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  • 2010
  • Working Paper
  • HBS Working Paper Series

Just Say No to Wall Street: Putting A Stop to the Earnings Game

By: Joseph Fuller and Michael C. Jensen
  • Format:Print
  • | Language:English
  • | Pages:9
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Abstract

Putting an end to the "earnings game" requires that CEOs reclaim the initiative by avoiding earnings guidance and managing expectations in such a way that their stocks trade reasonably close to their intrinsic value. In place of earnings forecasts, management should provide information about the company's strategic goals and main value drivers. They should also discuss the risks associated with the strategies, and management's plans to deal with them.

Using the experiences of several companies, the authors illustrate the dangers of conforming to market pressures for unrealistic growth targets. They argue that an overvalued stock, by encouraging overpriced acquisitions and other risky, value-destroying bets, can be as damaging to the long-run health of a company as an undervalued stock.

CEOs and CFOs put themselves in a bind by providing earnings guidance and then making decisions designed to meet Wall Street's expectations for quarterly earnings. When earnings appear to be coming in short of projections, top managers often react by suggesting or demanding that middle and lower level managers redo their forecasts, plans, and budgets. In some cases, top executives simply acquiesce to increasingly unrealistic analyst forecasts and adopt them as the basis for setting organizational goals and developing internal budgets. But in cases where external expectations are impossible to meet, either approach sets up the firm and its managers for failure and in the process value is destroyed.

Keywords

Stocks; Performance Expectations; Goals and Objectives; Risk and Uncertainty; Growth and Development Strategy; Decisions; Risk Management; Budgets and Budgeting; Earnings Management; Value; Projects

Citation

Fuller, Joseph, and Michael C. Jensen. "Just Say No to Wall Street: Putting A Stop to the Earnings Game." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 10-090, April 2010.
  • SSRN

About The Author

Michael C. Jensen

→More Publications

More from the Authors

    • 2012
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    Putting Integrity into Finance: A Purely Positive Approach

    By: Werner Erhard and Michael C. Jensen
    • 2012
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    Author-Level Eigenfactor Metrics: Evaluating the Influence of Authors, Institutions and Countries within the SSRN community

    By: Jevin D. West, Michael C. Jensen, Ralph J. Dandrea, Gregg Gordon and Carl T. Bergstrom
    • 2011
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    Pioneers in Finance: An Interview with Michael C. Jensen - Part 1

    By: Michael C. Jensen and Ralph A. Walkling
More from the Authors
  • Putting Integrity into Finance: A Purely Positive Approach By: Werner Erhard and Michael C. Jensen
  • Author-Level Eigenfactor Metrics: Evaluating the Influence of Authors, Institutions and Countries within the SSRN community By: Jevin D. West, Michael C. Jensen, Ralph J. Dandrea, Gregg Gordon and Carl T. Bergstrom
  • Pioneers in Finance: An Interview with Michael C. Jensen - Part 1 By: Michael C. Jensen and Ralph A. Walkling
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