Investing Expertise

What makes a guru, or analyst, good? The research on this question is predominantly “technical” rather than “fundamental,” focusing on performance and performance persistence rather than process (hence, the frequent use of the word guru, implying mystical insight). In their preliminary and incomplete paper of November 2004 entitled “Determinants of Superior Stock Picking Ability”, Michael Mikhail, Beverly Walther, Xin Wang and Richard Willis seek to identify the determinants of consistent analyst stock picking outperformance. Using a sample encompassing 268,170 recommendations issued by 4,923 analysts for 7,845 firms during 1985-1999 from Zacks Investment Research, they tentatively find that the best analysts tend to: Keep Reading

Recent research on the (stock picking and market timing) abilities of experts to generate excess returns has focused mostly on mutual funds and hedge funds. This focus stems from data availability (mutual funds via SEC filings) and headline value (hedge funds). Where is the research on investment newsletters? How do they rate in terms of excess returns? Digging deeper than usual, we find two on-target papers: (1) the February 1995 paper entitled “Market Timing Ability and Volatility Implied in Investment Newsletters’ Asset Allocation Recommendations” by John Graham and Campbell Harvey; and, (2) the November 1997 paper entitled “The Equity Performance of Investment Newsletters” by Andrew Metrick. Both papers draw upon the investment newsletter archive of the Hulbert Financial Digest. Using different aspects of this archive, they determine that: Keep Reading

Can investors count on the widely cited Morningstar mutual fund rating system as an investment screener? In their recent paper “Morningstar Mutual Fund Ratings Redux”, Matthew Morey and Aron Gottesman investigate the relationship between number of Morningstar stars and future performance of mutual funds since June 30, 2002, when Morningstar overhauled their rating system in terms of granularity, risk measurement and treatment of share classes. Focusing on the three-year performance of domestic equity funds that were rated by Morningstar as of 6/30/02 (1,902 funds) and adjusting for fund loads and survivorship bias, they conclude that: Keep Reading

Might the relative sizes of the gaps between analyst target and actual prices indicate degrees of current misvaluation? In other words, is a stock with analyst target price twice its current price a better buy than a stock presently at or near its target price? In their February 2006 paper entitled “Target Prices, Relative Valuations and the Premium for Liquidity Provision”, Zhi Da and Ernst Schaumburg investigate the usefulness of relative gaps between target and actual stock prices as an indicator of misvaluations. Using recently issued target prices for about 1,700 stocks each month over the period 1996-2004, they conclude that: Keep Reading

Does the distribution of analyst buy-hold-sell ratings predict the overall stock market? Is the distribution of ratings for a given firm indicative of the value of those ratings to investors? In the September 2005 version of their paper entitled “Buys, Holds, and Sells: The Distribution of Investment Banks’ Stock Ratings and the Implications for the Profitability of Analysts’ Recommendations”, Brad Barber, Reuven Lehavy, Maureen McNichols and Brett Trueman analyze the distribution of stock ratings at investment banks and brokerage firms and examine whether these distributions can be used to predict the profitability of analysts’ recommendations. Using 438,000 recommendations issued on more than 12,000 firms by 463 investment banks and brokerage firms from January 1996 through June 2003, they conclude that: Keep Reading

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) adopted Regulation FD (Fair Disclosure) effective October 2000, seeking to eliminate selective disclosure (for example, to favored securities analysts) by requiring companies to disseminate widely and publicly all material information. In their recent paper entitled “An Examination of the Differential Impact of Regulation FD on Analysts’ Forecast Accuracy”, Scott Findlay and Prem Mathew investigate the effects of Regulation FD on the relative accuracy of earnings forecasts. Have previously privileged analysts lost a private information edge? Using a database covering quarterly and annual earnings forecasts for 3,000 individual analysts, they determine that: Keep Reading

In their August 2005 paper entitled “Imitation is the Sincerest Form of Flattery: Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway”, Gerald Martin and John Puthenpurackal rigorously examine various possible explanations for Berkshire Hathaway’s superior investment performance. Is it luck? Is it reward-for-risk? Is it outstanding stock-picking skill? Using information on 261 common equity investments from Berkshire Hathaway’s SEC filings and market databases for 1980-2003, they conclude that: Keep Reading

In their March 2005 paper entitled “Do Investor Sophistication and Trading Experience Eliminate Behavioral Biases in Financial Markets?”, Lei Feng and Mark Seasholes analyze how sophistication and trading experience of investors affect their disposition behavioral bias (reluctance to realize losses and propensity to realize gains). They define sophistication based on four factors: number of trading rights; initial level of portfolio diversification; age; and, gender. They define trading experience as the number of positions taken since account initiation. Using data from a national brokerage firm in the People’s Republic of China for 1,511 individual accounts initiated on or after 1/1/99 and monitored through 12/31/00, they conclude that: Keep Reading

In the August 2005 draft of their paper entitled “Analyst Conflicts and Research Quality”, Anup Agrawal and Mark Chen examine whether the forecasts quality of stock analysts relates to conflicts of interest from the investment banking and brokerage businesses of their employers. They define forecast quality in terms of: (1) accuracy; (2) bias; (3) frequency of quarterly earnings per share (EPS) forecast revisions; and, (4) relative optimism of long-term earnings growth forecasts. By cross-referencing the forecasts of 3,000 analysts with line-of-business revenue breakdowns for their respective employers (163 different firms) over the period 1994-2003, they find that: Keep Reading

In his recent paper entitled “Information Uncertainty and Analyst Forecast Behavior”, Frank Zhang explores the effects of an increase in information uncertainty (from either volatility of underlying fundamentals or poor information) on the behavior of sell-side stock analysts. He hypothesizes that if behavioral biases cause analysts to underreact to new information when revising their forecasts, they underreact even more as information uncertainty increases. Using dispersion in analysts’ earnings forecasts as a proxy for information uncertainty over the period 1983-2001, he determines that: Keep Reading