abstract: Managers’ control over the timing and content of information disclosure represents a significant strategic tool which they can use at their discretion. However, extant theoretical perspectives offer incongruent arguments and incompatible predictions about when and why managers would release inside information about their firms. More specifically, agency theory and theories within competitive dynamics provide competing hypotheses about when and why managers would disclose inside information about their firms. In this study, I highlight how voluntary disclosure theory may help to coalesce these two theoretical perspectives. Voluntary disclosure theory predicts that managers will release inside information when managers perceive that the benefits outweigh the costs of doing so. Accordingly, I posit that competitive dynamics introduce the costs associated with disclosing information (i.e., proprietary costs) and that agency theory highlights the benefits associated with disclosing information. Examining the context of seasoned equity offerings (SEOs), I identify three ways managers can use information in SEO prospectuses. I hypothesize that competitive intensity increases proprietary costs that will reduce disclosure of inside information but will increase discussing the organization positively. I then hypothesize that capital market participants (e.g., security analysts and investors) may prefer managers to provide more, clearer, and positive information about the SEO and their firms. I find support for many of my hypotheses. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Business Administration 2017

Este estudo buscou investigar duas relações de interesse: a relação entre poder e cobertura de analistas financeiros no mercado acionário brasileiro, e a relação entre poder e assimetria informacional neste mercado, nos períodos de 2000 a 2010. O objetivo desta pesquisa envolveu verificar se o poder empresarial aumenta a assimetria informacional decorrentes dos custos de agência envolvidos e possibilidade de expropriação de valor (Jensen & Meckling, 1976), ou diminui a assimetria, uma vez que administração da empresa não se sente vulnerável a demissões ou possíveis embaraços a sua atuação, e opta por não omitir informações aos stakeholders (Bertrand & Mullainathan, 2003). Ainda relacionado ao ambiente informacional impactado pelo poder empresarial, buscou-se verificar se os analistas financeiros acompanham empresas que apresentam uma maior assimetria informacional, e assim cumprindo sua função de monitoramento da gestão empresarial (Healy & Palepu, 2001), ou menor assimetria, em decorrência dos custos envolvidos em se obter informações privadas (Frankel, Kothari & Weber, 2006). Com o uso de proxies criadas pela análise fatorial para capturar as especificidades relacionadas a poder empresarial e assimetria informacional no ambiente empresarial brasileiro, foram observadas uma relação negativa entre cobertura de analistas financeiros e poder empresarial e uma relação positiva entre assimetria e poder empresarial. Pelas hipóteses esquematizadas por Jiraporn, Liu e Kim (2012), que abarcam todas as relações possíveis entre assimetria, poder empresarial e cobertura de analistas financeiros, os resultados se enquadram na Hipótese da Opacidade. / This research aims to investigate two relationships: the relationship between corporate power and financial analysts coverage in Brazilian stock market, and the relationship between corporate power and asymmetric information during 2000 to 2010. This research\'s purpose involve to verify if corporate power increases the asymmetric information resulting from agency costs and potential expropriation value (Jensen & Meckling, 1976), or decreases this asymmetry since the firm\'s management does not feel vulnerable to layoffs or possible embarrassment to managerial performance, and chooses do not omit information to stakeholders (Bertrand & Mullainathan, 2003). Also related to the information environment impacted by corporate power, this research seek to investigate if financial analysts follow firms that have higher asymmetric information, and thus fulfill this monitoring role of business management (Healy & Palepu, 2001), or less asymmetry in due to the costs involved in obtaining private information (Frankel et al., 2006). With the use of proxies created by factor analysis to capture the specifics characteristics related to corporate power and information asymmetry in Brazilian business environment, it was observed a negative relationship between financial analysts coverage and corporate power and a positive relationship between asymmetry and corporate power. The assumptions outlined by Jiraporn et al. (2012) that cover all possible relationships between asymmetry, corporate power and financial analysts coverage, fit the Opacity Hypothesis.

Este trabalho tem como objetivo analisar o impacto da convergência às normas internacionais de contabilidade sobre a qualidade preditiva da informação contábil no Brasil. Particularmente, o estudo verifica o impacto da adoção do padrão International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) sobre: i) a acurácia das estimativas de lucro realizadas pelos analistas de mercado e ii) a dispersão dessas estimativas de lucro, além de verificar o comportamento do viés de previsão. Os dados da pesquisa foram extraídos da base Institutional Brokers Estimate System (I/B/E/S) e dos formulários de referência das empresas, no site da Comissão de Valores Mobiliários (CVM), no período de 2006 a 2012. A metodologia utilizada foi a de análise de dados em painel, com estimação de modelos de efeitos fixos e aleatórios. Para adequação dos modelos, foram utilizadas variáveis de controle comumente empregadas na literatura internacional, além de variáveis de ajuste para caso brasileiro. Os resultados do trabalho indicam que a adoção do padrão IFRS no Brasil ainda não contribuiu para melhora da qualidade preditiva da informação contábil, embora o viés de previsão tenha diminuído. A acurácia dos analistas de mercado diminuiu no período de adoção parcial do IFRS no Brasil e, no período de adoção obrigatória, as evidências encontradas não permitem concluir sobre a melhora da acurácia dos analistas. A dispersão das estimativas dos analistas de mercado aumentou no período de adoção parcial do IFRS e, no período de adoção obrigatória, não se verificou alteração no nível da mesma. Estes resultados contrariam as evidências dos estudos para a Europa e Austrália, as quais indicam elevação da qualidade preditiva das informações. Porém, assemelham-se aos resultados encontrados para o período inicial da adoção do padrão IFRS na Alemanha. A explicação para os resultados obtidos podem estar relacionadas (i) ao método de adoção do IFRS no Brasil - que incluiu um período de adoção parcial - diferentemente de outros países; e (ii) à necessidade de um tempo de aprendizado para as empresas e analistas de mercado, haja vista as alterações ainda serem recentes. Considera-se que o estudo contribui para a literatura de análise do impacto do padrão IFRS na qualidade preditiva da informação contábil no Brasil, podendo colaborar para as decisões de normatizadores sobre futuras alterações nos padrões contábeis brasileiros e auxiliar as decisões de investidores e analistas no mercado de capitais. / This study aims to analyze the impact of the adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) on the predictive quality of accounting information in Brazil. In particular, the study investigates the impact of the IFRS adoption on i) the accuracy of the profit forecasting by market analysts, and ii) the dispersion of these estimates, besides verifying the forecast bias. The data was extracted from the base of Institutional Brokers Estimate System (I\\/B\\E\\S) and from the forms of companies, on the website of Securities and Exchange Commission of Brazil (CVM) between 2006 and 2012. The empirical strategy employed involves the analysis of panel data and estimation of fixed-effects and random-effects models, considering control variables commonly found in international literature and specific variables for Brazilian reality. The results indicate that IFRS adoption in Brazil has not contributed to improve the predictive quality of accounting information, although the forecast bias has decreased. The forecasts accuracy decreases during the period of partial adoption of IFRS in Brazil and, for the period of mandatory adoption, this study has not found conclusive evidences about accuracy of analysts\' forecasts. Moreover, the dispersion of estimates has increased in the period of partial adoption of IFRS, however no evidence was found for the mandatory adoption period. These results are contrary to the evidences for the European and Australian cases, which suggest improvement of accounting information. Nevertheless, the results resemble the evidences encountered in Germany, particularly for the initial period of IFRS adoption. The results provided might be related (i) to the method of adoption in Brazil - which includes partial and mandatory adoption periods; and (ii) need for a time of learning period for companies and market analysts, considering the requirements are still recent. We believe that this study contributes to the literature that analyzes the impact of IFRS on the predictive quality of accounting information in Brazil. Also, might contribute to the standard-setting decisions on future changes in Brazilian accounting standards and assist the decisions of investors and research analysts.

Defining ambiguity as investor's uncertainty about the precision of the observed information, Chapter One constructs an empirical measure of ambiguity based on analysts' earnings forecast information, and finds that the market tends to react more negatively to highly ambiguous bad news, while it tends to be less responsive to highly ambiguous good news. This result supports the theoretical argument of Epstein and Schneider (2003, 2008) that ambiguity-averse investors take a worst-case assessment of the information precision, when they are uncertain about the information precision. In addition, Chapter One shows that returns on stocks exposed to highly ambiguous and intangible information are more negatively skewed. Chapter Two finds that certain traders are informed about either the forthcoming analysts' forecasts or long-term value of the stock, and informed traders prefer to use medium-size trades to exploit their private information advantage. Specifically, medium-size trade imbalance prior to the forecast announcements is positively correlated with the nature of forecast revisions, while in the days immediately after the forecasts medium-size trade imbalance is positively correlated with future stock returns for up to four months. Small-size trade imbalance is also positively correlated with future returns but only following downward revisions. In contrast, it is also shown that large trades placed right after the forecasts are unprofitable and generate slightly negative profits in the long run. Overall, our results are consistent with the "stealth trading hypothesis" proposed by Barclay and Warner (1993).

Bakgrund Bukaortaaneurysm är en potentiell farlig sjukdom med en dödlighet på 80-90% vid bristning. I Sverige screenas således alla 65-åriga män med ultraljud för att upptäcka aneurysmen i tid innan den brister och erbjuda männen behandling.  Syfte Syftet med examensarbetet var att utvärdera den interindividuella mätosäkerheten hos legitimerade och erfarna biomedicinska analytiker vid screening av bukaorta med ultraljud på 65-åriga män.  Material och metod Den interindividuella mätosäkerheten har utvärderats hos två par erfarna biomedicinska analytiker (BMA). BMA-paren screenade och registrerade bukaortandiametern på 65-åriga män vid två olika fysiologiska kliniker med metoden leading edge to leading edge (LELE) i anteroposteiror riktning. Analysen av data har genomförts med programmet IBM SPSS Statistics.  Resultat Analysen av data visade ingen signifikant skillnad i mätosäkerhet mellan BMA eller mellan klinikerna. Skillnaden i medelvärde mellan BMA låg på -0,06 mm respektive -0,07 mm. Medianen för skillnaderna av mätresultaten för respektive BMA-par var 0,0 mm (-0,5 til 0,4 mm, 95% CI) och -0,3 mm (-0,6 till 0,5 mm, 95% CI). Mätosäkerheten påverkades inte av BMI.  Slutsatser Utbildade och erfarna BMA som följer samma undersökningsprotokoll uppnår en hög nivå av interindividuell mätsäkerhet vid screening av bukaortaaneurysm med ultraljud.  Nyckelord: Bukarotaaneurysm, biomedicinska analytiker, interindividuell variation, LELE

This thesis analyzes the effects of analysts’ recommendations on stock prices and trade volumes of firms listed on OMXS30 during the three-year period 2018-2020. An event study of 313 recommendations issued during the three- year period was conducted in order to calculate the abnormal returns and abnormal volumes during the event window. Our results show only one occasion respectively where buy and sell recommendations induces abnormal returns significantly different from zero. We thereby conclude that analysts’ recommendations, on average, do not impose significant abnormal returns for OMXS30-firms during the event window. A potential investment value can be found in short selling sell recommended stocks, provided that one obtains information prior to public release. However, the nature of short selling may reduce or erase this value. Our results indicates that recommendations in general, do not contain new information and that the market to an extent, acts efficient. Positive abnormal volumes significant on the 5% level are found on three occasions, hence the majority are found to be insignificant. Significant abnormal volumes of 0,071% were found on the first post-event day of a recommendation, implying a small initial volume reaction. In general, however, the results do not show clear indications of a recommendation generating positive abnormal volumes.

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Individuals who train to become behavior analysts should be able to organize, create, and display data accurately in order to make a data-based decision about the interventions being used for his or her clients. Behavior analysts most commonly use the visual analysis of the data to continuously evaluate the relationship between the intervention and the target behavior being measured. A multiple probe design across behaviors (i.e., Reversal Design, Alternating treatments and Multiple baseline design) was used to evaluate the effects of behavioral skills training (BST) with video modeling on three potential behavior analysts’ single-subject design graphing skills in Microsoft Excel™. Behavioral skills training is a training package made up of multiple components, but for the purpose of this study BST included: rehearsal, video modeling w/ instructions, and feedback. The three participants were taught remotely via Zoom how to accurately complete the steps in the graph creation process for a reversal design, alternating treatments design, and a multiple baseline design. Results indicate that BST with video modeling was an effective and efficient intervention to increase the accuracy of three potential behavior analysts’ single-subject design graphing skills on Microsoft Excel™. / Applied Behavioral Analysis

本研究探討Banker and Chen (2006)建構之CVCS模型與本研究建構之CVCS’模型之盈餘預測準確度與資訊內涵，並以ROE模型、OPINC模型、CASHFLOW模型與分析師盈餘預測作為判斷CVCS模型與CVCS’模型是否具有盈餘預測準確度與資訊內涵之比較基準模型。盈餘預測準確度之實證結果顯示：(1)CVCS模型之盈餘預測準確度低於ROE模型、OPINC模型與CASHFLOW模型之盈餘預測準確度；(2)CVCS’模型與ROE模型、OPINC模型、CASHFLOW模型之盈餘預測準確度並無差異；(3)CVCS模型之盈餘預測準確度低於分析師盈餘預測之盈餘預測準確度；(4)CVCS’模型之盈餘預測準確度低於分析師盈餘預測之盈餘預測準確度。資訊內涵之實證結果顯示：(1)CVCS模型之資訊內涵高於ROE模型、OPINC模型與CASHFLOW模型之資訊內涵；(2)CVCS’模型之資訊內涵低於ROE模型、OPINC模型與CASHFLOW模型之資訊內涵；(3)CVCS模型之資訊內涵低於分析師盈餘預測之資訊內涵；(4)CVCS’模型之資訊內涵低於分析師盈餘預測之資訊內涵。 / This study examines the forecast accuracy and the information content of CVCS model, proposed by Banker and Chen (2006), and CVCS’ model, constructed by this study. To evaluate the performances of these two models, this study uses ROE model, OPINC model, CASHFLOW model and analysts’ consensus forecasts as the benchmarks. The results of forecast accuracy show (1) the forecast accuracy of CVCS model is less than that of ROE model, OPINC model, and CASHFLOW model, (2) the forecast accuracy of CVCS’ model is not different from that of ROE model, OPINC model, and CASHFLOW model, (3) the forecast accuracy of CVCS model is less than that of analysts’ consensus forecasts and (4) the forecast accuracy of CVCS’ model is less than that of analysts’ consensus forecasts. The results of information content show (1) the information content of CVCS model is greater than that of ROE model, OPINC model, and CASHFLOW model, (2) the information content of CVCS’ model is less than that of ROE model, OPINC model, and CASHFLOW model, (3) the information content of CVCS model is less than that of analysts consensus forecasts, (4) the information content of CVCS’ model is less than that of analysts consensus forecasts.