Skin in the game: personal stock holdings and investors’ response to stock analysis on social media

Motivated by concerns that financial positions impair analyst objectivity, we examine investor perceptions of the financial positions of nonprofessional analysts (hereafter NPAs) writing on the social media outlet Seeking Alpha. We find that NPA positions contribute directly to short-window returns surrounding the article’s publication, holding constant the information in the article as well as contemporaneously issued news from professional analysts, managers, and the business press. Contrary to concerns that stock positions are associated with biased analysis, we find no evidence that NPA positions reduce investor responses to the tone of the article. In fact, our evidence suggests that holding a position magnifies investor responses to both positive and negative tone, although this effect is limited to tone that is contrary to the NPA’s stock position. Overall, our findings suggest that, contrary to regulators’ concerns, NPA stock positions do not decrease the credibility and informativeness of their analyses.