【Topic】
A Look into Firms’ R&D Activities through Online Job Postings
【Host】
Prof. WU Yuhui, Director of Department of Finance, School of Management, Xiamen University
【Abstract】
Information about firms’ research and development (R&D) activities is considered proprietary and is rarely disclosed. This study examines firms’ R&D activities through a new information source – R&D job postings. Using the detailed textual information in job postings to identify R&D positions, we find an increasing demand for R&D human capital by US firms from 2010 to 2021. Controlling for other information sources of firms’ R&D activities (R&D expenses and narrative R&D information in 10-K), we find that R&D job postings have incremental power to predict firms’ future patent filing, with the effect being more pronounced for firms with higher growth opportunity and lower labor intensity. We further show that R&D postings that require new technology skills or higher education attainment have stronger predictive power for future innovation. Lastly, we show that the stock market reacts positively to firms’ R&D postings. However, the market underreacts to such information, reflected by a positive link between firms’ R&D postings and future abnormal returns. Taken together, our results show that R&D job postings are an important information source for understanding firms’ innovation activities.
【Speaker】
Prof. WANG Wenfeng, assistant professor, City University of Hong Kong
Dr. Wang Wenfeng received his PhD in accounting at University of Maryland, US, and his bachelor degree form Central University of Finance and Economics. His research interests focus on understanding how different information disclosure affects the capital market and how the audit market functions. He is now an assistant professor of accounting at City University of Hong Kong.
