the firm but negatively associated with forecast quality of analyst reports (lower accuracy and higher dispersion). Finally, I find the future discussions in management presentation is positively associated with the time that analysts took to release the next quarter's forecasts.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph. D.

Level thesis:degree_level

doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Accounting and Information Systems

Department dc:contributor.department

Accounting and Information Systems

Grantor dc:publisher

Virginia Tech

Year dc:date.issued

2017

Author dc:creator

• Zhou, Mi

Chair dc:contributor.committeechair

• Fan, Weiguo Patrick

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Hansen, Thomas Bowe
• Huang, Jingjing
• Barkhi, Reza
• Chen, Feng
• Stein, Sarah E.

• temporal focus
• analyst scrutiny
• conference calls
• investment horizon
• litigation risk

Statement dc:rights

• In Copyright

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Dc Identifier Other

vt_gsexam:10215

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/84982