How Do Investors Interpret Announcements of Earnings Delays?

In this paper, Tiago Duarte-Silva and his co-authors show that delays in earnings announcements are associated with decreases in firm value, which are especially sizeable when they are precipitated by accounting reasons or when no reason for the delay is announced. This decrease in firm value is also shown to be proportional to the decline in future earnings. In the paper they discuss implications both for shareholders and corporate decision makers faced with an earnings delay.