How well does net income measure firm performance? A discussion of two studies

Abstract

The papers by Dhaliwal, Subramanyam and Trezevant (1998)and Vincent (1998)both examine whether stock returns are more highly associated with net income or an alternative measure of firm performance in contexts that are of some current interest to accounting regulators. However, since neither paper does a very good job of motivating their basic economic questions, we are left with results that are not all that interesting or surprising. Both papers would have benefited greatly from a clearer delineation of the economic rationale for their tests and predictions.