Nonnegative (negative) cash flow surprises help generate nonnegative (negative) earnings surprises; hence, the two surprises are generally expected to have the same sign. We document firms' propensity to report surprises of opposing signs and investigate conditions under which firms beat cash...

Managers play earnings surprise games to avoid negative earnings surprises by managing earnings upward or by managing analysts' earnings expectations downward. We investigate the effectiveness of the financial reporting process at restraining earnings surprise games. Because the annual reporting...

We investigate the implications of firms' benchmark-beating pattern with respect to analysts' quarterly cash flow forecasts for current capital market valuation and future firm performance. We contend that nonnegative earnings surprises are more likely to be supported by real operating...

We investigate firms' propensity to meet analysts' forecasts of cash flows and earnings, and identify factors pertaining to market valuation, financial analysts, and firms' financial condition to explain why firms sometimes meet cash flow forecasts but miss earnings forecasts. Firms meet cash...