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This paper aims to study the impact of earnings alerts on market reaction to annual earnings announcements. Relatively few studies have investigated this issue. Our empirical survey based on the study of events finds strong negative stock returns as well as abnormally high trading volume in reaction to negative earning alerts. Market reaction depends on the size of the firm, the P/E ratio, and on its risk level. Moreover, we observe positive abnormal returns at the date of earnings announcements for companies having previously released a profit alert. Our results prove that both disclosures convey informative content for investors. These findings may result from a financial communication strategy. Managers are more likely to voluntarily disclose bad news (i.e., earnings alerts for example) as early as possible and postpone good news disclosures for annual press conferences. This explains the negative market reaction to profit warnings and the positive market reaction to earnings announcements.