We examine how the sudden drop in public information search capability caused by Google’s withdrawal from China affects Chinese analysts’ earnings forecasts. We observe, after Google’s withdrawal, a decline in analysts’ forecast accuracy for firms with foreign trade relative to those without it. This decline suggests that the withdrawal hinders analysts’ acquisition of foreign information about firms, which decreases the quality of their earnings forecasts. We also find that the effect of the withdrawal on forecast accuracy is stronger for firms with higher business complexity and more opaque financial reporting and for analysts with weaker information processing capacity and more attention constraints. Additionally, we find that corporate site visits serve as an alternative information source that can compensate for the information loss caused by the Google withdrawal. Last, we document that the withdrawal reduces analysts’ forecast timeliness and increases their forecast dispersion.

Investors have limited attention, especially when getting busy. They also possess a capability of fast thinking that requires little, if any, attention, although fast thinking leads to biased judgement and inferior outcome. From a Chinese online peer-to-peer lending market, we document a substantial amount of instant loan bids (i.e., those confirmed within only a few seconds) which help identify fast thinking. We find that lending decisions made within busy working hours with more attention constraint have significantly higher likelihood of being instant and significantly lower investment performance, suggesting that investors are prone to fast thinking when their attention becomes limited.