Earnings calls are now the primary channel for oral financial reporting in the globalized corporate world. During these events, teams of executives present their companies’ economic results to professional financial analysts within an audio teleconference setting. The presentations are followed by Q&A sessions with the analysts allowing them to interact directly with the executives. Research on this genre thus far has focused on their linguistic features, with little attention to their prominent multimodal dimension, which incorporates a unique blend verbal and non-verbal input. Using a case study approach, I analyse all the semiotic resources that come into play during an earnings call of a leading European telecommunications company, with particular attention to the intersemiotic complementarity of the various modes, including prosodic features of the participants’ vocal production and accompanying visual supports with numerical data, graphics, and images. The findings showed that the earnings call combined verbal and nonverbal semiotic resources which are interdependent and cannot be fully understood in isolation. Moreover, a smooth shifting between verbal and visual modes without explicit cuing suggested a consolidated and mutually understood protocol for utilizing various modes and media. The prosodic features of the participants’ speech appeared to convey pragmatic meanings linked to both authoritativeness and tentativeness, depending on the sometimes conflicting goals of analysts who request information and executives who may or may not want to provide it. The findings of the study can be used to inform financial communication courses that aim to train future company executives and financial analysts.

Multimodality and financial communication: The case of earnings calls

Crawford Camiciottoli, B
2019-01-01

Abstract

Earnings calls are now the primary channel for oral financial reporting in the globalized corporate world. During these events, teams of executives present their companies’ economic results to professional financial analysts within an audio teleconference setting. The presentations are followed by Q&A sessions with the analysts allowing them to interact directly with the executives. Research on this genre thus far has focused on their linguistic features, with little attention to their prominent multimodal dimension, which incorporates a unique blend verbal and non-verbal input. Using a case study approach, I analyse all the semiotic resources that come into play during an earnings call of a leading European telecommunications company, with particular attention to the intersemiotic complementarity of the various modes, including prosodic features of the participants’ vocal production and accompanying visual supports with numerical data, graphics, and images. The findings showed that the earnings call combined verbal and nonverbal semiotic resources which are interdependent and cannot be fully understood in isolation. Moreover, a smooth shifting between verbal and visual modes without explicit cuing suggested a consolidated and mutually understood protocol for utilizing various modes and media. The prosodic features of the participants’ speech appeared to convey pragmatic meanings linked to both authoritativeness and tentativeness, depending on the sometimes conflicting goals of analysts who request information and executives who may or may not want to provide it. The findings of the study can be used to inform financial communication courses that aim to train future company executives and financial analysts.
2019
Las conferencias de resultados son el principal canal de información financieraoral en el actual mundo corporativo globalizado. En este tipo de intercambiosverbales, los equipos de ejecutivos de cada compañía presentan sus resultadoseconómicos a analistas financieros profesionales por audio-teleconferencia. Laspresentaciones están acompañadas de una sesión de preguntas y respuestas quepermiten a los analistas la interacción directa con los ejecutivos. La investigaciónsobre este género se ha centrado hasta ahora en los aspectos lingüísticos y haprestado poca atención a su destacada dimensión multimodal, que integra unamezcla única de inputs verbales y no verbales. A través de un estudio de caso, eneste artículo se analizan todos los recursos semióticos que desempeñan un papelimportante en una conferencia de resultados de una operadora detelecomunicaciones puntera en Europa, con especial atención a lacomplementariedad intersemiótica de las diferentes modalidades, incluidos loselementos prosódicos de la producción vocal de los participantes y los soportesvisuales que acompañan a la conferencia con datos numéricos, gráficos eimágenes. Los resultados muestran que las conferencias de resultados combinanrecursos semióticos verbales y no verbales que son interdependientes y que nopueden entenderse por completo de manera aislada. Además, el cambio fluidoentre modalidades verbales y visuales sin una entrada explícita parece revelar laexistencia de un protocolo consolidado y compartido respecto al uso de lasdiferentes modalidades y de los elementos digitales. Las característicasprosódicas del discurso de los participantes parecen expresar significadospragmáticos que pueden indicar tanto autoridad como duda, dependiendo de siresultan o no conflictivos los objetivos de los analistas al solicitar información alos ejecutivos, o de si estos últimos quieren o no proporcionarla. Los resultadosde este estudio pueden ser útiles para cursos de comunicación financiera quetengan como finalidad formar futuros ejecutivos y analistas financieros.
earnings calls
multimodal analysis
prosody
financial communication
oral financial reporting
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11770/344218
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