CEO Exposure, Media Influence, and Stock Returns

Media-aware stock movements are well acknowledged by behavioral finance. As the soul of a firm, CEO media behavior is critical to the operation of a firm. CEO exposure could capture the investors' attention and enhance the media effect in the stock market in terms of the "eyeball economics," or CEO overexposure could attract more attention than firm-specific news, which attenuates the media effect in the stock market due to the investors' limited attention. This study systematically explores the role and the moderating effect of CEO media behavior on the relationship between media content and stock markets. Using daily frequency data for a sample of Chinese stocks, this study shows that higher CEO media exposure attenuates the media effect on stock markets, especially consumer-related stocks.