Maarten Pronk
Tilburg University
Frank Hodge
University of Washington
Abstract: We investigate the use of the annual and quarterly financial reports of one of the world's largest electronics companies, Royal Philips Electronics. We track who views the reports, their stated purpose for viewing the reports, when they view the reports, and the individual pages they view within the reports. Our sample consists of over 20,000 observations during a six week period after the launch of one annual and three quarterly reports. Several interesting results emerge. For example, professional and nonprofessional investors, with the same stated purpose, view different pages when analyzing the reports. In addition, only 30% of investors who state they are viewing the reports to make a buy/sell decision view the information on the day of publication. We conclude with a discussion of how the Internet can facilitate research on who uses what types of financial information to make various investment- and credit-related decisions.
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