Do Financial Websites Meet the Users' Information Needs? A Survey from the Italian Context

Abstract

This paper shows the results of an empirical research on the expert users' behaviour in visiting websites to acquire financial information about listed companies. Italian financial analysts and corporate lenders are investigated through a questionnaire to understand (1) how they use both listed companies websites and financial news websites (financial portals) and (2) whether their information needs are satisfied using the Internet channel. This research also raises two additional issues: (a) both user groups exploit the Internet in a very large way and adopt a similar behaviour in using the websites, and (b) financial news websites play an important role in expert users behaviour, acting as a preliminary information switching point from which professional operators address towards specific listed corporate websites. This paper gives a contribution to the study of the demand side of corporate web reporting, rather neglected by previous academic research if compared to the analysis of the information offered by corporate websites.

Keywords: Financial reporting, Internet, company websites, users' information needs

JEL Classification: M49, G39