Advertising Exposure and Investor Attention: Estimates from Super Bowl Commercials

Abstract

Product advertising captures the attention not only of consumers but also of investors. Constructing a measure of local investment interest in stocks from Google searches and using the Super Bowl as an experiment, we study the effects of advertising expenses on investor attention. We find that the post-game Monday attention of investors in areas with high viewership increases significantly for both local and non-local companies that air commercials. Non-local firms with high advertising exposure in a region attract more interest than local firms with low exposure, suggesting that advertising has a stronger impact on investor attention than the local bias.