Investor Sentiment, Accruals Anomaly, and Accruals Management

This study examines the effect of investor sentiment on the accruals anomaly. We find that for small stocks mispricing per unit of accruals is greater in high sentiment periods as compared with low sentiment periods. This result is consistent with the notion that in high sentiment periods individual investors pay less attention toward understanding the accruals and cash flow components of earnings. This effect is observed primarily for small stocks because these stocks are more likely to be followed by individual investors, who tend to have limited attention. We also find that for small stocks reported accruals are greater during high sentiment periods as compared with low sentiment periods, suggesting that managers exploit the greater overvaluation per unit of accruals during high sentiment periods.