Amy P. Hutton

Short-sellers, fundamental analysis and stock returns *

Abstract Firms with low ratios of fundamentals (such as earning and book values) to market values are known to have systematically lower future stock returns. We document that short-sellers position themselves in the stock of such firms, and then cover their positions as the ratios mean-revert. We also show that short-sellers refine their trading strategies to minimize transactions costs and maximize their investment returns. Our evidence is consistent with short-sellers using information in these ratios to take positions in stocks with lower expected future returns.

Economic consequences of accounting for stock-based compensation

The Financial Accounting Standards Boards (FASB) project on employee stock-based compensation was one of the most controversial in the Boards 20-year history. In particular, the Boards 1993 Exposure Draft proposing the recognition of an expense for employee stock options generated predictions of dire economic consequences and prompted the threat of regulatory intervention from Congress and the White House. This study employs three complementary research approaches to evaluate the nature and extent of the predicted economic consequences. First, we examine the characteristics of firms lobbying against the 1993 Exposure Draft (FASB [1993]). Second, we examine the characteristics of firms using employee stock options under the original financial reporting rules. Finally, we examine stock price reactions to announcements concerning the new financial reporting rules.

The Role of Social Media in the Capital Market: Evidence from Consumer Product Recalls

We examine how corporate social media affects the capital market consequences of firms’ disclosure in the context of consumer product recalls. Product recalls constitute a “product crisis” exposing the firm to reputational damage, loss of future sales, and legal liability. During such a crisis it is crucial for the firm to quickly and directly communicate its intended message to a wide network of stakeholders, which, in turn, renders corporate social media a potentially useful channel of disclosure. While we document that corporate social media, on average, attenuates the negative price reaction to recall announcements, the attenuation benefits of corporate social media vary with the level of control the firm has over its social media content. In particular, with the arrival of Facebook and Twitter, firms relinquished complete control over their social media content, and the attenuation benefits of corporate social media, while still significant, lessened. Detailed Twitter analysis confirms that the moderating effect of social media varies with the level of firm involvement and with the amount of control exerted by other users: the negative price reaction to a recall is attenuated by the frequency of tweets by the firm, while exacerbated by the frequency of tweets by other users.

Opaque Financial Reports, R-Square, and Crash Risk

We investigate the relation between the transparency of financial statements and the distribution of stock returns. Using earnings management as a measure of opacity, we find that opacity is associated with higher R2s, indicating less revelation of firm-specific information. Moreover, opaque firms are more prone to stock price crashes, consistent with the prediction of the Jin and Myers (2006) model. However, these relations seem to have dissipated since the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, suggesting that earnings management has decreased or that firms can hide less information in the new regulatory environment.

Short Interests, Fundamental Analysis, and Stock Returns

Firms with low ratios of fundamentals (such as earnings and book values) to market values are known to have systematically lower future stock returns. We document that short-sellers position themselves in the stock of such firms, and then cover their positions as the ratios revert to normal levels. We also show that short-sellers avoid firms where the transaction costs of short-selling are high and where the low ratios are due to temporarily low fundamentals, rather than temporarily high prices. Our evidence suggest that short-sellers use information in these ratios about either (i) temporary mispricing, or (ii) unknown risk factors, to boost their investment returns.

A Discussion of “Aggregate Noise Trader Risk, Mispricing, and Accounting Fundamentals”

Burger and Curtis (2017) is an empirical investigation of whether aggregate margin debt correlates with aggregate stock prices and aggregate accounting-based fundamentals. While the paper convincingly documents a significant relation: aggregate margin debt is higher when aggregate fundamentals-to-price ratios are low, it fails to document why. The documented relation could exist because margin traders are the overly exuberant noise traders that push stock prices higher away from fundamental values; or the documented relation could be spurious, and exist because aggregate margin debt rises with aggregate price levels simply because margin loan capacity increases as aggregate price levels increase. With insufficiently granular data (aggregate margin debt measured monthly), the authors are not able to sort out why the relation exists. Thus, interpretation of the findings documented in this paper is difficult. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.