Analysts who own stock in companies they follow give more helpful recommendations and work harder to cover those companies. However, they also tend to make more optimistic target price forecasts. This shows that analysts' stock ownership can make their recommendations more trustworthy by showing they have better information, but it can also lead them to overestimate target prices. Surprisingly, over half of analysts who own stock in a company sell it while still recommending that company's stock, which might break rules about analysts' research.