Announcement

Analyst Forecast Performance Report
Revised Technical Description

The first version of this report is ready and is available immediately.

General Comments

This report analyses analysts’ forecasts against actual company results, and generates a variance number for each of the following data items:

Recommendations are also listed as part of stock’s entry. The variance number is calculated using the formula:

(( ACTUAL VALUE / FORECAST VALUE ) - 1 ) * 100

In the event that there are no recent actual company results, the report will use the analyst’s last forecast as a baseline, and then compare that figure to earlier figures. This is, of course, is highly subjective and should be treated as such.

 User-defined Variables

The user can tailor the report’s output according to the following parameters:

Tag Selected Analysts

When you press the F2 key at the report’s setup screen, the program will pop up a list of all of the analysts currently defined in S.I.S. You can tag one or more of the analysts to be included in the report. The program will cycle through the S.I.S. database, and prepare a list of all stocks that are covered by the tagged analysts, and the stocks in the list will then be included in the final output.

Select Effective Report Date

You can set the effective date for the report. In other words, the program will ignore all data later than the effective date. Normally, however, you would leave the default date in this field, which is set according to the date that the last prices update was done.

Select Local Board, Foreign Board or All Stocks

You can filter the report according to the S.I.S. ‘Foreign Indicator’ field, selecting only local board stocks or foreign board stocks or all stocks.

Select Number Of Months To Consider Results As ‘Current’

In order to present the user with output, the program retrieves the most recent actual company results. You may set how many months back from the effective date (see #2 above) to consider those results as ‘current’. If the results were announced earlier than the period you specify, then the program will calculate a semi-arbitrary variance number using the last forecast number as the base. See the example below.

 Comments On Program Logic

1. Actual or Pending Company Results

If no actual year end data is available and the program is using the analyst’s last forecast number as the base number, then the report will have the word PENDING under the company name. Also, the letter code ‘P’ will appear next to the figures in the ‘Final’ column and Variance column.

Otherwise, the word ACTUAL, and the code ‘A’ will be used.

The program determines whether the use the latest actual data or calculate a PENDING value by using the following logic:

1.1. Determine the actual results announcement date

1.2. Calculate the cutoff date by subtracting the ‘Number of Months To Consider Results As Current’ value from the "Effective Date’.

Any stocks whose results announcement date are earlier than this date will have a PENDING value calculated.

2. Variance Number Calculation

The program compares the most recent forecast within each date range (1-44, 45-89, etc.) to the base figure. For example, if the program finds 3 forecast figures within the 1 to 44 day date range, it will use the most recent number of the three to compare against the actual results number, in order to calculate the variance.

If data appears in all three columns of forecasts (the 1-44 Days, 45-89 Days and 90-179 Days columns), then the program will use the 1-44 Days column for its variance calculations.

3. No Data Displayed

These lines have been left in on purpose. It will help indicate to the Research Head stocks where insufficient attention is being paid.

Also, please note that prior to 1997, only 6 months of revision data was being stored. Therefore older forecast data may not be available. The program is currently set to hold a minimum of 18 months of revision data, with a default value of 24 months.

4. ‘1-44 Days, 45-89 Days & 90-179 Days’ Columns

These columns refer to the date ranges relative to the dates in the FINAL column, not to the ‘Effective Date’ or today’s date.

5. Missing ‘Results Announced’ Date In Latest Results

If there are recent actual results, but the ‘Announced Date’ field has not yet been filled in (this may occur when analysts bring back actual results from a company visit, but the results are not yet officially announced), the program will use the company’s year end setting and add 2 months to it to set an arbitrary announcement date. The announcement date is used as the base date to compare against the 1 of the 3 earlier date ranges (see #4 above).

6. Recommendation Data

The recommendation appearing in the ‘Final’ column will be the last recommendation up to and including the ‘Effective date’ set for the report, and does not relate to the announcement date of the stock.

However, other recommendations in other columns do use the same date ranges used by the NET, EPS & DPS figures, as defined by the Results Announcement date.