How to Measure Analyst Forecast Effort

30 Pages Posted: 19 Mar 2014

See all articles by Tanja Klettke

Tanja Klettke

University of Cologne

Carsten Homburg

University of Cologne

Sebastian Gell

University of Cologne

Date Written: March 18, 2014

Abstract

We introduce a new way to measure the forecast effort that analysts devote to their earnings forecasts by measuring the analyst’s general effort for all covered firms. While the commonly applied effort measure is based on analyst behavior for one firm, our measure considers analyst behavior for all covered firms. Our general effort measure captures additional information about analyst effort and thus can identify accurate forecasts. We emphasize the importance of investigating analyst behavior in a larger context and argue that analysts who generally devote substantial forecast effort are also likely to devote substantial effort to a specific firm, even if this effort might not be captured by a firm-specific measure. Empirical results reveal that analysts who devote higher general forecast effort issue more accurate forecasts. Additional investigations show that analysts’ career prospects improve with higher general forecast effort. Our measure improves on existing methods as it has higher explanatory power regarding differences in forecast accuracy than the commonly applied effort measure. Additionally, it can address research questions that cannot be examined with a firm-specific measure. It provides a simple but comprehensive way to identify accurate analysts.

Keywords: Financial analysts, Earnings forecasts, Forecast accuracy, Forecast effort

JEL Classification: G24, G29, M41

Suggested Citation

Klettke, Tanja and Homburg, Carsten and Gell, Sebastian, How to Measure Analyst Forecast Effort (March 18, 2014). European Accounting Review, Forthcoming, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2410784

Tanja Klettke (Contact Author)

University of Cologne ( email )

Albertus-Magnus-Platz
Cologne, 50923
Germany

Carsten Homburg

University of Cologne ( email )

Albertus-Magnus-Platz
Cologne, 50923
Germany

Sebastian Gell

University of Cologne ( email )

Albertus-Magnus-Platz
Cologne, 50923
Germany

Do you have a job opening that you would like to promote on SSRN?

Paper statistics

Downloads
390
Abstract Views
1,706
Rank
127,812
PlumX Metrics