Working Paper
Debt Dictionaries
Abstract: Stock and bond investors treat different aspects of firm information as value-relevant, generating distinct mappings of text to returns (“dictionaries”). Comparing stock and bond responses to earnings calls, bondholders emphasize operations and downside risk (relative to growth and innovation). While consistent with asset payoff differences, dictionary differences follow the investor cohort and not the payoff structure. Among bonds that are de facto equities but priced by bondholders—junior debt for which firm value is less than senior debt face value—bond investors continue to interpret information through a creditor’s lens. Information ignored by one dictionary but not the other generates price underreaction.
https://doi.org/10.21799/frbp.wp.2026.43
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Bibliographic Information
Provider: Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia
Part of Series: Working Papers
Publication Date: 2026-09-21
Number: 26-43