ABSTRACT: Existing literature assumes that the order and timing of analysts' earnings forecasts are determined exogenously. However, analysts choose when to issue their forecasts. This study develops a model that endogenizes the timing decision of analysts and analyzes their equilibrium timing strategies. In the model, analysts face a trade-off between the timeliness and the precision of their forecasts. The model introduces a timing game with two analysts, derives and analyzes its unique pure strategies equilibrium, and provides new empirical predictions about the precision and timing of analysts' forecasts. The equilibrium has one of two patterns: either the times of the analysts' forecasts cluster, or there is a separation in the times of the forecasts. The less informed and less similar the analysts are, the more likely it is that they forecast at different points in time. All else equal, analysts with a higher precision of initial private information tend to forecast earlier, and analysts with a higher learning ability tend to forecast later.

[We argue that dividend stickiness, the tendency of managers to keep dividends unchanged, implies that managers use a partially pooling dividend policy. We offer a model that demonstrates how such a policy can evolve endogenously in equilibrium. An informed manager who cares about the firm's intrinsic value as well as short-term stock price allocates earnings between investments and dividends. We show that there is a continuum of equilibria in which the dividend is constant for a range of realized earnings. Compared with the standard separating equilibrium, this partial pooling behavior induces higher firm value and lower underinvestment. We offer new empirical implications relating the pooling nature of dividend stickiness to the information environment of the firm, dividend prediction models, managerial incentives, and investment.]

We argue that dividend stickiness, the tendency of managers to keep dividends unchanged, implies that managers use a partially pooling dividend policy. We offer a model that demonstrates how such a policy can evolve endogenously in equilibrium. An informed manager who cares about the firm's intrinsic value as well as short-term stock price allocates earnings between investments and dividends. We show that there is a continuum of equilibria in which the dividend is constant for a range of realized earnings. Compared with the standard separating equilibrium, this partial pooling behavior induces higher firm value and lower underinvestment. We offer new empirical implications relating the pooling nature of dividend stickiness to the information environment of the firm, dividend prediction models, managerial incentives, and investment.