The Earnings Information Content of Dividend Initiations and Omissions
发现股利停发后企业盈利会显著回升，但启动股利后盈利并未显著增加，且生存偏差会高估股利对未来盈利的信号作用。
Previous studies have found that dividend initiations and omissions convey important information about subsequent earnings changes. However, this finding may be subject to a sample survival bias. We find that survivorship does not affect the positive relation between dividend changes and past earnings changes. Also, we find dividend omitting firms are able to generate significantly positive earnings one to two years after the omission. However, contrary to previous findings, firms' earnings are not significantly increased following the dividend initiation. The results suggest that survivorship tends to bias inference toward finding that dividends signal future earnings.