小额信贷机构的全要素生产率——基于30家小额信贷机构的实证分析

本研究运用30家小额信贷机构2005～2009年的投入产出数据和基于数据包络分析(DEA)的Malmquist生产率指数法,对小额信贷机构的全要素生产率进行测算和分解.实证结果表明:在时间序列上,30家小额信贷机构整体全要素生产力呈下降趋势.引起生产力下降的原因是规模效率低和技术进步缓慢,规模和技术进步成为小额信贷机构...     

True and Fair': UK Auditors' View

An earlier paper surveyed the behaviour of finance directors of the 900 largest UK companies with respect to giving a true and fair view in annual accounts. This present paper results from personal interviews with technical partners of all the 20 largest UK auditing firms (which includes the auditors of nearly all the companies in the previous survey). The paper examines the operational meaning of ‘true and fair’ to large auditing firms, and how it fits into the context of law and standards. It is concluded that one effect of the requirement as it works in practice is to give support to auditors' views in areas not yet covered by accounting standards. Contrasts emerge between the interpretations of directors and those of auditors.     

Regulation of accountancy and the power of capital: some observations

In response to Briloff’s study of the regulation of fraudulent financial reporting in the USA, this paper examines the regulation of financial reporting and auditing in the UK. In common with Briloff, it reports that little effective regulatory action is taken against auditing firms implicated in audit failures and/or the publication of “defective" financial statements. Seemingly, as major fraction of international capital, auditing firms have colonised and captured the state to shield themselves from regulatory action.     

我国会计师事务所效率的实证研究——基于中注协2008—2010年发布数据

运用DEA数据包络和Malmquist生产力指数相结合的方法,综合考虑投入和产出以及它们之间的关系,对我国会计师事务所行业2007至2009年的效率变动进行实证研究;实证了会计师事务所投入要素的使用效用具有波动性,在经营管理上存在投入成本的浪费,技术效率变动为正增长,总的生产力水平在逐渐下降;事务所管理层可以通过控制并即时调整、优化和整合有效资源,加强技术创新的投入,实现规模经济效益,提升市场竞争力。     

Financial Statements Insurance

The fact that auditors are paid by the companies they audit creates an inherent conflict of interest. We analyze how the provision of financial statements insurance could eliminate this conflict of interest and properly align the incentives of auditors with those of shareholders. We first show that when the benefits to obtaining funding are sufficiently large, the existing legal and regulatory regime governing financial reporting (and auditing) results in low quality financial statements. Consequently, the financial statements of firms are misleading and firms that yield a low rate‐of‐return (low fundamental value) are over‐funded relative to firms characterized by a high rate‐of‐return (high fundamental value). We present a mechanism whereby companies would purchase financial statements insurance that provides coverage to investors against losses suffered as a result of misrepresentation in financial reports. The insurance premia that companies pay for the coverage would be publicized. The insurers appoint and pay the auditors who attest to the accuracy of the financial statements of the prospective insurance clients. For a given level of coverage firms announcing lower premia would distinguish themselves in the eyes of the investors as companies with higher quality financial statements relative to those with higher premia. Every company would be eager to pay lower premia (for a given level of coverage) resulting in a flight to high audit quality. As a result, when financial statements insurance is available and the insurer hires the auditor, capital is provided to the most efficient firms.     

Voluntary CSR disclosure,institutional environment,and independent audit demand

Using a sample of A-share listed companies on the Shanghai and Shenzhen Stock Exchanges, this study examines the impact of voluntary corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure on independent audit demand in different institutional environments. The sample covers the 2008–2016 period and excludes firms that are required to disclose CSR information. The findings show that compared with companies that choose to not disclose such information, companies that voluntarily disclose CSR information prefer to employ “small” accounting firms for auditing services, although the auditing fees are much higher. However, as the institutional environment improves, this preference is weakened. Further analyses show that this preference is stronger in enterprises where CSR disclosure is driven by strong political motivations and managerial self-interest motivations. Legitimate motivations and economic motivations do not significantly impact the preference for “small” audit firms. Furthermore, this preference is more obvious in enterprises with poor operational performance and low information disclosure quality, and it increases as CSR disclosure level decreases. The study enriches our understanding of the economic consequences of voluntary CSR disclosure and the factors that influence independent audit demand. The results also have implications for the construction and regulation of China’s system for supervising CSR information disclosure in the transitional phase.     

中注协约谈部分证券资格事务所负责人及注册会计师 提示上市公司年报审计风险

为深入贯彻落实会计师事务所执业质量检查制度改革精神和《上市公司年报审计监管工作规程》要求,中注协在系统总结2010年年报审计监管约谈经验的基础上,通过创新约谈工作思路、健全约谈工作机制、加强约谈工作技术支持力量,进一步加大年报审计事前事中监管力度,有效抵制不正当低价竞争,更好地引导和帮助事务所防范审计风险。2012年,中注协先后约谈了9次(其中,当面约谈6次,书面约谈3次)、共20家证券资格事务所,就部分上市公司2011年年报审计风险进行提示,引起社会各界的高度关注和积极反响。为帮助广大读者深入了解中注协年报审计监管约谈机制和全面把握风险提示内涵,现接上期,继续将有关约谈的情况予以刊发。     

The Unintended Consequences of the Frequency of PCAOB Inspection

After more than 50 years of self‐regulation of the US auditing profession, the Sarbanes‐Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) created the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) as a quasi‐governmental entity with statutory authority to inspect accounting firms that audit public clients. The frequency of this inspection is annual or triennial, based upon the number of public clients the firm audits. We examine the effects of these two levels of inspection frequency on financial reporting quality and audit fees for clients of small and midsize public accounting firms. Our findings provide evidence of significantly higher audit quality and audit fees for clients of annually inspected firms relative to clients of triennially inspected firms. These findings are robust to auditor‐client alignment analyses, propensity score matching, time‐series analyses, examination of firms that have changed from triennial to annual inspection, and particular examination of firms with inspection deficiencies. Overall, our study suggests that the two‐tier frequency system of PCAOB inspection may have also resulted in two‐tier audit quality and audit fee systems for small and midsize public accounting firms, with more frequent inspection leading to more rigorous and informed auditor decisions. We discuss the implications of our results for the Board and the profession at large.     

Do investors forecast fat firms? Evidence from the gold‐mining industry

Conventional economic theory assumes that firms minimize costs given output, but news articles and managers indicate that firms cut costs when they are in economic distress and grow fat when they are relatively wealthy. Under conventional theory, firm value is convex in the price of a competitively supplied input or output, but we find that the stock values of many gold‐mining companies are concave in the price of gold. We show that this is consistent with fat accumulation when a firm grows wealthy. We then address alternative explanations and discuss where fat in these companies might reside.     

Has Adoption of IFRS Increased Non–North American Institutional Investment in the Canadian Stock Markets?

We investigate whether non–North American (non‐NA) institutional investment in firms listed on the Canadian stock markets increased between the pre‐ and post‐IFRS adoption periods relative to such investment in firms listed on the U.S. stock markets. Prior to IFRS adoption, Canada had high‐quality financial reporting standards that were similar to the U.S. standards. As consequences of IFRS adoption, Canadian financial statements became more comparable with European and other IFRS country financial statements and less comparable with neighboring U.S. financial statements. Thus, a question of interest is whether the enhanced comparability with non‐NA companies was beneficial in terms of attracting non‐NA investment to Canadian companies versus U.S. companies. We find that there was no significant change in non‐NA institutional investment in Canadian firms relative to U.S. firms for the very largest (fifth quintile) and for smaller (first, second, and third quintiles) Canadian companies. However, intermediate‐sized Canadian companies in the fourth size quintile lost non‐NA institutional investment relative to their U.S. peer companies, suggesting that non‐NA investors cared more about comparability with U.S. peer companies than non‐NA peer companies for companies in this size quintile.     

An Analysis of Submissions on Proposed Regulations for Audit and Assurance in New Zealand

After numerous collapses of finance companies in New Zealand, and widespread losses by investors, self‐regulation of the auditing profession was no longer considered adequate or acceptable internationally. The New Zealand Government sought to restore public perceptions of audit quality and investor confidence in the financial markets with proposals to change existing accounting standards and audit and assurance requirements. The proposals included a review engagement for some entities, and imposing the force of law on auditing standards. We analyse the public submissions on the auditing and assurance aspects of these proposals. Many respondents object to the proposal, requiring small public sector and not‐for‐profit entities to obtain review engagements, and to give auditing standards the force of law.     

最低工资标准提高对企业资本劳动比的影响研究

资本劳动比的提高对企业发展、经济增长和结构转型都具有重要意义。本文利用2002—2011年中国工业企业数据和283个地级市统计数据,探讨了最低工资标准提高对企业资本劳动比的影响。研究发现,最低工资标准提升对制造业企业资本劳动比具有显著的正向影响。平均而言,最低工资标准每提升10%,企业资本劳动比将提高2%,该结果在工具变量回归、双重差分法等多项稳健性检验下均成立。机制分析表明,最低工资标准提高会使企业增加资本投入和减少劳动力雇佣,这一结论为企业用资本替代劳动力的事实提供了直接证据。异质性分析表明,最低工资标准提升对企业资本劳动比的影响主要集中于非国有企业、较低工资水平企业和劳动密集型企业。进一步研究发现,随着最低工资标准提升,企业生产率和盈利能力显著提高,从而佐证了企业用资本替代劳动力的积极效应。本文的研究为进一步完善最低工资制度,促进经济转型升级提供了经验依据与政策启示。     

Corporate Innovations and Mergers and Acquisitions

Using a large and unique patent‐merger data set over the period 1984 to 2006, we show that companies with large patent portfolios and low R&D expenses are acquirers, while companies with high R&D expenses and slow growth in patent output are targets. Further, technological overlap between firm pairs has a positive effect on transaction incidence, and this effect is reduced for firm pairs that overlap in product markets. We also show that acquirers with prior technological linkage to their target firms produce more patents afterwards. We conclude that synergies obtained from combining innovation capabilities are important drivers of acquisitions.     

Equity Markets Do Not Fit All: an Analysis of Public‐to‐Private Deals in Continental Europe

Concentration of family‐based ownership and recent development of private equity companies in Continental Europe suggest that the motivations and results of public‐to‐private (PTP) deals may differ from well‐studied cases in the USA and the UK. We overview the PTP market and measure the cumulative abnormal returns (CARs) of 106 PTP deals concluded in Continental Europe from 2000 to 2005, introducing a model to explain the abnormal returns. Our results partially confirm findings of previous studies, namely, that undervalued and smaller firms register higher CARs. We additionally find that deals promoted by family owners register higher abnormal returns, whereas financial investors and private operating firms show no impact.     

A Comparative Analysis of Real and Accrual Earnings Management around Initial Public Offerings under Different Regulatory Environments

While earnings management around IPOs has been researched in a number of settings, there has been a relative absence of work that analyses the impact of the regulatory environment on such activities. We find that the regulatory environment does impact the real and accrual earnings management activities of IPO firms. Our results show that IPO firms listing on the lightly regulated UK Alternative Investment Market (AIM) have higher (lower) levels of accrual‐based and sales‐based (discretionary expenses‐based) earnings management around the IPO than firms listing on the more heavily regulated Main market in the UK.     

Financial structure,informality and development

The impact of capital market imperfections and costs of creating and operating formal sector firms on total factor productivity is studied. We propose a firm dynamics model with endogenous formal and informal sectors where firms face a technology adoption opportunity. The model predicts that countries with a low degree of debt enforcement and high costs of formality are characterized by low allocative efficiency and large output shares produced by low productivity, informal sector firms. For frictions parametrized using the Doing Business database, the model generates a drop in total factor productivity of up to 25% relative to the US.     

Perceived auditor independence and audit firm fees

Regulations requiring the disclosure of fees paid to an auditor for audit and non-audit services (NAS) respond to concerns that such payments are potentially detrimental to auditors' actual or perceived independence. Although empirical studies have failed to produce unequivocal evidence of detrimental effects on auditor independence, the actions of regulators, audit firms and companies are consistent with the belief that economic bonding generated by fees can impair perceived levels of auditor independence.

Using a sample of UK companies over a six year period to March 2006, we study perceived impairment of auditor independence by examining the relationship between levels of total relative fees (combined audit and NAS fees payable by a company to its auditor as a proportion of the audit firm's UK income) and market value. This paper's methodological innovation is its use of a valuation framework in this setting. A further contribution lies in dropping the assumption of linearity found in most prior empirical studies. We provide evidence that shareholders perceive a threat to auditor independence only at high total relative fee levels. At lower levels, total relative fees are positively related to company value. These results suggest that disclosure of NAS and audit fees are of relevance to investors, as is information about auditor income. Our results support the view that regulation by reference to the threshold at which total relative fees are perceived negatively is more consistent with investor preferences than prohibition of the supply of NAS by auditors to their audit clients.     

Pay me a single figure! Assessing the impact of single figure regulation on CEO pay

In this paper, we examine the relation between quantitative disclosure of CEO pay and the optimality of pay structure in terms of 1) level of pay, 2) pay-performance relationship, and 3) CEO-to-employee pay ratio. We use the new reporting regulation in 2013, requiring large and medium-sized companies and groups in the UK to report a single figure of total pay, as an exogenous shock to pay disclosure. Our results are based on a hand-collected sample of FTSE 100 firms over the period of 2010–2017. The main findings are threefold: Firstly, we find that CEO total pay stays roughly the same before and after the new regulation. In addition, firms that voluntarily adopt the regulation early have higher pay increases than their counterparts that do not adopt early in univariate tests. Secondly, pay-performance sensitivity actually declines after the new regulation by more than 50%. This effect is particularly evident in firms with weak corporate governance. Thirdly, the effect of the reform on the CEO-to-employee pay ratio is minimal, whereby it declined slightly following the reform, but this is only significant in univariate tests. Our results suggest that the 2013 regulation which increases the reporting transparency has limited impact on total pay and pay-performance in the UK.     

The Role of Auditing Firms in the Implementation of New Accounting Standards: Evidence from China

This paper explores the impact of auditing firms on the implementation of the new Chinese Accounting Standards for Enterprises 22 (new CAS 22), which converges with IFRS 9. We find that the Big4 firms focus on fair value measurement and application of the expected credit loss (ECL) impairment model, whereas the LocalTop6 firms primarily focus on the classification of financial assets. The results indicate that effective implementation of the new standards mainly depends on standardized procedures and professional techniques of auditing firms, as the Big4 firms exhibit better implementation of the new standards in terms of items that generate greater risk and uncertainty than do local large auditing firms in China. In addition, we further test how cross-listing affects the role of auditing firms in implementing the new standards and find that the Big4 firms play a more significant role for A-share only companies than A + H companies. The findings reveal the challenges associated with implementation of IFRS 9-based new CAS 22 in China.     

自愿中报审计能减少盈余管理吗?——基于自选择模型的实证分析

中国上市公司除特殊情况外可以自愿选择是否进行中报审计。本文使用2001—2005年自愿选择进行中报审计的445家 A 股上市公司和其配对样本公司的数据,研究了公司进行中期报告审计的决定因素和中报审计对盈余管理的影响。我们发现,公司的 ROE、财务杠杆以及会计师事务所是否前十大对中报审计的购买有显著影响。考虑到中报审计可能是上市公司自选择的结果,我们进一步采用 Heckman 的两阶段模型方法来控制中报审计决定的内生性。研究发现,尽管自愿审计公司的中报显示更低的非正常应计利润,但没有证据表明这是由于审计造成的,模型估计结果表明,具有较高盈余质量的公司更倾向于进行中报审计。