Report of the Editor of The Journal of Finance for the Year 2018

• Author: STEFAN NAGEL
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/jofi.12781
• Published date: 01 August 2019
• Date: 01 August 2019

THE JOURNAL OF FINANCE •VOL. LXXIV, NO. 4 •AUGUST 2019

Report of the Editor of The Journal of Finance

for the Year 2018

STEFAN NAGEL, EDITOR

I am pleased to report that 2018 was a good year for the Journal. With Philip

Bond, Amit Seru, and Wei Xiong, I am fortunate to have a fantastic team of

coeditors. I am very grateful for their excellent work in running the Journal.

Table Idetails the number and timing of submissions received throughout

the year. We received 1,149 submissions, of which 1,033 were new manuscripts

and 116 were resubmissions. The number of new submissions rose slightly

compared with 2017, when it was 1,030.

Turnaround remains good with little change from previous years. As can be

seen in Table II, in 2018, 69.4% of editorial decisions took less than 70 days.

The median turnaround time in 2018 of 49 days is slightly higher than in

2017 (45 days), but at 10.5% we managed to keep the share of decisions that

took over 100 days lower than in the previous year (11.3%). Figure 1compares

turnaround over the 2014 to 2018 period.

One reason why the median turnaround time went up by a few days in 2018

is that the desk rejection rate fell once more from 36% in 2017 to 33% in 2018

(after 39% in 2016). The fall in the desk rejection rate is not due to a change

in our editorial policy compared with previous years but reflects the generally

high quality of the submissions we received in 2018.

Table III provides information on editorial decisions. The total number of

revise-and-resubmits rose in 2018 to 141 (from 128 in 2017), but the number

of acceptances fell to 55 (from 86 in 2017). We anticipate that the rise in R&Rs

in 2018 year will translate into a higher number of accepted papers in 2019.

Focusing on initial submissions, the probability of an Editor asking for a

revision or granting acceptance after one round of review was stable at around

9.5% in 2018 compared with 9.7% in 2017.

To maintain the Journal’s position as the premier outlet in the field of Fi-

nance, our editorial team is determined to ensure an efficient review process

for authors. The number of rounds until acceptance is a particularly important

metric in this regard. Through guidance in our decision letters and by aiming to

clearly distinguish revisions necessary for clearing the bar from revisions that

should remain optional, we have made an effort to limit the number of revisions

until acceptance. As Figure 2shows, among accepted papers in 2018, almost

two thirds (65%) were accepted after at most one revision. This is a very high

number. Virtually, all papers (98%) were accepted after at most two revisions.

DOI: 10.1111/jofi.12781

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2118 The Journal of Finance R

Tabl e I

Submission and Resubmission Timing

2018 2017

Month Submissions Resubmissions Total Month Submissions Resubmissions Total

Jan. 76 8 84 Jan. 95 6 86

Feb. 73 7 80 Feb. 107 8 89

Mar. 94 6 100 Mar. 85 4 99

April 93 6 99 April 70 11 77

May 94 9 103 May 78 13 87

June 82 11 93 June 69 13 107

July 86 12 98 July 89 11 110

Aug. 96 19 115 Aug. 91 15 114

Sept. 87 9 96 Sept. 89 13 114

Oct. 91 16 107 Oct. 75 7 107

Nov. 80 6 86 Nov. 93 4 105

Dec. 81 7 88 Dec. 89 11 100

Total 1,033 116 1,149 Total 1,030 136 1,166

Tabl e II

Turnaround Statistics

2018 2017

Processing Time Number Cumulative % Processing Time Number Cumulative %

Less than 20 days 335 29.7% Less than 20 days 384 33.5%

20 to 29 days 41 33.3% 20 to 29 days 47 37.6%

30 to 39 days 71 39.6% 30 to 39 days 85 45.0%

40 to 49 days 136 51.6% 40 to 49 days 97 53.4%

50 to 59 days 99 60.4% 50 to 59 days 101 62.2%

60 to 69 days 102 69.4% 60 to 69 days 88 69.9%

70 to 79 days 81 76.6% 70 to 79 days 69 75.9%

80 to 89 days 68 82.6% 80 to 89 days 80 82.9%

90 to 99 days 77 89.5% 90 to 99 days 66 88.7%

100 or more days 119 100.0% 100 or more days 130 100.0%

Total 1,129 Total 1,147

Median turnaround 49 Median turnaround 45

Average turnaround 51 Average turnaround 49

These numbers are particularly remarkable in light of the fact that we

discontinued the use of “reject-and-resubmit” in editorial decisions from the

beginning of our term in July 2016. This means that a paper recorded as

accepted after at most one revision was indeed only subject to one revision

(and not a second revision after a “round zero” reject-and-resubmit, where the

resubmission is counted as a “new submission”).

The Journal’s visibility and impact remain extremely high. As Table IV

shows, articles published in the Journal were cited 34,342 times across all

journals in 2017, a total that ranks first among business and finance journals