기업규모 및 상장시장에 따른 재무분석가의 이익예측치 미달 회피성향의 차이 (The Association Between Firms’ Size and Listing Status, and Firm’s Tendency to Meet or Beat Analysts’ Earnings Forecasts)

서지정보

· 발행기관 : 한국중소기업학회
· 수록지 정보 : 중소기업연구 / 32권 / 2호 / 29 ~ 48페이지
· 저자명 : 남혜정, 최종학

초록

중소기업과 비교할 때 대규모 기업, 코스닥상장 기업과 비교할 때 유가증권 시장에 상장된 기업들은 보다 많은 이해관계자 집단의 관심을 받는 대상이 된다. 이들은 이해관계자의 높은 기대수준을 충족하기 위해서 재무분석가의 이익예측치에 미달하는 이익을 발표하지 않는, 즉 재무분석가의 이익예측치에 부합하거나 이를 초과하는 수준의 이익을 보고할 가능성이 높다. 이러한 경향을 재무분석가의 이익예측치 미달 회피성향이라고 칭한다. 즉 제한된 범위의 이익조정 또는 시장의 기대 조정을 통하여 기업들이 시장의 기대치를 달성하려는 경향이 높아진다는 것이다.
본 연구는 2000년부터 2008년까지의 3,207개 기업-연도 표본을 이용하여 기업의 규모와 상장시장에 따라 재무분석가의 이익예측치 미달 회피성향이 달라지는지 검증하였다. 실증분석 결과 중소기업 보다는 대기업에서, 그리고 코스닥상장 기업 보다는 유가증권 시장에 상장된 기업들에서 재무분석가의 이익예측치 미달 회피 현상이 유의적으로 관찰되었다. 특히 이익예측오차가 정확히 0또는 0을 약간 초과하는 경우가 대부분 이었다. 이러한 결과는 이익예측치 미달 회피 현상이 자연적으로 일어난 것이 아니라 기업의 이익조정이나 시장의 기대수준 조정의 결과라는 선행연구의 발견을 뒷받침한다.
본 연구의 결과는 대기업들과 비교할 때 중소기업들이 재량적 발생액을 이용한 이익조정을 더 많이 수행해서 회계투명성이 낮다는 사회적 통념과 달리, 특정 상황하에서는 중소기업들보다 대기업들이 이익조정의 크기 자체는 적을 지라도 더욱 빈번하게 소규모의 이익조정 또는 시장의 기대수준 조정을 수행할 수 있다는 점을 보여주었다는 측면에서 규제기관 및 관련 유관기관, 투자자들과 채권자들에게 많은 시사점을 제공하고 있다.

영어초록

This study examines the association between firm size (i.e., large versus small firms) and the listing status (i.e., Korea Stock Exchange [KSE] market (which is comparable to New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in the U.S.) listed firms versus Korea Securities Dealers Automated Quotation [KOSDAQ] market (which is comparable to National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations (NASDAQ) market in the U.S.) listed firms), and the firms' tendency to avoid negative earnings surprise (i.e., the case when actual earnings are smaller than financial analysts' consensus earnings forecasts announced before the actual ex post earnings announcements). Multiple number of financial analysts follow a firm and issue earnings forecasts. Before firms release actual earnings (both quarterly and annual earnings), they compare the estimated earnings with contemporaneous analysts' earnings forecasts. If the estimated earnings fall short of financial analysts' earnings forecasts, implicit claims by outside or inside stakeholders can greatly influence the firm's behavior and, thus, firms have incentive to try to report earnings that meet or beat analysts' contemporaneous earnings forecasts. To do so, if firms find out that their internally estimated earnings are slightly below the market's expectation (which is measured by the consensus forecasts), firms may release pessimistic or bad news forecasts to lower the market's expectation. This tendency is called as expectation management. Otherwise, firms may manage earnings upward to shift earnings upward to the level that exceeds the analysts' forecasts. As a result, the tendency that firms report earnings that are equal to the market's expectation (i.e., meeting the expectation) or just above the expectation (i.e., beating the expectation) increases. This tendency is called 'negative earnings surprise avoidance.' Since Burgstahler and Dichev (1997) and Degeorge, Patell, and Zackhauser(1999) report this kind of tendency to meet or beat three earnings benchmarks (i.e., loss avoidance, earnings decrease avoidance, and negative earnings surprise avoidance'), many studies started to investigate this issue with various topics. The studies show that firms try to meet the earnings benchmarks to meet or beat the three benchmarks in various reasons. There are also several studies that investigate the same issue in Korean context. In this study, we focus on negative earnings surprise avoidance because prior studies have documented that the tendency is the related to the most important benchmark among the three benchmarks (e.g., Brown and Caylor(2005) and Skinner and Sloan (2002)).
In this study, we investigate the relationship between the above mentioned tendency and firm size and firms' listing status. Large firms, compared with small firms, and firms listed in KSE market, compared with firms listed in KOSDAQ market, are watched and followed by many interested parties or stakeholders. For example, many financial analysts cover large and/or KSE listed firms but they are less likely to do son for small and/or KOSDAQ listed firms. Media coverage also show similar pattern. Prior studies of Graham, Harvey, and Rajgopal(2005) and Nam and Choi(2009) report that firms try to report actual earnings to meet the analysts' forecasts when there exists greater interests on the firm from the interested parties or stakeholders. Studies of Barton and Simko(2002) and Matsumoto(2002) also reported that, consistent with this prediction, large firms and firms followed by more number of analysts show stronger tendency to meet or beat analysts' earnings forecasts. Firms that receive a lot of attention from media or stakeholders may have stronger incentive to try to satisfy the needs of those organizations or individuals than followed my small number of outsiders.
In this study, we examines if large firms, compared with small firms, and firms listed in KSE market, compared with firms listed in KOSDAQ market, are more likely to show such a tendency. Large firms, as already investigated by prior studies, are more likely to report earnings that meet or beat analysts' earnings forecasts. In addition, firms listed in the KSE market are more likely to report earnings that meet or beat the forecasts, since larger firms or KSE listed firms received more attention from stakeholders. Those firms are likely to have stronger incentives to meet the expectation of those stakeholders, by reporting earnings which satisfy the expectation of the stakeholders.
With 3,207 firm-year observations collected from Korea over the period from year 2000 to year 2008, we empirically examine these two predictions by using logistic analyses. The samples are collected from non-financial industries, because firms in financial industry use very different types of accounting principles which are difficult to compare with firms in other industries. The financial data are retrieved from Kis-Value II database and analysts' earnings forecasts data are collected from FnGuidePro database. We use various measures to divde the full sample into small versus large firms. The theoretical predictions are all supported by empirical findings. Furthermore, we find that large firms are not more likely to meet or beat analysts' earnings forecasts than small or medium-sized firms are when the firms are listed in KSE market. In contrast, we find significant evidence that large firms listed in KOSDAQ market are more likely to avoid negative earnings surprise than small firms listed in the market. It may caused by the fact that KSE listed firms receive enough attention from stakeholders, regardless of the size of large or small firms. As a result, firms try to report earnings higher than analysts' earnings forecasts only in the KOSDAQ market where there are mixed set of firms that receive more or not enough attention. Furthermore, we find that not only the tendency for meeting or beating analysts' earnings forecasts but also the tendency for just meeting or beating (i.e., by small margin) the forecasts are also present. This is more direct evidence that the documented phenomena are due to the firms' opportunistic behaviors.
The findings in this study has various implications. The findings in this study suggest that in some situation, unlike popular beliefs, large firms and KSE listed firms are more likely to report earnings that meet or beat analysts' forecasts. Unlike the findings in this study, prior studies document that the magnitude of earnings management is greater for the small firms than that of large firms (e.g, Dechow and Dichev 2002). Contrary to the finding and popular beliefs, this study show that in a specific situation, even large firms can avoid negative earnings surprise more frequently than small firms can. It could become possible by market's expectation management or actual earnings management. As a result, this paper shows that the large firms are not always more transparent. In some situations. like the one documented in this study, even large firms could manage earnings or market's expectation more frequently than other firms, although the magnitude of the earnings management could be small. Regulators, investors and creditors need to know this phenomena and may use the findings in this study for their decision-makings. Academics can also apply the discussion in this paper for any future research.

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