New research paper at Internationale Tagung Wirtschaftsinformatik 2021

New research paper published at Internationale Tagung Wirtschaftsinformatik 2021:

Bankamp, S., Neuss, N., and Muntermann, J. 2021. "Crowd Analysts vs. Institutional Analysts – A Comparative Study on Content and Opinion," in Proceedings of Internationale Tagung Wirtschaftsinformatik 2021, Duisburg, Germany, Link.

Abstract: The ongoing digital transformation shapes the world of information discovery and dissemination for investment decisions. Social investment platforms offer the possibility for non-professionals to publish financial analyst reports on company development and earnings forecast and give investment recommendations similar to those provided by traditional sell-side analysts. This phenomenon of “crowd analyst reports” has been found to provide an adequate alternative for non-professional investors. In this study, we examine the informational value of these crowd analyst reports regarding their timeliness in publishing and their originality as for content and opinion. Our findings suggest that crowd analysts strongly rely on previously published institutional reports. Therefore, crowd analysts do not pose a threat to institutional analysts at this time, however, they provide a more accessible information basis and improve decision-making for individual investors.