Analyst Coverage, Group Affiliation, and Cost Stickiness: Evidence from South Korea

Manuscript type: Research paperResearch aims: Financial analysts may improve corporate governanceby monitoring corporate behaviour, but close relationships with firmsmay exacerbate agency costs. We examine these competing theoriesby investigating the impact of affiliated analysts’ coverage on the coststickiness of firms within the same group.Design/Methodology/Approach: We employ an empirical design usinga sample of South Korean companies. We add four analyst coveragevariables to the baseline cost stickiness equation from Anderson, Banker,and Janakiraman (2003), indicating whether the analyst is affiliated andwhether affiliated analysts forecast firms affiliated within the same group.We compare results between when affiliated analysts forecast samegroup-affiliated firms and when they do not.Research findings: Analyst coverage is negatively associated with coststickiness. However, when affiliated analysts forecast same-groupaffiliatedfirms, analyst coverage is positively associated with cost stickiness. Hence, analysts’ monitoring role is ineffective when theyforecast the same group of firms. This positive relationship is morepronounced when the chief executive officer’s power is high. The findingsare robust to endogeneity concerns.Theoretical contribution/Originality: Using a unique institutionalsetting in South Korea, we are able to investigate the effect of analysts’group affiliation on managers’ cost management decisions. Our approacheffectively separates the two competing theories of analyst coverage.Practitioner/Policy implication: The findings provide a betterunderstanding of the complex links underlying analysts’ monitoring role,short-term horizon, and conflicts of interest to market participants.Research limitation: We could not control for all factors that mayinfluence the investigated relationship.