Peer-based performance comparison and tone management

Pratik Goel and Oveis Madadian

Applied Economics, 2024, vol. 56, issue 12, 1440-1462

Abstract: While performance comparison against peers is documented as a key decision-making factor in strategic management, its potential role as a strategic determinant of disclosure tone has so far been overlooked in the literature on narrative disclosures. In this study, we examine whether, and how, peer-based performance comparison (i.e. the comparison of earnings/cash flows of a firm with its peers) affects tone management. Using a measure of tone management based on 10-K filings over 1993–2013, we show that firms with performance falling below the peer-based benchmark engage in greater downward tone management in their earnings-related narrative disclosures, and the extent of this over-pessimism increases the further performance falls below the benchmark. We further document that the observed over-pessimism not only prompts security analysts to revise their earnings forecasts downward, but it is also associated with a higher probability of meeting or beating these forecasts (i.e. expectation management). This is the first study that links tone management with expectation management, in the context of peer-based performance comparison.

Date: 2024
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DOI: 10.1080/00036846.2023.2176454

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