More US firms turn investor shy

It pays to communicate but Corporate America is doing less and less of it with investors as the US economy falls deeper into recession, undermining market confidence in the process, a new study showed.

The number of companies in the Standard & Poor's 500 index with a consistent track record over the past 10 years of issuing quarterly earnings per share guidance is down 36 percent in the last 10 months, according to Thomson Reuters Proprietary Research.

Well-known companies such as General Electric, Microsoft, Costco Wholesale, and Nucor have stopped giving consistent earnings guidance.