Universität zu Köln

Haase, Frederic ORCID: 0009-0004-2138-0441, Rath, Oliver ORCID: 0000-0002-1608-2042, Krauß, Jonas and Schoder, Detlef (2025). The Role of Finfluencers in Shaping Crowd Sentiment: An Empirical Investigation. Business & Information Systems Engineering. pp. 1-24. Springer Nature. ISSN 2363-7005

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Abstract

The paper utilizes empirical data to investigate finfluencers – key actors in financial social media – and their impact on crowd sentiment. Despite its importance for various stakeholders such as hedge funds and regulators, the antecedents of crowd sentiment remain largely unexplored. The study analyzes 80 million posts on stocks and cryptocurrencies, grouping actors by their social networking potential (SNP) to distinguish between those with potential to influence and the broader crowd. The authors construct sentiment time series employing transformer-based models for both groups and apply panel vector error correction models (PVECMs) to examine their relationship. Drawing on herd theory, the findings confirm that finfluencer sentiment positively predicts crowd sentiment in the short term, without a reciprocal effect. This effect is stronger for cryptocurrency assets than for stocks and is positively moderated by the uncertainty of the crowd. These insights contribute to the fields of information systems (IS) and marketing research by exploring the role of social media influencers (SMIs) in contexts outside traditional consumer marketing. The study’s findings have significant implications for regulators, firms, social media platforms, and investors, supporting the development of regulatory frameworks, marketing strategies, platform policies, and investment decisions.

Item Type:	Article
Creators:	Creators Email ORCID ORCID Put Code Haase, Frederic UNSPECIFIED https://orcid.org/0009-0004-2138-0441 UNSPECIFIED Rath, Oliver UNSPECIFIED https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1608-2042 UNSPECIFIED Krauß, Jonas UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED Schoder, Detlef UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED
URN:	urn:nbn:de:hbz:38-801435
Identification Number:	10.1007/s12599-025-00947-1
Journal or Publication Title:	Business & Information Systems Engineering
Page Range:	pp. 1-24
Number of Pages:	24
Date:	2 June 2025
Publisher:	Springer Nature
ISSN:	2363-7005
Language:	English
Faculty:	Faculty of Management, Economy and Social Sciences
Divisions:	Weitere Institute, Arbeits- und Forschungsgruppen > Cologne Institute for Information Systems (CIIS)
Subjects:	Data processing Computer science Economics Commerce, communications, transport Management and auxiliary services
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Keywords Language Finfluencers ; Crowd sentiment ; Sentiment analysis ; Social media influence ; Herding ; Vector error correction model ; Granger causality English
['eprint_fieldname_oa_funders' not defined]:	Publikationsfonds UzK
Refereed:	Yes
URI:	http://kups.ub.uni-koeln.de/id/eprint/80143