The hidden tactic revealed A new academic study shows public companies routinely pair negative SEC Form 8‑K filings with unrelated press releases to pull investor attention away from the bad news. The researchers trac…

The analysis covered 49,652 non‑earnings‑related 8‑K filings between 2005 and 2018. Roughly 40 % of those filings disclosed negative events, and a full 33 % of the total sample were accompanied by a same‑day press rel…

How the researchers measured distraction The team, led by Caleb Rawson of the University of Arkansas, classified each 8‑K as “good” or “bad” using textual cues and then applied natural‑language processing to the accom…

They then measured market response by tracking stock‑price movement in the minutes after the filing and by counting downloads of the 8‑K from the SEC’s EDGAR system. Negative filings paired with unrelated releases saw…