consumes heinrichs september · september 2015 using a set of proprietary records, we examine who...
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Electronic copy available at: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2653088
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Who Consumes Firm Disclosures?
Evidence from Earnings Conference Calls
Anne Heinrichs
Columbia Business School
Jihwon Park
Harvard Business School
Eugene Soltes
Harvard Business School
September 2015
Using a set of proprietary records, we examine who consumes quarterly earnings conference
calls. We find significant interest in earnings conference calls beyond investors and sell‐side
analysts and demand varies in predictable ways according to the objectives of these users.
Institutional investors who do not hold a position in the firm are the primary consumers of calls
and many institutional investors that hold large positions only consume news periodically. We
find that most of the variation in consumption is driven by firm related factors that are not readily
influenced by direct managerial decisions in the short‐run. We find that some efforts to hide news
by disclosing it late in the day or week are associated with lower immediate consumption.
However, the more limited immediate consumption is offset by even greater consumption in the
coming days, thereby thwarting efforts to avoid scrutiny. Overall, our investigation illuminates
the actual usage of firm news by different consumers. We would like to thank participants at the SAFE Transparency conference, Stanford’s Accounting Workshop, and Suraj
Srinivasan for helpful feedback and Thomson Reuters for sharing the conference call records with us. This research is
funded by the Harvard Business School and Columbia University.
Electronic copy available at: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2653088
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1. Introduction
Whether reviewing a press release, preparing for a conference call, or speaking at an
industry conference, executives spend a considerable amount of time and effort on the public
disclosure of firm news. Some of this disclosure is mandated by regulation, but much of it is
voluntary. Managers expend this effort on voluntary disclosure because of the perceived benefits
of providing greater transparency to the market (e.g., improved liquidity, lower cost of capital.)1
Researchers who study the effects of disclosure implicitly assume that once news is
publicly disclosed, it is consumed by market participants. However, academic research says little
about the specific market participants that actually seek out and consume these disclosures. The
lack of evidence around who scrutinizes these disclosures arises from the nature of information
consumption. In most cases, investors, analysts, and other market participants digest news in
private (e.g. reading on a monitor, listening over a phone, watching on television, etc.).
Consequently, it is difficult to interpret exactly who is processing this information.
In this paper, we seek to illuminate the consumption of firm news by examining a
proprietary set of records collected by Thomson Reuters, a multinational media firm and leading
market data aggregator. Beginning in 2009, Thomson Reuters began to monitor and record when
institutional clients listened to broadcasts or downloaded transcripts of conference calls. Using
these records, we ascertain the specific types of individuals who sought information, which
conference calls they looked for, when they sought to acquire the information, and for what firms.
By detailing the information consumption choices of institutional investors, analysts, and other
business users, these records offer a unique opportunity to investigate the demand for one form
of firm‐initiated disclosure.
Our analysis of these records offers several insights into the consumption of firm
disclosures. Beyond the significant demand for earnings conference calls by institutional
investors and sell‐side analysts, we show significant demand for earnings conference calls by
individuals who are neither market participants, nor intermediaries that provide information to
investors. These other constituencies include suppliers, strategic partners, bankers, consultants
1 See Leuz and Wysocki (2008) for a discussion of the related theoretical and empirical research on the economic
consequences of firm disclosure.
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and media. This broader interest in firm‐initiated news suggests a more expansive use of firm
disclosures beyond simply reducing information asymmetries between managers and investors.
Among institutional investors that consume earnings conference calls, demand primarily
arises from investors who are not contemporaneous holders in the firm’s securities. Much of the
academic research on firm disclosure focuses on the monitoring and contracting roles that arise
between firm and investors. However, our findings suggest that investors who do not have such
a relationship with the firm are actually the largest consumers of news. This suggests a more
nuanced picture of consumers for whom this information is being produced for. To the extent
that managers are aware of this broader constituency of consumers, it also suggests a more
complex production function when creating disclosures. Overall, the significant consumption of
firm news by investors who do not hold positions support the significant role played by
disclosure in building investor recognition (Merton 1987).
In addition, institutional investors are often not regular consumers of earnings conference
calls for the firms in which they have invested. Notably, we find that institutional investors, some
of whom hold hundreds of millions of dollars in stock, only periodically consume the call. We
find that particular types of investors, like hedge funds, and those holding relatively larger
positions in the firm are considerably more engaged. However, the irregularity of consumption
suggests that institutional investors do not necessarily monitor all news being produced by firms,
but rather consume it selectively and in a periodic fashion.
We examine factors that influence consumption of earnings conference calls by the
different constituencies. We explore factors at the firm level (e.g. market value, leverage), event
level (e.g. negative surprise), and under the immediate discretion of management (e.g. time of
call). We find that the vast majority of the variation in demand is driven by firm level factors
suggesting that managers have, at least in the short run, only limited ability to influence the
amount of consumption.
Researchers often focus on the timeliness of firm‐initiated disclosures. However, we find
considerable demand for earnings conference call events in the months and even years after the
initial disclosure event. This suggests that the demand for voluntary disclosure not only arises
from the desire for timely updates about a firm’s performance, but also from an interest in
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understanding a firm’s past. Notably, less than half of the historical demand is from investors.
Sell‐side analysts and corporate users (e.g. suppliers, competitors, bankers) are also significant
consumers of historical earnings conference call disclosures. This finding complements recent
work by Drake, Roulstone, and Thornock (2015) on how investors digest historical financial
reports using the EDGAR database.
Prior academic research has hypothesized that managers may strategically release news
to influence the amount of attention it receives. For instance, managers with bad news may seek
to disclose it late Friday evening when market participants are less attentive in hopes that it will
not be digested as critically. Using our records, we explore the effectiveness of hosting calls at
less popular times, specifically after hours and Fridays. We find that firms who host calls after
hours or Fridays do receive lower consumption at the time of its disclosure. However, this
reduced consumption is offset by greater consumption of the archival call in subsequent days.
Consequently, it appears that managerial strategies to “hide” news may not be especially effective
when this information can be consumed by users more conveniently in the following days.
Although our records from Thomson include a variety of different types of conference
events for firms headquartered around the globe, we focus on earnings conference calls for NYSE,
AMEX, and NASDAQ firms in order to facilitate comparison of our analysis with the broader
literature on disclosure and earnings conference calls. Within this set of events, our analysis
contains data for nearly 42,000 unique Thomson Reuters clients who make over 2.5 million
requests for audio or transcript records during our sample period from late 2009 to the end of
2012. The sample of firms for which we have data about earnings conference call consumption
represents nearly 55% of all US‐based firms with publicly listed equity securities on NYSE, AMEX
and NASDAQ.
Our investigation contributes to several sets of academic literature. First, our analysis
facilitates a more expansive understanding of the demand for firm‐initiated disclosure. Our
analysis suggests that the buy‐side constitutes approximately half of all demand for earnings
conference call disclosures. Moreover, of this buy‐side demand, less than half arises from
investors who hold a position at the time of the call. Thus, the consumption of firm news is a
much wider phenomenon than simply a transactional relationship between managers and
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existing investors. 2 In addition, our analysis offers evidence that disclosure is not simply a
mechanism for the timely reduction in information asymmetry. There is considerable institutional
demand for disclosure long after its initial release by different constituencies, which suggests that
this information plays a broader role in understanding a firm’s narrative.3
We also contribute to an understanding of how and when institutional investors use firm
disclosures. Because of the difficulty of observing the consumption of news by institutional
investors, there is relatively little work describing how widely disclosures are consumed by
holders and potential future holders (i.e. non‐holders) of securities. The irregularity of
consumption suggests that holders are not directly consuming all firm news about all their
investments. Some investors are relatively passive when it comes to information consumption,
suggesting that they may be relying on information intermediaries (e.g. sell‐side analysts, media),
only some disclosure types (e.g. 10‐Q and not the earnings conference call), or only periodically
checking in when certain events occur. In contrast, the widespread consumption of earnings
conference calls by non‐holders supports a desire for greater information.
Our investigation also contributes to the literature on earnings conference calls. 4
Researchers often implicitly assume that sell‐side analysts are the primary group of individuals
that consume earnings calls. This is due to the fact that sell‐side analysts are typically the
individuals that ask questions on calls. Other individuals that consume the call, but do not
necessarily participate, are not known. However, a lack of participation does not necessarily
imply a lack of consumption. Using our records, we are able to better understand and describe
the different constituencies beyond sell‐side analysts that consume earnings conference calls.
One caveat to our analysis is that users can consume earnings conference calls in ways
that are not captured by Thomson Reuters. In particular, a user can contemporaneously consume
2 Bozanic et al. (2014) explore another set of users of financial disclosers by looking at IRS access to the EDGAR database. 3 Drake, Roulstone, and Thornock (2015) investigate the historical use of financial reports (10‐Ks and 10‐Qs) by EDGAR users. Our analysis complements a number of their findings, but also differs in several regards. In particular, we focus
on institutional clients, rather than individual investors and we exploit the ability to identify the type of consumer
(buy‐side, sell‐side, media). In the case of institutional investors, we can also identify the specific investor consuming
a conference call, which gives us the ability to match the investors with their contemporaneous holdings in the stock. 4 Prior work broadly related to examining conference calls as a means of disclosure include Bushee et al (2003), Skinner
(2003), Brown et al (2004), Brochet et al (2012), Frankel et al (1999), Mayew (2008), Hollander et al (2010), Kimbrough
(2005), Bushee et al (2004), Matsumoto et al (2011), Bowen et al (2002), Kimbrough (2011), and Chen et al (2012).
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the event by using a dial‐in number, which is not run by Thomson Reuters. Alternatively, he can
gain access to earnings conference call transcripts after the event via other channels that
reproduce and disseminate transcripts (e.g. Bloomberg, FactSet, Seekingalpha.com, Yahoo!
Finance). To the extent that certain constituencies utilize these alternative services rather than
Thomson Reuters disproportionately, our analysis may understate the relative magnitude of
usage by one group.
Finally, for managers this analysis should offer a better understanding of the determinants
of earnings conference call consumption. Thomson Reuters originally collected this data to offer
its investor relations clients a better way to understand who consumes their information releases.
However, there was little analysis done on the aggregate sample to understand the variation in
demand. Our analysis begins to illuminate the factors associated with greater or lesser
consumption of conference calls. In particular, our analysis shows that much of the variation is
determined by firm characteristics that managers have little control of in the short run. Moreover,
we find evidence suggesting that those firms which choose to make their audio broadcast
available for a longer duration have greater news consumption. While broadening access seems
an obvious way to increase demand, the fact that some firms who purportedly tout their
transparency restrict access to their audio broadcast soon after the event suggests that either there
are other considerations motivating this choice or that firms are myopically restricting access to
their disclosures.
2. Institutional Background: Firm Disclosure and Earnings Conference Calls
Empirical research on disclosure typically follows efficient market assumptions in that
once information is disclosed by firms, it is implicitly assumed to be immediately consumed by
investors.5 Firm news that is inaccessible or ignored by investors is unlikely to impart the same
economic consequences as news that is more widely consumed by investors.
A growing body of recent research challenges this basic notion of informational efficiency
by investigating how the differential dissemination of news influences its economic impact. For
5 For instance, Merton (1987) describes this assumption as “the diffusion of every type of publicly available information
takes place instantaneously among all investors” (485).
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example, Engelberg and Parsons (2011) investigate the asset pricing consequences when investors
are unable to consume timely firm news. By exploiting extreme weather events (e.g. blizzards,
high precipitation, etc.), Engelberg and Parsons identify days in which specific subsets of
investors are not able to receive their local paper and therefore cannot consume specific pieces of
firm news.6 Using this identification strategy, Engelberg and Parsons are able to causally identify
an economically significant impact of news consumption on individual trading.
Even more recently, Blankespoor, Miller, and White (2014) offer evidence that firms who
disseminate news via Twitter experience lower bid‐ask spreads and greater depth. Their work
complements other research on the role of the media in disseminating information to facilitate
reductions in information asymmetries (Bushee et al. 2010, Li, Ramesh, and Shen 2011, Rogers et
al. 2013). This body of evidence offers support that there are differential economic consequences
associated with the availability and consumption of firm‐initiated news.
In these investigations, researchers do not directly observe the consumption of news by
investors.7 The process of consuming news (e.g. reading a newspaper, listening on headphones)
is private and therefore not generally observed or recorded. Thus, researchers implicitly assume
that when news is more accessible (e.g. disseminated more widely by the media), it is consumed.
Yet, there is little direct evidence showing who specifically consumes firm‐initiated disclosures.8
Earnings conference calls are one form of public firm disclosure where a subset of market
participants that consume the news is known. Since the passage of Regulation Fair Disclosure in
2000, the public can listen to each question asked by participants (Bushee, Matsumoto, and Miller
2004, Mayew 2008, Hollander, Pronk, and Roelofsen 2010). In most cases, these participants are
sell‐side analysts. Mayew (2008) reports nearly eight sell‐side analysts participate, on average, on
each earnings conference call. While the names and brokerages of the analysts are publicly
disclosed when they ask a question, they are not the only market participants listening to the call
and seeking to consume this form of disclosure. Regulation Fair Disclosure was motivated, in
6 Engelberg and Parsons (2011) focus on a period in the early 1990’s prior to the widespread availability of the internet
when investors were much more likely to rely on the local newspaper for news. 7 An exception within this body of research, Blankespoor et al 2014 manage to acquire click data on Twitter links.
This allows them to observe consumption in conjunction with the level of dissemination. 8 In a different but related setting, there is evidence around the specific types of investors and analysts that consume
private disclosure in the context of one‐on‐one meetings (Solomon and Soltes 2015, Soltes 2014).
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part, by the fact that other constituencies were interested in consuming these firm‐initiated
disclosures, but were denied access.9 Yet, which other types of individuals and to what extent
they seek to consume these disclosure events is not well understood.
Prior research offers some hypotheses about non‐sell side consumers of earnings
conference calls. Investors who provide equity or debt capital to firms have an interest in
acquiring and monitoring news about firms. Empirical research has provided evidence that
earnings conference calls offer incremental information to other sources of firm‐initiated news
(e.g. Frankel et al. 1999, Bushee et al. 2003, Brown et al. 2004, Matsumoto et al. 2011). In addition
to specific information provided on the call, earnings conference calls also offer investors the
opportunity to hear managers, thereby providing additional information through their vocal cues
(Mayew and Venkatachalam 2012, Chen et al 2012). Consequently, prior research has suggested
that investors are significant consumers of earnings conference calls (Tasker 1998, Bowen et al.
2002, Kimbrough 2005, Kimbrough and Louis 2011).10
While sell‐side analysts are one significant information intermediary consuming earnings
conference calls, another information intermediary is journalists who write for business media
and seek to process, analyze, and disseminate news (Healy and Palepu 2001, Miller 2006, Bushee
et al. 2010). Although they usually do not participate in the call as do sell‐side analysts, journalists
need to hear the call or read a transcript to effectively report on the news offered by managers on
the call.
One factor limiting managers’ public disclosure of firm news is concern that such
information could be used by competitors. The proprietary cost hypothesis has been explored in
both theoretical and empirical accounting research (Verrecchia 1983, Darrough and Stoughton
1990, Feltham and Xie 1992, Newman and Sansing 1993, Hayes and Lundholm 1996, Berger and
Hann 2007). To the extent that earnings conference calls potentially offer information strategically
useful for a firm’s competitors, firm competitors are hypothesized to be consumers listening to
the call and/or reading a transcript of the call. Similarly, firm disclosures have also been
9 In an informal investigation, Tasker (1998) contacted firms prior to the passage of Regulation Fair Disclosure and was
denied access to the earnings conference call for some of those she contacted. 10 Mayew (2008) also finds that some non‐analyst participants ask questions. In doing so, their identity becomes known.
These include “bankers, institutional investors, and occasionally individuals” (page 642, footnote 16).
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hypothesized as a tool to facilitate contracting (e.g. Watts and Zimmerman 1986, Holthausen and
Watts 2001). Suppliers and strategic partners who interact and contract with the firm could seek
to consume the information in earnings conference calls to enhance their knowledge about the
firm.
All these aforementioned constituencies that are hypothesized to listen to earnings
conference calls are external entities not employed by the firm. Some evidence also suggests that
internal parties may seek to listen to earnings conference calls. For example, Bushee et al. 2003
note that “informal discussions with investor relations officers indicate that employees frequently
listen to earnings conference calls and view them as a useful forum for learning about issues
facing the firm”(159). In this spirit, a variety of internal or closely connected individuals may also
be hypothesized to listen to earnings conference calls including consultants and bankers.
For these different groups that could potentially consume earnings conference calls, it is
difficult to make ex‐ante predictions about what proportion of these various constituencies might
seek to consume earnings conference calls. Moreover, more deeply understanding the nature of
information consumption steps beyond prior theoretical and empirical work since many of these
relationships have not previously been identified. With this in mind, the analysis of consumption
in Section 4 is presented in an ethnographic manner by seeking to describe and interpret this
information consumption. In this spirit, this analysis is much in line with the recent call by Gow,
Larcker, and Reiss (2015) for greater in‐depth descriptive focused research.
3. Data and Descriptive Statistics
Thomson Reuters collected the records used for our analysis by monitoring its client
activity on its Streetevents platform. Streetevents is a leading corporate disclosure and archiving
product. It is designed for institutional and corporate users who access the database via
subscription to one of Thomson Reuters’ products. Subscribers can access Streetevents through
one of a variety of desktop platforms offered by Thomson Reuters (e.g. Thomson One,
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Streetevents.com, etc.) and through Thomson Reuter’s proprietary Eikon analysis and trading
software. As of 2013, Streetevents had over 87,000 institutional account subscriptions.11
Thomson Reuters offers Streetevents platform subscribers access to audio recordings (live
and archival) and transcripts of earnings conference calls. 12 To create the records, Thomson
Reuters internally recorded each time a Streetevents client listened to or downloaded a broadcast
of an earnings conference call. For each access request, Thomson Reuters recorded the specific
user, the user’s firm (name and type), type of request (audio or transcript), time of request and
the firm as well as the specific earnings call for which the access request was made.13 Clients are
internally classified by Thomson as buy‐side, sell‐side, corporate, consultant, media, or other (i.e.
no designated classification). Thomson Reuters provided this data to us under a confidentiality
agreement that we would not reveal individual user, client, or firm statistics that would
compromise that anonymity.
Our records begin in December 2009, when Thomson Reuters began monitoring its clients’
activity, and continue to December 2012.14 During this time, 48,335 unique institutional users
accessed audio and transcript records of 90,870 unique earnings conference calls and 47,229
unique non‐earnings conference calls for NYSE, AMEX, and NASDAQ traded firms.15 In total,
over 3.1 million separate requests were made during our sample period for audio and transcript
records of these firms’ earnings conference calls, guidance calls, product release presentations,
analyst calls, and annual meeting broadcasts. In connecting our analysis to the broader research
and literature on earnings conference calls, our analysis focuses on earnings conference calls. As
described in our data, access requests for earnings conference calls make up the majority of all
11 This figure excludes “live feed” subscribers that redistribute this data within their own proprietary software. 12 Thomson Reuters facilitates live web broadcasts (both, via Streetevents platform and/or on a firm’s website), but
firms rely on external vendors to facilitate the telephone broadcast of the call (e.g. Intercall, BT Conferencing, ACT
Conferencing, etc.). These outside vendors provide the “1‐800” number used for the phone conference/broadcast and
coordinate the question and answer period with participants. 13 Due to internal processes, staff at Thomson Reuters Investors Relations have access to the identities of buy‐side
clients, but do not always have access to the identities of other clients using of the product. This availability reflects
Thomson Reuters’ objective to provide information about buy‐side demand to its Investor Relations clients (but not
about other consumers’ demand of earnings conference calls). 14 The records conclude in December 2012 when NASDAQ purchased the Thomson Reuters Investor Relations unit,
which created our original agreement for the records used in this analysis. 15 Streetevents includes data on listed firms from over 90 countries. Our analysis focuses on the subset of users who
demanded earnings conference call information from NYSE, NASDAQ, and AMEX firms.
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such corporate presentation requests. In particular, during our sample period, nearly 2.6 million,
or 81% of the total access requests, were requests for audio broadcasts or transcripts for earnings
conference calls.
The 2,828 firms hosting the earnings conference calls in our sample represent 53% of the
firms that are publicly traded on NYSE, AMEX and NASDAQ. With a mean market capitalization
of $5.6 billion, our sample firms are somewhat larger than the comparable universe with a mean
of $2.8 billion. However, some smaller listed firm which lack a formal IR department and do not
have quarterly earnings conference calls naturally skew the population size downwards as
compared to our sample which only includes firms that conduct quarterly earnings conference
calls.
Table 1, Panel A provides descriptive statistics on the number of unique users seeking
access to the earnings conference call in a timely manner. Users may listen to audio broadcasts of
the earnings conference calls or they can read the transcripts that Thomson Reuters creates in
real‐time, i.e. as the earnings conference call progresses. We define timely access as demand for
the audio or transcript records of an earnings conference call that occurs on the day of the call (i.e.
either contemporaneously with the broadcast or soon after its completion). Table 1, Panel A
indicates that 14 users demand the audio and 26 users demand the transcript, on average, in a
timely manner per earnings conference call.16
Since the audio broadcast and transcript are substitute products for many users (i.e. users
may only select one or the other based on their own personal preferences), we also create an
aggregate measure that captures users’ unique demand for one or both disclosure mediums (i.e.
demand for audio, transcript, or audio and transcript). Specifically, we count more than one
timely access to records of the same earnings conference call by the same user as a single, i.e. one,
access. The advantage of the aggregate measure is it captures the specific interest for each
earnings conference call without conflating this demand for different mediums of access (i.e.
16 To observe that a Streetevents conference call in the data is an open call, it must have a non‐zero number of users (i.e.
some demand). Thus, all conference calls utilized in the analysis have at least one user (investor, sell‐side analyst,
media, etc.) demanding the event.
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transcript or audio). In later analysis, we primarily focus on aggregate consumption using this
metric.
Using the aggregate measure of demand, on average, there are 27 requests for each
earnings conference call as shown in Table 1, Panel A. A histogram further detailing the
distribution of demand is also shown in Figure 1. It indicates that a small number of firms have
significantly larger demand (i.e. greater than 200 individuals per call). In Figure 1, Panel B we
also explore the average timely demand at the firm level. The average firm in our sample has 24
timely access requests on average.
Comparing the distributions of Figure 1, Panel A and Figure 1, Panel B, it is apparent that
there is considerable variation in the amount of demand for earnings conference calls over time.
Figure 2 shows the quarter‐by‐quarter percentage change in aggregate timely demand for two
sample firms. The dashed‐line firm is a mid‐cap (i.e. between $3‐10 billion) retail firm and the
solid‐line firm is a large‐cap consumer goods firm (i.e. over $10 billion). Both sample firms have,
on average, over one‐hundred consumers per earnings conference call, so the percentage changes
do not arise simply from variation in a limited consumer base. These two sample firms have an
absolute average quarterly change of 12% with a rise of over 40% in one quarter for the retailer.
Thus, firms often exhibit considerable variation from quarter‐to‐quarter in the amount of
institutional demand for their earnings conference calls.
Our records from Thomson Reuters also permit us to examine the type of user (i.e. the
consumer) who sought access to the earnings conference call. Table 2 provides descriptive
statistics on the six types of users classified by Thomson Reuters. The user type designation is
determined internally by Thomson Reuters and is based on a user’s firm and function.17 The most
prominent consumers of earnings conference call news in our records are buy‐side investors (i.e.
institutional investors who purchase equity or debt securities). We find an average of 16 buy‐side
investors demanding audio or transcript access per event. The second‐highest demand is by the
17 For most cases, our records contain the name of the firms that each user works for. However, using Thomson Reuters’
classification types offers greater information content since they know the functional role of each individual. For
example, while we might know that an individual works for a particular investment bank, this would not allow us to
classify the individual as an analyst, trader, or M&A banker. However, Thomson Reuters’ internal classification
captures these differences in job functionality.
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‘sell‐side’, which designates analysts and brokers who typically work for investment banks.
‘Corporate’ describes institutional clients who do not work in an investment capacity or analyst
capacity at other firms. In addition to suppliers and strategic partners, ‘corporate’ includes users
who work in strategy, public relations, and investor relations at competing firms. Corporate users
consume earnings conference call news marginally lower than sell‐side users in our records.
The final two groups, consultants and media, consume conference call considerably less
than others in our records. Consultants include users who are employees of strategic, managerial,
or economic consultancies. Media includes journalists who work for either print/online
publication or broadcast stations.
Overall, these descriptive statistics suggest that there is significant demand for earnings
conference calls by heterogeneous groups of institutional consumers. Beyond the buy‐side and
sell‐side demand that is the focus of much of the academic work on earnings conference calls, our
analysis suggests that numerous other groups (i.e. corporate users, consultants, and the media)
also significantly consume these events. Understanding the factors associated with this variation
in both timely and historical demand is the focus of our analysis in Section 4.
4. Analysis of Demand for Earnings Conference Call Records
We investigate why the demand for audio and transcript records of earnings conference
calls varies across different firms and differs in the type of users. We examine both the
determinants for demand and how they vary across different consumers of information. Our
analysis begins by examining the timely demand for earnings conference calls. We then examine
the historical demand for audio and transcript records of these earnings conference call events,
i.e. the demand that occurs at least one day after the earnings conference call takes place.
Table 3 provides descriptive statistics of our independent variables, i.e. firm and earnings
call characteristics, across our data panel. All variables are collected from Thomson Reuters,
WRDS, FactSet, and MergerStat. Specific definitions for each explanatory variable are given in
the header to Table 3.
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4.1 Analysis of Timely Demand for Earnings Conference Calls
We explore how three different categories of explanatory variables– those related to the
firm, those related to the event, and those under the immediate influence of management–
influence demand for earnings conference calls. Firm related factors (e.g. market value, trading
volume, number of analysts, etc.) tend to be relatively stable over time and not under the direct
influence of management. Event level factors (e.g. negative surprise) are related to the
information being disclosed by the firm and are largely outside of management’s immediate
discretion. The third set of factors captures the timing of the release (e.g. evenings, Friday release,
conflicts with other events) and has the greatest managerial discretion.18 Although all explanatory
variables are under managerial control in the long‐run (e.g. firm strategy influences leverage), by
separating them based on managerial discretion, we seek to better understand the relative
flexibility management has on influencing consumption.
Table 4 displays our regression analysis of timely demand for earnings conference calls
on factors hypothesized to explain variation in this demand. All regression specifications are
based on OLS and standard errors are double clustered by firm and quarter. We also include
quarterly time fixed effects to account for changes in aggregate product usage across our sample
period.
Our model explains a considerable amount of the variation in demand for earnings
conference calls. For the aggregate model, the R‐squared of the model is 76%. Even after removing
the Fama‐French industry indicators (i.e. 47 indicator variables for the 48 industry groups), the
R‐squared for model (1) is still 71%.19
The majority of the explanatory power underlying aggregate earnings conference call
consumption is driven by firm related factors. Specifically, 67% of the variation is explained by
firm factors (i.e. excluding competing events, after hours/Friday, and surprise). When earnings
18 All explanatory variables are under managerial control in the long‐run (e.g. firm strategy influences leverage).
Separating the explanatory variables along these dimensions allows us to understand the relative influence of short‐
term managerial decisions on the demand for earnings conference calls. M&A activity could be considered under the
immediate discretion of management, however as we are presenting it here, managers are unlikely to directly engage
in M&A activity to strategically seek greater or lesser earnings conference call demand. 19 Removing both the Fama French industry indicators and quarterly time fixed effects, we find that the R‐squared in
Table 4, Model 1 is 69%.
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conference call factors are included (e.g. negative surprise return, or large negative surprise), the
R‐squared rises by less than 1%. When factors under immediate managerial control are included
(e.g. competing events, after‐hours/Friday), there is a 4% increase in R‐squared over the model
with only firm factors. Overall, this suggests that much of the variation in earnings conference
call demand is outside the immediate control of management.
Looking at the economic and statistical significance of individual explanatory variables,
regression (1) of Table 4 indicates that explanatory variables associated with larger and more
influential firms, such as market value and the number of analysts, are positively associated with
greater consumption. These effects are also economically significant. For example, a one standard
deviation increase in the market capitalization from the mean is associated with a nearly 41%
increase in the number of aggregate earnings conference call requests. Firms with greater trading
volume also experience greater demand.
Information asymmetry arises from differences in information sets held by firm insiders
and outsiders. Such asymmetries can be resolved through the consumption of firm‐initiated
disclosures. We find that firms with greater information asymmetry, as proxied by analyst
dispersion, experience greater demand for their earnings conference call records.
Firms with greater institutional ownership as a percentage of total shares outstanding and
firms that recently changed their CEO also have greater earnings conference call demand. In
particular, a new CEO is associated with a 9% increase in demand. Newly listed firms who
conducted their IPO in year prior to the earnings conference call have 12% lower demand on
average.
Significant and unexpected informational shocks are hypothesized to attract more
demand in an effort to understand the nature of the news. Descriptive evidence (e.g. spike in
demand in Figure 2) suggests that this arises around significant negative news. In models (2)‐(3)
of Table 4, we examine whether a negative surprise leads to greater consumption through several
different specifications of negative news shocks. All three specifications show a rise in
consumption with larger negative news surprises having the largest economic impact. In
particular, earnings conference calls around large negative news surprises have 13% more
consumption on average.
16
We also examine in Table 4 a number of factors under the discretion of management about
the timing of the call. Market participants have constraints on the amount of information that
they can consume at a given point in time (Simon 1997). We expect that when there are more
earnings conference calls occurring at a particular point in time, the likelihood that any earnings
conference call will be consumed will be lower. Consistent with this, we find that the number of
competing earnings events is negatively associated with demand for the earnings call. In terms
of economic magnitude, a one standard deviation increase in the number of competing earnings
conference calls from the median is associated with a 16% decline in number of consumers. Firms
that hold their earnings conference calls after‐market hours have considerably lower demand
than those that hold them earlier in the day. Specifically, after hour calls have 60% lower demand
on average. Firms holding their earnings conference calls on Friday also have lower demand.
Firms holding their earnings conference calls after the market close on Friday, beyond the work
week for many users, have incrementally lower demand as would be expected.
In summary for Table 4, a variety of explanatory variables, including firm characteristics,
earnings conference call characteristics, and timing variables that are under short‐term
managerial discretion, influence the amount of consumption of earnings conference calls. In
untabulated results, analysis of demand for audio records and analysis of demand for transcript
records are largely consistent with results in the aggregate model. While variables in each of these
categories are statistically and economically significant, we find that most of the explanatory
power arises from firm related factors that are relatively stable in the short run. This suggests that
investor relation’s effort to significantly increase demand has limited success in the short run. In
section 5, we revisit the question about the amount of discretion managers have in influencing
demand for earnings conference calls.
In Table 5, we explore how demand varies across different institutional consumers of
earnings conference calls. For brevity, we focus on interpreting the results of the aggregate model
in the analysis. Our variables offer considerably more explanatory power for the buy‐side, sell‐
side, and corporate groups than either consultants or media. In particular, the R‐squared for buy‐
side, sell‐side, and corporate groups ranges between 61‐77%, whereas the consultants and media
R‐squared is 15% and 28% respectively. One potential explanation for this difference is that we
17
rely on publicly observable and quantifiable variables to explain variation in demand.
Consultants operate within a firm and journalists, specifically those playing a more investigative
role, focus on internal firm dynamics (e.g. individual managers, personnel, etc.).
The results in Table 5 offer evidence that there are several differences in the drivers of
demand for the various consumers of earnings conference calls. We find that higher average daily
volume is associated with greater demand for all groups, but plays a relatively greater role for
the buy‐side that needs liquidity to enter/leave investment positions. Information asymmetry in
the markets is associated with demand from the buy‐side, sell‐side, and corporations but no other
group. Institutional ownership is positively associated with the buy‐side and sell‐side as one
would expect given their group’s objectives, but is negatively associated with corporate and
media groups. M&A activity is especially important to corporate groups which help facilitate
these transactions and the sell‐side/media that report on these activities. Following this, we find
that M&A is positively associated with consumption for these groups.
Overall, we find that factors that influence consumption vary both in significance and
relative importance across the different types of consumers. These differences reflect the different
objectives of the different groups such as the buy‐side which focus on investment decisions or the
media which focuses on reporting events that garner wider readership.
4.2 Analysis of Timely Buy‐Side Demand for Earnings Conference Calls Table 2 suggests that the buy‐side is the largest consumer of earnings conference calls.
More clearly, Figure 4 Panel A shows that 57% of all earnings conference call demand is from the
buy‐side. By virtue of this being the largest consumer as well as the consumer that is most closely
connected to prior research, we seek to further investigate the nature of buy‐side consumption.
The Thomson Reuters records allow us to identify the specific buy‐side investors
consuming the calls. We match the names of the buy‐side institutions with 13F filings data to
understand whether these buy‐side institutions are security holders of the firms they consume
the earnings conference call of and what amount of securities they hold.20 From the Thomson
20 We lose some observations in doing this matching because buy‐side institutions cannot be matched with any 13F
holdings data. Inspection of a random sample of these firms suggests that they do not meet the requirements for 13F
18
Reuters data, we also know the type of institutional investor (e.g. hedge fund, value, passive, etc.)
and later explore the relationship between the type of institutional investor and earnings
conference call demand.
We find that the majority of the buy‐side institutions consuming earnings conference calls
are not contemporaneous holders of the firm’s securities. Specifically, 52% of the buy‐side
consumers are not holders of the firm’s securities at the time they are consuming the earnings
conference call (Figure 4, Panel B). Thus, although the academic literature typically speaks of the
investor as someone who currently holds a stake in the firm and uses firm disclosure to monitor
his investment, we find that much of the buy‐side institutional consumption actually arises from
non‐holders who may be considering an investment or using this information to fulfil other
informational needs (e.g. relationship of this firm vs. a competitor that they do hold a position
in). These results support that accounting information serves not only a contracting and
monitoring role, but also a screening role for investment decisions.
The proportion of holders vs. non‐holders varies significantly across firms and time.
Although the average firm has 52% non‐holders on the call, the interquartile range varies from
33% to 67% (Table 6, Panel A). In Panel B of Table 6, we seek to understand the determinants of
the relative demand by holders and non‐holders. In regression (1), we find that larger firms, those
with worse stock performance and those hosted on days with more competing events have a
lower proportion of non‐holders. Consistent with the idea that large negative surprises attract the
attention of potential investors, we find in (2) an increase in the proportion of non‐holders when
firms report a large negative surprise.
One potential concern with models (1) and (2) is that firms with a relatively small number
of holders could be skewing results through a small‐denominator in the ratio of non‐holders to
holders. To mitigate this concern we rerun the analysis, restricting it to firms with a least 10 to 25
buy‐side institutional holders respectively in models (3) and (4). In doing so, we find that our
explanatory power rises from 8% to 37%. The significance of the coefficients remains largely
similar, except for analyst dispersion that becomes both positive and statistically significant. Such
filings (often because of size threshold). In addition, there are cases in which Thomson does not provide a specific client
name for a buy‐side client which prevents this matching.
19
a finding is consistent with the idea that greater uncertainty in the market attracts more non‐
holders to understand the nature of the firm’s disclosures.
The composition of holders and non‐holders also varies. Panel C of Figure 4, displays the
type of holders and non‐holders consuming earnings conference calls. Most notably, hedge funds
consist of a much larger proportion of non‐holders on calls than holders. One explanation for this
finding is that hedge funds are searching for potential investment ideas. Another observation is
the lack of passive investors on earnings conference calls. On the one hand, given that passive
investors, by nature, do not actively respond to firm disclosures, this ought to be expected. On
the other hand, while passive investors only consist of 2% of holders, they constitute a significant
portion of the total investment in firms. This suggests that as passive investment rises to a greater
proportion of total invested assets, consumption
Even for institutional investors that have holdings in the firm, consumption of the
earnings conference calls is not certain. As an example, consider the consumption of one large
Boston‐based institutional investor in a large‐capitalization oil and gas refiner. Over the sample
period, the investor had, on average, an over $400 million dollar position in the firm. Yet, the
investor only consumed the earnings call in approximately 70% of quarters.
To better understand the likelihood of an institutional holder of the firm’s stock
consuming the earnings conference call, we examine several determinants of demand in Table 7.
Period end On call?12/31/2009 No3/31/2010 Yes6/30/2010 Yes9/30/2010 Yes12/31/2010 No3/31/2011 Yes6/30/2011 No9/30/2011 Yes12/31/2011 Yes3/31/2012 Yes6/30/2012 No9/30/2012 Yes
20
To assure usage of the Thomson Reuters product by a particular institutional investor to listen or
read earnings conference calls for a particular firm (as opposed to some other mechanism), we
focus on consumption only after we observe consumption of a firm’s information by that
particular investor for the first time. By adopting this conservative choice, we avoid potentially
misclassifying investors as missing a call because they do not use the Thomson Reuters product
to consume disclosures for a particular firm.
In Table 7, Panel A, we find that hedge funds and venture capitalists are considerably
more likely to consistently consume earnings conference calls of the firms they hold investments
in. In particular, hedge funds will be on the call 59% of the time on average as compared to growth
and value investors (both 47% on average). These differences are also statistically significant (t‐
stat: 30.7 and 24.4 respectively). There are relatively fewer venture capitalists in our sample (i.e.
n=78) given the requirement of 13F holding making the validity of consumption by venture
capitalists somewhat more conjectural.
In Panel B, model (1) we regress whether a particular holder is on a call against the market
value of the firm and the type of institutional investor. Notably, we find that hedge funds
investors are more likely to be on the call, but do not find similar trends with other investor
groups.
To further explore how the characteristics of the investor contribute to their consumption
decisions, we examine how the size of their position contributes to earnings conference call
consumption. In models (2)‐(4) we look at how the raw size of their holding, the percentage of
their position as compared with that of the overall firm, and the relative size of their position
compared to others in their portfolio (as measured by all their 13F holdings) contribute to their
consumption choices. In all three models, we find that large holdings contribute to greater
earnings conference call consumption. In terms of economic magnitude, a one‐standard deviation
increase in the value of holdings is associated with a 29% increase in the likelihood of being on
the call.
21
4.3 Analysis of Historical Demand for Earnings Conference Calls
Individuals can access disclosure in a timely manner when news is released or they can
choose to access them at a later time when conducting research on a firm. In addition to timely
requests for earnings conference calls, our records from Thomson Reuters include requests for
historical disclosure items. While the records of these requests begin in November 2009 when
Thomson Reuters began comprehensively monitoring such requests, the availability of disclosure
extends back to 2001. During our sample period, we find over 1.5 million requests for historical
earnings conference calls for NYSE, AMEX, and NASDAQ firms by Thomson Reuters’
institutional clients.
Figure 3 displays the number of requests for historical earnings conference calls (audio or
transcript). We define historical demand as all demand for audio and transcript records of the
earnings conference call beginning one day after the day of the earnings conference call. The
figure displays the first three months’ demand (where the first month only includes historical
demand one day after the event) and then quarterly demand until twelve quarters after the
earnings conference call. As shown in the figure, demand for the earnings conference call falls
over time, but there is still considerable demand even long after the event date. In particular, two
thirds of the historical demand is within three months of the earnings conference call. Yet, there
is still over 82,000 access requests, or 7% of the historical demand, made over 3 years (i.e. 12
quarters) after the event date. This suggests that market participants not only value public firm
disclosures for their timeliness, but also as historical record for understanding the firm.
As shown in Figure 5, Table A, nearly 50% of the demand is from the buy‐side, which is
similar to that for timely demand. However, of these buy‐side consumers two‐thirds (specifically,
67%) comes from non‐holders, i.e. investors that do not hold a security in the firm at the time
when they consume the firm’s earnings conference call. This historical demand for earnings
conference calls from non‐holders is considerably larger than the timely demand for earnings
conference calls from non‐holders. As compared with holders, non‐holders consuming historical
information are more likely to be hedge funds (Panel C, Figure 5). This pattern is similar to the
one exhibited in the timely demand for earnings conference calls.
22
Like our analysis of the timely demand for earnings conference calls, we seek to
understand the determinants of historical demand. One difference in the specification is that the
number of items available to consumers varies over time for each firm. Firms can decide at their
own discretion whether and for how long consumers have access to the audio broadcast of
earnings conference calls. The audio version is considered property of the firm and therefore
Thomson Reuters will remove the audio broadcast when desired by the firm. Usually, when it is
removed from a firm’s website (if it was made available there) Thomson Reuters will
simultaneously remove the audio record from Streetevents. Audio records of the earnings
conference calls are publicly accessed, at the firms’ bequest, often for as little as one quarter. In
other cases, the firm may continue to allow public availability for a year or more. Because we are
interested in understanding the determinants of demand, we include an explanatory variable
describing the number of audio records available to consumers for a firm in a given quarter.
Table 8 investigates the determinants of historical demand. We run the analysis on a
quarterly basis where the dependent variable is the number of items demanded (audio or
transcript) in a given quarter for a firm. All standard errors are clustered by both firm and quarter.
We utilize similar explanatory variables as in the timely analysis, however we also include an
additional variable describing the number of audio records available in a particular quarter.
We find some similarities and differences between the timely demand and the historical
demand for earnings conference calls. As in the timely analysis, larger firms, those with more
analysts, and greater leverage have more demand. We also find evidence that firms with greater
(recent) analyst dispersion have greater demand. This is consistent with the idea that investors
use historical data to resolve contemporaneous information asymmetry in the market.
Contemporaneous excess returns are negatively associated with demand for historical earnings
conference calls.
We also find, as expected, that firms with more available audio records have greater
historical demand for earnings conference calls. On one hand, this is to be expected since demand
can only arise when the products are available to consumers. However, firms are given the
opportunity to remove the audio broadcast of their earnings conference call within a quarter and
we find that the average firm in a given quarter only has one archived earnings conference call
23
available. This suggests that many firms are potentially curtaining demand of their own earnings
conference calls.
As might be expected given the relatively greater scholarly attention towards investors
and the sell‐side, the model explains considerably more variation for the buy‐side and sell‐side
(R‐squared between 64‐73%) than consultants or the media (R‐squared 29% and 20%
respectively).
5. “Hiding” Consumption
Prior literature in both accounting and finance has examined whether managers seek to
hide news by disclosing it at inconvenient times for market participants (deHaan et al. 2015, Doyle
and Magilke 2009, Dellavingna and Pollet 2009, Patell and Wolfson 1982). To the extent that
managers try to avoid engagement with external parties and/or attempt to limit consumption of
difficult conversation, hosting earnings conference calls at inconvenient times may be an effective
strategy. By using our records which allow us to examine the consumption of information
directly, we are able to investigate if such maneuverers are effective.
We find some evidence suggesting that firms that disclose at inconvenient times do gain
lower timely coverage. Table 4 shows that firms that host calls on Friday and after hours have
lower coverage. At the same time as shown in Table 4, when firms disclose bad news, firms
actually get more timely demand. The magnitude of this negative news effect does not offset the
inconvenient timing impact, thus creating overall lower timely consumption.
However, investors are not forced to consume firm news immediately when it is disclosed
by the firm. If a firm hosts an earnings conference call at an inconvenient time, the consumer
could simply wait until it is convenient for him to view a recording. For example, a Friday evening
disclosure could be consumed Monday morning when the investor is back in the office.
Consistent with this idea, we see that after‐hours earnings conference calls gain greater historical
demand in Table 8. This suggests that institutional consumers more frequently postpone
information consumption if information is disclosed at an inconvenient time.
Table 9 more directly shows the impact on demand for earnings conference calls when
firms switch times for earnings conference calls. For firms that normally disclose during the day
24
(Panel A) and switch to evening (Panel B) we see a decline in same day demand and a jump in
follow‐on demand in the coming days. A similar effect came be seen on Friday vs. non‐Friday
demand (Panels C and D) although the magnitude is much lower.
To better understand the demand for earnings conference calls that are hosted at different
times, Table 10 shows a regression of the sum of same day and follow‐on consumption on
different call times. For the firms disclosing on Friday, the sum of same day and follow‐on
consumption is on average lower by nearly 4%. Even for firms disclosing a negative surprise, the
net effect of Friday disclosure is marginally negative albeit at an economically limited magnitude.
Firms disclosing after hours had significantly lower timely demand in Table 4. However,
when viewed in conjunction with the additional demand in the coming days, firms disclosing
after hours actually have greater consumption. Specifically, firms disclosing after hours are
associated with 8% greater total consumption. Thus, firms disclosing after hours actually have
greater consumption.
Viewing this evidence in light of the negative timely demand for after hour calls in Table
4, suggests that hosting calls at inconvenient times is not an entirely successful strategy to avoid
information consumption.
6. Conclusion and Future Opportunities
Our analysis offers insight into the types of institutional users that demand corporate
earnings conference calls. In this way, our work complements several recent pieces of research
(Drake et al 2014, Drake et al 2015, Bozanic et al 2014) that explain the demand for mandatory
SEC filings by examining the EDGAR database.21 In contrast to these examinations that focus on
the demand for mandatory disclosure filings by largely individual investors, we explore
institutional demand for earnings conference calls, a form of voluntary firm‐initiated disclosure,
and find that much of the demand is from non‐buy‐side investors. Our results suggest that
researchers have the opportunity to consider an expansive view of the potential consumers when
thinking about the demand for firm‐initiated news.
21 In a different spirit, Lawrence, Ryans, and Sun (2014) examine the demand for sell‐side research by investors on
stocktargetprices.com.
25
The evidence that significant numbers of non‐market participants consume these
disclosures raises a number of questions for future research. While much research has been done
on the incremental information content of earnings conference calls to investors, we understand
little about how these other constituencies utilize the information disclosed during earnings
conference calls. In addition, it would be compelling to understand the relationship between these
other constituencies and the firm. For example, are most consultants consuming earnings calls
currently engaged by the sample firm? Consultants may be consuming these calls to understand
prospective clients or to understand the competition of clients with whom they are currently
engaged. A better understanding of the full use of such firm‐initiated disclosures would offer a
more complete understanding of how they are being utilized by both market and non‐market
participants.
Our analysis focuses on the institutional consumers of earnings conference calls.
However, there is also a related question of the specific non‐institutional users who consume
earnings conference calls. Records of these events could help shine additional light on the specific
types of individual investors that seek to consume firm‐initiated voluntary disclosures. Since
Regulation Fair Disclosure was motivated to facilitate greater accessibility of events like earnings
conference calls, examining such records could offer evidence potentially validating this
regulatory change. Moreover, such an investigation is likely to shed light on other groups (e.g.
regulators) that also seek to consume this news.
We also find that institutional investors, even those with large holdings, irregularly
consume earnings conference calls. In periods that they do not consume calls, the question is how
they satisfy their information needs. Do they rely on information intermediaries (e.g. analysts,
media) instead of consuming the call on their own? Do these investors simply rely on information
signals from the market (e.g. major swings in stock price) to determine how much attention they
ought to pay to different investments in their portfolio? Additional data would help illuminate
how these investors are making their portfolio decisions.
Finally, we find very little consumption of calls by passive investors like indexers. This is
not surprising given that they, by definition, are not making allocation decisions based on firm
news. At the same time, as additional funds flow into indexers as a “best practice” investment
26
strategy (i.e. low cost, avoids chasing returns), it suggests that there will be potentially less
investment engaged in actively monitoring firm news. Despite some public criticism around their
fees and incentives, it is intriguing to find that the funds that are typically the most richly
rewarded for performance (e.g. hedge funds and VC) are also those that are most engaged with
consuming firm news in a timely manner.
27
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Figure 1 – Timely Demand for Earnings Calls
Figure 1, Panel A shows the distribution of timely, aggregate demand for 27,392 earnings conference calls. Timely,
aggregate demand for an earnings conference call is measured on the day when the earnings conference call takes place
and represents the total number of consumers that request audio or transcript records of the earnings conference call
on that day. The sample period starts in December 2009 and ends in December 2012. Repeated access requests by the
same consumer for the same earnings conference call count only once. Figure 1, Panel B shows for 2,828 firms the
average timely, aggregate demand for the firm’s earnings conference calls during the sample period. This ratio is
calculated as the sum of timely aggregate demand for all earnings conference calls of a given firm divided by the
number of earnings conference calls for the given firm.
Panel A: Timely Demand (per Earnings Conference Call)
Panel B: Timely Demand (Average for Firm)
0
1,000
2,000
3,000
4,000
5,000
6,000
7,000
8,000
9,000
# Unique Consumers
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
700
800
900
1,000
# Unique Consumers
32
Figure 2 – Change in Timely Demand over Time Figure 2 shows the quarterly change in timely, aggregate demand per quarterly earnings conference call for two sample
firms. The dashed firm represents a mid‐capitalization (between $3‐$10 billion) retailer. The solid line represents a
large‐capitalization (over $10 billion) consumer goods firm.
‐30.0%
‐20.0%
‐10.0%
0.0%
10.0%
20.0%
30.0%
40.0%
50.0%
% Chan
ge Tim
ely Deman
d
33
Figure 3 – Timeliness of Historical Demand Figure 3 shows the historical, aggregate demand for earnings conference calls. Historical, aggregate demand for
earnings conference calls measures all requests for audio and transcript records beginning one day after the earnings
conference call takes place. Historical, aggregate demand includes requests for audio or transcript records between
December 2009 and December 2012 even if the earnings conference calls that occurred before December 2009. Repeated
access requests by the same consumer for the same earnings conference call count only once. Historical demand is
presented until 12 quarters (12Q) after the original earnings conference call takes place.
-
100,000
200,000
300,000
400,000
500,000
600,000
700,000
800,000
900,000
1M 2M 3M 2Q 3Q 4Q 5Q 6Q 7Q 8Q 9Q 10Q 11Q 12Q
Historical deman
d
34
Figure 4 – Timely Demand Figure 4, Panel A shows timely, aggregate demand by consumer type. Panel B displays demand by holders vs. non‐
holders. Panel C displays the type of investor by holders and non‐holders.
Panel A: Timely Demand by Consumer Type
Panel B: Proportion of Holders and Non‐Holders
Buy Side57%
Sell Side19%
Corporation13%
Consultant1%
Media1%
Other10%
Non‐holders52%
Holders48%
35
Panel C: Holders and Non‐Holders by Investor Type
Holders
Non‐Holders
Hedge30%
Growth45%
Value22%
VC0%
Passive2%
Other1%
Hedge47%
Growth25%
Value16%
VC2%
Passive2%
Other8%
36
Figure 5 – Historical Demand Figure 5 shows the level of historical demand by different institutional consumer types. Panel A displays demand by
type. Panel B displays historical demand by holders vs. non‐holders. Panel C displays the type of investor by holders
and non‐holders.
Panel A: Demand by Consumer Type
Panel B: Proportion of Holders and Non‐Holders
Buy Side50%
Sell Side19%
Corporation
16%
Consultant2%
Media0% Other
12%
Holders33%
Non‐holders67%
37
Panel C: Buy‐Side Holders and Non‐Holders by Investor Type
Holders
Non‐Holders
Hedge28%
Growth43%
Value26%
VC0%
Passive2%
Other1%
Hedge47%
Growth22%
Value19%
VC3%
Passive2%
Other7%
38
Table 1 –Timely Demand
Table 1, Panel A provides summary statistics for timely demand for 27,392 earnings conference calls. Timely demand
for an earnings conference call is measured on the day when the earnings conference call takes place and represents
the total number of consumers that request audio or transcript records of the earnings conference call on that day. The
sample period starts in December 2009 and ends in December 2012. Timely, aggregate demand counts repeated access
requests through the same or through different mediums (i.e. audio vs. transcript) by the same consumer for the same
earnings conference call only once. Timely, audio demand only counts requests for audio records. Timely, transcript
demand only counts requests for transcript records. Timely, audio demand and timely, transcript demand count
repeated access requests through the same medium by the same consumer for the same earnings conference call only
once. Figure 1, Panel B provides summary statistics for the average timely, aggregate demand for 2,828 firm’s earnings
conference calls during the sample period.
Panel A: Demand (per Earnings Call)
Panel B: Average Demand (by Firm)
Mean Median SD Q1 Q3Aggregate 27 14 36 4 36
Audio 14 5 23 0 18Transcript 26 13 36 3 35
Mean Median SD Q1 Q3Aggregate 24 11 33 4 30
Audio 12 5 19 1 15Transcript 22 10 32 3 29
39
Table 2 – Timely Demand by Type
Table 2, Panel A provides summary statistics of the number of individuals who consume each earnings conference call in a timely manner by the type of user over
the period from December 2009 to December 2012. The total number of events in the sample is 27,392. Timely demand includes all consumption within one day of
the event. Aggregate demand excludes repeated access requests through different mediums (i.e. audio vs. transcript) by the same user for the same event. Audio
and transcript shows the number of audio broadcasts and transcript downloads per event. Figure 1, Panel B computes the number of consumers, on average, per
firm during the sample period. The total number of firms in the sample is 2,828.
Panel A: Timely Demand (per Earnings Conference Call)
Panel B: Timely Demand (Average per Firm)
Mean Median SD Q1 Q3 Mean Median SD Q1 Q3 Mean Median SD Q1 Q3Buy-side 16 7 22 2 21 8 2 14 0 10 15 7 22 1 20Sell-side 5 3 7 1 7 2 1 4 0 3 5 2 7 0 7
Corporate 3 2 5 0 4 2 1 3 0 2 3 1 5 0 4Consultant 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Media 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0Other 3 2 3 0 4 2 0 2 0 2 2 1 3 0 4
Aggregate Audio Transcript
Mean Median SD Q1 Q3 Mean Median SD Q1 Q3 Mean Median SD Q1 Q3Buy-side 14 6 20 2 18 7 2 12 0 9 13 5 19 1 17Sell-side 4 2 6 1 6 2 1 3 0 3 4 2 6 0 6
Corporate 3 1 5 1 4 2 1 3 0 2 3 1 4 0 3Consultant 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Media 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0Other 2 2 3 1 3 1 1 2 0 2 2 1 2 1 3
Aggregate Audio Transcript
40
Table 3 – Descriptive Statistics
Table 3 displays descriptive statistics for the firm characteristics, earnings conference call characteristics and factors
under short‐term managerial discretion that are used as explanatory variables in Table 4 and Table 5. The sample
comprises of 27,392 earnings conference call. Variables are collected from Thomson Reuters, WRDS, FactSet,
Execucomp and MergerStat. Market Value and Volume‐Daily are averages of the respective values over the 90 days
prior to the earnings conference call date. Market‐to‐book is market value divided by total asset evaluated at the latest
quarter‐end before the earnings conference call. Leverage refers to the ratio of interest bearing debt as a percentage of
total assets at the latest quarter‐ end before the earnings conference call. Analyst Dispersion is the standard deviation
of analystsʹ most recent EPS forecast for the quarter. Number of Analysts refers to the number of individual sell‐side
analysts that forecast EPS for the quarter. Excess Return is a firmʹs quarterly return minus the value‐weighted market
return for the same period. Institutional Ownership is the sum of shares owned by institutional owners divided by
total number of outstanding shares. IPO is an indicator (1/0) showing if the firm went public within the prior year.
M&A Activity is an indicator variable (1/0) for whether the conference call was made within 30 days after an M&A
announcement. CEO change is an indicator variable (1/0) showing if the conference call was made within 90 days after
a CEO change. Competing Events is calculated as the number of total earnings conference calls hosted by other firms
during the same time (measured for the full hour) as the firm’s call. Data on the number of daily earnings conference
calls is collected from the Streetevents database calendar. Negative surprise (Return) is an indicator (1/0) that the firm’s
4‐day (from earnings announcement date to 3 days after) cumulative abnormal return is negative. Large negative
surprise is an indicator (1/0) that the firm’s reported earnings surprise (scaled by beginning period stock price) fell in
the bottom decile of negative news surprises that quarter. After hours release is an indicator (1/0) that the conference
call was hosted after trading hours (i.e. 16:00 EST). Friday is an indicator (1/0) that the conference call was hosted on
Friday.
Mean Median Std Dev Q1 Q3Market Value ($ mil) 5,635 966 20,026 326 3,281Volume-Daily ($ mil) 54.07 8.24 213.86 1.91 37.57
Market-to-book 1.31 0.88 1.47 0.46 1.61Leverage (%) 20.9% 15.9% 22.7% 2.3% 31.9%
Analyst Dispersion 0.01 0.00 0.24 0.00 0.00Number of Analysts 9 7 7 4 13
Excess Return 0.01 0.00 0.20 -0.11 0.10Inst. Ownership 0.66 0.74 0.27 0.52 0.87
IPO 0.02 0.00 0.15 0.00 0.00M&A Activity 0.10 0.00 0.30 0.00 0.00CEO Change 0.01 0.00 0.12 0.00 0.00
Competing Events 29 25 23 11 41Negative surprise (Return) 0.5 1.0 0.5 0.0 1.0Large Negative Surprise 0.1 0.0 0.3 0.0 0.0
After hours release 0.31 0.00 0.46 0.00 1.00Friday release 0.09 0.00 0.29 0.00 0.00
41
Table 4 – Analysis of Timely Demand
Table 4 examines the determinants of timely, aggregate demand for 27,392 conference calls. The dependent variable is
logged timely, aggregate demand for a quarterly earnings conference call and further described in Table 1, Panel A.
Explanatory variables are described in Table 3. All standard errors are double‐clustered by firm and quarter. ***,**,*
indicate statistical significance at the 1%, 5%, and 10% level respectively with the standard errors shown in parentheses.
(1) (2) (3)Aggregate Aggregate Aggregate
Market Value (log) 0.116*** 0.117*** 0.125***(0.016) (0.016) (0.017)
Daily Volume (log) 0.277*** 0.277*** 0.274***(0.014) (0.014) (0.014)
Market-to-book -0.050*** -0.050*** -0.049***(0.010) (0.010) (0.010)
Leverage 0.240*** 0.240*** 0.228***(0.044) (0.044) (0.044)
Analyst Dispersion 0.059*** 0.059*** 0.056***(0.014) (0.014) (0.013)
Number of Analysts (log) 0.393*** 0.394*** 0.396***(0.018) (0.018) (0.018)
Excess Return -0.070* -0.070* -0.068*(0.039) (0.039) (0.039)
Inst. Ownership 0.356*** 0.358*** 0.374***(0.038) (0.038) (0.039)
IPO -0.123** -0.123** -0.120**(0.058) (0.058) (0.058)
M&A Activity 0.027 0.027 0.026(0.017) (0.017) (0.017)
CEO Change 0.091*** 0.091*** 0.088***(0.026) (0.026) (0.026)
Competing Events(log) -0.178*** -0.178*** -0.177***(0.014) (0.014) (0.014)
After hours release -0.596*** -0.596*** -0.596***(0.022) (0.022) (0.022)
Friday release -0.053** -0.053** -0.054**(0.021) (0.021) (0.021)
Negative Surprise (Return) 0.024**(0.010)
Large negative surprise 0.128***
(0.016)Constant 1.186*** 1.168*** 1.120***
(0.191) (0.193) (0.191)FF 48 Industry Fixed Effects Yes Yes YesObservations 27,392 27,392 27,392R-squared 0.76 0.76 0.76
42
Table 5 – Analysis of Timely Demand by Type
Table 4 examines the determinants of timely, aggregate demand for 27,392 conference calls by consumer type. The
dependent variable is logged timely, aggregate demand for a quarterly earnings conference call and further described
in Table 1, Panel A. Explanatory variables are described in Table 3. All standard errors are double‐clustered by firm
and quarter. ***,**,* indicate statistical significance at the 1%, 5%, and 10% level respectively with the standard errors
shown in parentheses.
(1) (2) (3) (4) (5)
Buy-side Sell-side Corporate Consultant MediaMarket Value (log) 0.127*** 0.123*** 0.186*** 0.028*** 0.056***
(0.014) (0.015) (0.014) (0.006) (0.010)Daily Volume (log) 0.292*** 0.119*** 0.075*** 0.008* 0.020***
(0.013) (0.012) (0.011) (0.004) (0.005)Market-to-book -0.034*** -0.036*** -0.058*** -0.006** -0.011***
(0.010) (0.007) (0.006) (0.002) (0.003)Leverage 0.246*** 0.231*** 0.042 -0.007 -0.002
(0.044) (0.040) (0.035) (0.015) (0.019)Analyst Dispersion 0.038*** 0.030** 0.056*** 0.000 0.002
(0.006) (0.015) (0.011) (0.001) (0.003)Number of Analysts (log) 0.319*** 0.487*** 0.227*** 0.022*** 0.017**
(0.017) (0.015) (0.016) (0.006) (0.007)Excess Return -0.053 -0.056** -0.080** -0.012* -0.033***
(0.039) (0.022) (0.032) (0.006) (0.011)Inst. Ownership 0.377*** 0.076** -0.063** -0.017 -0.137***
(0.036) (0.032) (0.031) (0.011) (0.015)IPO -0.077* -0.078** -0.103*** -0.011 -0.028**
(0.046) (0.035) (0.032) (0.012) (0.013)M&A Activity 0.026 0.036** 0.063*** 0.002 0.048***
(0.016) (0.014) (0.014) (0.007) (0.011)CEO Change 0.063*** 0.086*** 0.091** 0.027*** 0.030**
(0.022) (0.025) (0.038) (0.008) (0.015)Competing Events(log) -0.130*** -0.088*** -0.107*** -0.012*** -0.028***
(0.013) (0.009) (0.007) (0.003) (0.004)After hours release -0.487*** -0.247*** -0.556*** -0.075*** -0.023**
(0.020) (0.021) (0.019) (0.008) (0.009)Friday release -0.052** -0.041** -0.028 -0.007 -0.007
(0.021) (0.018) (0.022) (0.008) (0.009)Negative Surprise (Return) 0.021* 0.018*** 0.021*** 0.004 0.013***
(0.012) (0.006) (0.004) (0.003) (0.003)Constant 0.479*** -0.601*** -0.186 -0.131*** -0.128***
(0.185) (0.181) (0.154) (0.032) (0.048)FF 48 Industry Fixed Effects Yes Yes Yes Yes YesObservations 27,392 27,392 27,392 27,392 27,392R-squared 0.77 0.69 0.61 0.15 0.28
43
Table 6 – Timely Demand by Holders and Non‐Holders
Table 6 examines timely demand by buy‐side institutions. Unlike prior tables that look at timely demand by individual
consumers, this table focuses on timely demand by institutions that individual consumers work for. If at least one
individual buy‐side consumer who works for a specific buy‐side institution consumes the earnings conference call, the
timely demand for this institution is counted as one. The sample includes only buy‐side institutions that file 13F Forms.
Each buy‐side institution is classified into a holder or non‐holder at the time of consuming a firms’ earnings conference
call. A buy‐side institution is considered a holder of the firm’s securities if the firm was included in the investor’s 13F
filing for the prior quarter. Panel A provides descriptive statistics of the number of holders and non‐holders that
consume, on average, an earnings conference call. Panel B displays the results from OLS regressions where the
dependent variable is the percentage of institutional investors who are on the call and do not hold the firms securities.
The sample for Panel A and Model (1)‐(2) in Panel B comprises of 2,580 firms and 21,468 earnings conference calls.
Models (3) and (4) condition on the there being at least 10 and 25 buy‐side consumers for an earnings conference call
respectively. The sample for Panel B, Model (3) comprises of 1,495 firms and 11,580 earnings conference calls. The
sample for Panel B, Model (4) comprises of 779 firms and 5,164 earnings conference calls. All explanatory variables are
described in Table 3. All standard errors are double‐clustered by firm and quarter ***,**,* indicate statistical significance
at the 1%, 5%, and 10% level respectively.
Panel A: Timely Demand (per Earnings Conference Call)
44
Panel B: Analysis of Proportion of Non‐Holders
45
Table 7 – Likelihood of Timely Demand by Buy‐side Holders
Table 7 examines the likelihood of timely, aggregate demand for an earnings conference call by a buy‐side holder as
defined in table 6. Panel A provides descriptive statistics of timely, aggregate demand by investor type over the sample
period. The column “N” counts, at the investor type level, for how many firms a buy‐side holder demands at least one
conference call. The column “mean” displays the ratio of the total number of earnings conference calls that a buy‐side
holder consumes divided by the total number of earnings conference calls from firms that the buy‐side institution is
invested in. Panel B displays the results from logit regressions where the dependent variable is a binary variable (1/0)
that assumes the value of 1 when the buy‐side holder consumes the earnings conference call via audio or transcript on
the day when the earnings conference call takes place. The sample for Panel B comprises of 18,828 earnings conference
calls and 581 buy‐side holders. The 18,828 earnings conference calls represent 2,214 firms. All standard errors are
double‐clustered by firm and quarter ***,**,* indicate statistical significance at the 1%, 5%, and 10% level respectively.
Panel A: Timely Demand (by Investor Type)
46
Panel B: Analysis of Likelihood of Timely Demand by Buy‐side Holders
(1) (2) (3) (4)On Call On Call On Call On Call
Value Holdings (log) 0.129***(0.021)
% of Firm (log) 0.128***(0.021)
% of Portfolio (log) 0.072***(0.014)
Hedge 0.409*** 0.523*** 0.523*** 0.360**(0.140) (0.131) (0.131) (0.157)
Value 0.026 -0.005 -0.005 0.000(0.179) (0.149) (0.149) (0.191)
VC 0.365 0.292 0.292 0.137(0.239) (0.179) (0.178) (0.230)
Passive -0.117 0.013 0.012 -0.118(0.301) (0.378) (0.378) (0.337)
Other 0.329 0.417* 0.417* 0.181(0.241) (0.243) (0.243) (0.233)
Market Value (log) -0.192*** -0.252*** -0.121** -0.241***(0.050) (0.050) (0.051) (0.050)
Daily Volume (log) 0.196*** 0.206*** 0.203*** 0.209***(0.060) (0.060) (0.060) (0.059)
Market-to-book 0.033** 0.033** 0.033** 0.031*(0.017) (0.016) (0.016) (0.017)
Leverage -0.137* -0.121 -0.122 -0.106(0.075) (0.077) (0.077) (0.075)
Analyst Dispersion 0.143 0.190 0.196 0.152(0.252) (0.331) (0.337) (0.278)
Number of Analysts (log) -0.061 -0.058 -0.057 -0.046(0.065) (0.064) (0.064) (0.063)
Excess Return 0.356*** 0.282** 0.328*** 0.308***(0.117) (0.117) (0.116) (0.114)
Inst. Ownership -0.259*** -0.320*** -0.318*** -0.293***(0.084) (0.084) (0.084) (0.083)
IPO 0.495*** 0.489*** 0.490*** 0.495***(0.117) (0.119) (0.119) (0.118)
Competing Events(log) -0.001 -0.009 -0.010 -0.004(0.028) (0.028) (0.028) (0.028)
After hours release -0.286*** -0.300*** -0.300*** -0.294***(0.050) (0.053) (0.052) (0.049)
Friday release -0.053 -0.053 -0.052 -0.056(0.040) (0.043) (0.043) (0.042)
Negative Surprise (Retur 0.063*** 0.070*** 0.071*** 0.068***(0.017) (0.017) (0.017) (0.017)
Constant 0.901* 1.115** 1.095** 1.803***(0.483) (0.472) (0.473) (0.521)
Observations 223,040 223,040 223,040 223,040R-squared 0.01 0.02 0.02 0.02
47
Table 8 – Analysis of Historical Demand
Table 8 examines the determinants of historical demand for earnings conference calls using 29,056 firm‐fiscal quarters.
Historical demand is calculated for each firm‐fiscal quarter as the sum of all audio and transcript requests during the
firm‐fiscal quarter minus timely demand during the firm‐fiscal quarter. Within a firm‐fiscal quarter, repeated access
requests by the same consumer for the same earnings conference call through the same or through different mediums
(i.e. audio vs. transcript) are counted only once. ‘All’ includes audio and transcript requests from all user types.
Regressions by type of user only include the audio and transcript requests from the respective type of user. Explanatory
variables are described in Table 3. All standard errors are double‐clustered by firm and quarter. ***,**,* indicate
statistical significance at the 1%, 5%, and 10% level respectively.
(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6)All Buy-side Sell-side Corporate Consultant Media
Market Value (log) 0.152*** 0.146*** 0.132*** 0.168*** 0.046*** 0.058***(0.014) (0.013) (0.012) (0.011) (0.014) (0.006)
Daily Volume (log) 0.113*** 0.161*** 0.076*** 0.041*** 0.032*** 0.007**(0.011) (0.010) (0.008) (0.008) (0.009) (0.003)
Market-to-book -0.003 0.003 0.009 -0.022*** 0.004 -0.008***(0.007) (0.007) (0.007) (0.006) (0.006) (0.002)
Leverage 0.223*** 0.250*** 0.312*** 0.029 -0.090*** -0.016(0.046) (0.048) (0.048) (0.033) (0.034) (0.015)
Analyst Dispersion 0.027 0.015 0.043*** 0.036*** 0.011 0.002(0.020) (0.017) (0.010) (0.009) (0.011) (0.004)
Number of Analysts (log) 0.308*** 0.294*** 0.375*** 0.273*** 0.074*** 0.020***(0.019) (0.019) (0.019) (0.016) (0.011) (0.005)
Excess Return -0.127*** -0.135*** -0.099*** -0.123*** -0.089*** -0.050***(0.045) (0.050) (0.035) (0.037) (0.021) (0.015)
Inst. Ownership 0.405*** 0.484*** 0.147*** 0.030 0.025 -0.125***(0.036) (0.034) (0.030) (0.030) (0.053) (0.014)
M&A Activity 0.037*** 0.031*** 0.046*** 0.042*** 0.024** 0.020***(0.011) (0.011) (0.013) (0.012) (0.010) (0.006)
CEO Change 0.074*** 0.090*** 0.002 0.090** 0.064** 0.048**(0.024) (0.029) (0.040) (0.035) (0.027) (0.023)
Number Audio Available 0.118*** 0.090*** 0.083*** 0.110*** 0.032*** 0.009***(0.013) (0.012) (0.010) (0.009) (0.006) (0.002)
Number Transcript Available 0.037** 0.020** 0.006 0.012 0.007 -0.003(0.015) (0.008) (0.009) (0.010) (0.029) (0.002)
Constant -0.018 -0.601*** -1.197*** -1.081*** -0.810** -0.398***(0.222) (0.178) (0.204) (0.144) (0.334) (0.109)
FF 48 Industry Fixed Effects Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes YesObservations 29,056 29,056 29,056 29,056 29,056 29,056R-squared 0.71 0.73 0.64 0.59 0.29 0.20
48
Table 9 – Demand and Timing of Conference Call
Table 9 provides descriptive statistics of conference call demand for buy‐side and sell‐side consumers for calls hosted
during turning hours, after hours, non‐Friday, and Friday’s. Panels A (n=1,669) and Panel B (n=475) are for firm
quarters that hold the earnings conference call during the day and switch in a particular quarter to after hours. Panels
C (n=5,730) and Panel D (n=1,208) are for firm quarters that hold the conference call on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday
or Thursday and switch in a particular quarter to Friday. Only firms that made a switch are included in Panel A/B or
Panel C/D. Same day demand is the amount of timely, aggregate demand on the same day that the earnings conference
call takes place. Follow‐on demand includes demand from one to five days after the earnings conference call takes
place.
Mean Median SD Mean Median SDBuy-Side 14.9 8 18.9 6.0 4 5.9Sell-Side 5.0 3 6.3 2.1 1 2.2
Mean Median SD Mean Median SDBuy-Side 7.6 3 11.9 12.4 8 16.1Sell-Side 2.9 1 4.2 4.0 2 5.5
Mean Median SD Mean Median SDBuy-Side 15.8 8 21.2 7.2 5 7.8Sell-Side 5.1 3 6.3 2.3 1 2.6
Mean Median SD Mean Median SDBuy-Side 15.7 8 20.4 6.6 5 7.4Sell-Side 5.0 3 6.3 2.2 1 2.8
Panel A: Conference Call During the Day
Same Day Demand Follow-on Demand
Same Day Demand Follow-on Demand
Panel C: Conference Call During Non-FridaySame Day Demand Follow-on Demand
Panel D: Conference Call Switch to Friday
Panel B: Conference Call Switch to After Hours
Follow-on DemandSame Day Demand
49
Table 10 – Analysis of Sum of Same Day Demand and Follow‐On Demand
Table 10 examines the determinants of the sum of same day and follow‐on demand as defined in Table 9. ‘All’
represents, per earnings conference call, the sum of same day and follow‐on demand across all consumer types.
Regressions by type of user only include the sum of same day and follow‐on demand from the respective user group.
Explanatory variables are described in Table 3. All standard errors are double‐clustered by firm and quarter. ***,**,*
indicate statistical significance at the 1%, 5%, and 10% level respectively.
(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6)All Buy-side Sell-side Corporate Consultant Media
Market Value (log) 0.111*** 0.110*** 0.107*** 0.174*** 0.035*** 0.058***(0.014) (0.014) (0.016) (0.014) (0.008) (0.011)
Daily Volume (log) 0.251*** 0.302*** 0.148*** 0.097*** 0.025*** 0.031***(0.012) (0.012) (0.012) (0.011) (0.006) (0.006)
Market-to-book -0.035*** -0.019*** -0.033*** -0.061*** -0.002 -0.013***(0.005) (0.006) (0.006) (0.006) (0.004) (0.003)
Leverage 0.265*** 0.292*** 0.307*** 0.073** -0.036 -0.009(0.037) (0.040) (0.047) (0.034) (0.024) (0.020)
Analyst Dispersion 0.052*** 0.038*** 0.038*** 0.063*** 0.003 -0.000(0.010) (0.005) (0.013) (0.014) (0.004) (0.003)
Number of Analysts (log) 0.352*** 0.300*** 0.496*** 0.303*** 0.071*** 0.027***(0.014) (0.015) (0.015) (0.017) (0.010) (0.007)
Excess Return -0.056* -0.033 -0.046** -0.058* -0.038*** -0.040***(0.033) (0.039) (0.022) (0.033) (0.011) (0.013)
Inst. Ownership 0.291*** 0.406*** 0.090*** 0.012 -0.038** -0.159***(0.034) (0.033) (0.032) (0.034) (0.019) (0.018)
M&A Activity 0.026* 0.021 0.034** 0.039*** 0.019* 0.054***(0.014) (0.014) (0.014) (0.012) (0.011) (0.012)
CEO Change 0.080*** 0.072*** 0.066*** 0.095*** 0.055*** 0.049***(0.015) (0.016) (0.020) (0.023) (0.017) (0.016)
Competing Events(log) -0.100*** -0.077*** -0.058*** -0.093*** -0.019*** -0.039***(0.007) (0.008) (0.008) (0.008) (0.004) (0.005)
After hours release 0.082*** 0.074*** 0.132*** 0.049*** 0.077*** 0.022*(0.016) (0.017) (0.020) (0.017) (0.012) (0.011)
Friday release -0.038** -0.050*** -0.045*** -0.000 -0.020 -0.006(0.017) (0.017) (0.017) (0.022) (0.013) (0.010)
Negative Surprise (Return) 0.023*** 0.017* 0.016** 0.027*** 0.009** 0.015***(0.008) (0.009) (0.008) (0.006) (0.004) (0.003)
Constant 1.425*** 0.717*** -0.355** -0.021 -0.271*** -0.142**(0.123) (0.153) (0.161) (0.142) (0.054) (0.059)
FF 48 Industry Fixed Effects Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes YesObservations 27,392 27,392 27,392 27,392 27,392 27,392R-squared 0.82 0.82 0.73 0.64 0.23 0.31