Earnings Announcements Are Full Of Surprises

The Earnings Announcement Return (EAR) captures the market reaction to unexpected information contained in the company's earnings release. Besides the actual earnings news, this includes unexpected information about sales, margins, investment, and other less tangible information communicated around the earnings announcement. A strategy that buys and sells companies sorted on EAR produces an average abnormal return of 7.55% per year, 1.3% more than a strategy based on the traditional measure of earnings surprise, SUE. The post earnings announcement drift for EAR strategy is stronger than post earnings announcement drift for SUE.