무형자산 생산성이 이익의 예측가능성에 미치는 영향

The Effect of Intangible Asset Productivity on Earnings Predictability

Purpose - This study examines whether intangible asset productivity enhances the predictability of future earnings and investigates how this relationship varies according to industry technological intensity and the presence of analyst coverage. While prior research has primarily focused on the value relevance or expenditure-based measurement of intangible assets, this study extends the literature by adopting a productivity-based perspective that captures the economic contribution of intangible assets to firms’ profit-generating processes. Design/methodology/approach - Intangible asset productivity is measured following the framework proposed by Clausen and Hirth (2016), using a Cobb–Douglas production function and converting adjusted efficiency measures into relative ranks (ROTARANK). Earnings predictability is assessed using the prediction error approach developed by Francis et al. (2004) and operationalized through the quarterly-based method of De Franco et al. (2011). The sample consists of KOSPI-listed firms from 2011 to 2019. After excluding financial firms, firms with non-December fiscal year ends, distressed or designated issues, and firms with insufficient data, the final sample comprises 6,874 firm-year observations. Findings - The empirical results show that intangible asset productivity has a positive and statistically significant effect on earnings predictability. This indicates that firms with higher productivity in their intangible assets generate earnings through more stable and structurally explainable processes, reducing uncertainty for external information users. Furthermore, the positive effect is more pronounced in high-technology industries, where intangible assets play a central role in value creation. However, analyst coverage does not significantly strengthen the relationship between intangible asset productivity and earnings predictability, suggesting that information intermediaries may improve the overall information environment but do not fundamentally amplify the productivity-based information effect of intangible assets. Research implications or Originality - This study contributes to the literature by shifting the focus from the size of intangible assets to their economic productivity, offering a more substantively grounded measure for evaluating intangible assets’ contribution to firm performance. It also demonstrates that the informational benefits of intangible asset productivity vary across industrial contexts, particularly in technology-intensive sectors. By providing evidence from Korean listed firms, this study enriches the empirical foundation of intangible asset research and highlights the importance of productivity-based measures in assessing firms’ information environments and future performance.