Abstract: The Securities Law, revised in 2019, has significantly increased the degree of punishment and deterrence of violations against laws and regulations. Taking A-share listed companies from 2016 to 2021 as samples, this paper tests the impact of the implementation of the new Securities Law on the accuracy of analysts’ earnings forecasts with the difference-in-differences method. The findings show that after the implementation of the new Securities Law, the accuracy of analysts’ predictions in the companies with weaker quality of information disclosure has greatly improved. In terms of economic significance, the range amounted to 39% of the mean value of analysts’ forecast deviations. After a series of endogeneity and robustness tests, these conclusions still stand. The mechanism analysis shows that the implementation of the new Securities Law improves analysts’ forecast accuracy by means of increasing the quality of corporate information disclosure rather than reducing the level of corporate risk-taking. The heterogeneity test reveals that after the implementation of the new Securities Law the improvement effect of analysts’ forecast accuracy is more significant in the state-owned enterprises, the enterprises with high goodwill, and those with less product market competition. This research conclusion reveals the spill-over effect of law amendments on other market participants. Therefore, the government should further improve the information environment of the capital market, and analysts should increase their attention to the enterprises with lower information disclosure quality.

Key words: the new Securities Law, analysts' forecast, information environment