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Are All Management Earnings Forecasts Created Equal? Expectations Management Versus Communication, Yongtae Kim, Myung Seok Park

Accounting

Recent studies associate management earnings forecasts (MEFs) with expectations management. These studies, however, neither provide evidence on the extent and scope of expectations management through MEFs nor consider alternative incentives for issuing MEFs. Consequently, existing evidence does not help regulators assess whether MEFs effectively facilitate communication with investors. We investigate to what extent managers exploit their earnings forecasts as a tool of expectations management or as a communication device. By examining relations among MEFs, analysts' forecasts, and actual earnings, we classify MEFs into three incentive categories: (1) expectations management, (2) communication, and (3) other incentives. We find that a significant …