Title
The Information Value of Credit Rating Action Reports: A Textual Analysis.
Abstract
We examine whether Standard & Poor's (S&P) credit rating action reports contain new default-related information beyond credit rating actions such as rating changes, credit watch, and outlooks. We find that the net linguistic tone (negative minus positive tone) in the reports is significantly and negatively related to abnormal returns and predicts future rating changes. We discover that the provision of tone does not seem to be inflated by the conventional proxies of conflict of interest faced by S&P, as higher conflict of interest is related to more negative net tone. Moreover, the tone can predict future rating changes even when conflict of interest is high. Overall, our study reveals novel evidence on the information value of credit rating action reports.
Year
DOI
Venue
2016
10.1287/mnsc.2015.2243
MANAGEMENT SCIENCE
Keywords
Field
DocType
credit ratings,credit rating agencies,credit rating action reports,linguistic tone
Economics,Conflict of interest,Actuarial science,Credit reference,Credit rating,Bond credit rating,Information value
Journal
Volume
Issue
ISSN
62
8
0025-1909
Citations 
PageRank 
References 
2
0.37
1
Authors
3
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Sumit Agarwal1112.33
vincent y s chen220.71
Weina Zhang3281.46