An examination of factors affecting Chinese financial analysts’ information comprehension, analyzing ability, and job quality

This paper examines various factors affecting Chinese financial analysts’ information comprehension, analyzing ability and job quality. We hypothesized that financial analysts with better educational background, more experience, superior resources provided by large brokerage firms and more information sources have better information comprehension, stronger analyzing ability, and higher job quality. Using a survey method to collect data, we found that information sources have a significant impact on analysts’ information comprehension, analyzing ability and job quality. Specifically, analysts tend to exhibit greater information comprehension and better job quality when they conduct more company-level surveys. Additionally, when they have more access to firms’ indirect information, analysts tend to have a stronger analyzing ability and better job quality. We also found that analysts’ educational background has a positive impact on their analyzing ability while analysts’ work experience improves their job quality. This study’s results indicate that financial analysts are still a fledgling profession in current China, and the capabilities of Chinese financial analysts need to be improved through additional training and continued education. Moreover, our study is important in highlighting the urgency of fostering the development of the financial analysis profession in China.