Sell-side analysts employ different benchmarks when defining their recommendations. A buy for some brokers means the stock is expected to outperform its industry, while for other brokers it means the stock is expected to outperform the market, or some return threshold. We show that these stated...

We offer a parsimonious index at the individual analyst level to measure the extent to which an analyst relies on earnings and long-term growth forecasts in her advice. Using this index, we evaluate the contribution of earnings and growth forecasts to the investment value of analysts’ stock...

Because analysts strategically allocate more effort to portfolio firms that are relatively more important for their careers, a firm's information environment is impacted by other firms covered by its analysts. Controlling for analyst and firm characteristics, an analyst makes more accurate,...

We use a proprietary dataset to test the implications of several asymmetric information models on how short-lived private information affects trading strategies and liquidity provision. Our identification rests on information acquisition before analyst recommendations are publically announced....