Gender Bias and Female Analyst Performance: Evidence from the #MeToo Movement

This study investigates the impact of changing gender bias on the career advancement and forecasting performance of female analysts. By leveraging the #MeToo movement as a shock to the prevailing gender-based discrimination, we find that women experience improvements in participation and promotion in the equity research profession. #MeToo has fostered a more genderinclusive environment both in the brokerage houses where analysts work and in the firms that they cover, as evidenced by more performance-based promotion assessments and improved access to management for female analysts. Female analysts' forecast performance improves significantly after #MeToo, in terms of forecast accuracy, frequency, timeliness, depth, and breadth. Such improvement is more pronounced when the movement triggers heightened awareness of gender bias. Collectively, this study demonstrates how the #MeToo movement reduces gender bias in equity research profession and enhances female analyst performance.