Does environmental law enforcement matter for financial reporting quality?

The Chinese government’s recent Environmental Inspection Program (EIP) eliminates a layer of regulatory actions and holds local government officials accountable for enforcement of environmental laws. We examine two aspects of the impact of the EIP on financial reporting quality. First, we derive a simple analytical model to show that the level of earnings management (EM) depends on the cost and probability of EM detection. This increase in environmental law enforcement (due to the EIP) raises the cost of environmental violation to a firm and managers. To respond to the increased costs, a firm engages in less EM. Second, consistent with the model prediction, we find firms subject to the EIP engage in less EM than otherwise equivalent firms located in non-EIP jurisdictions. The effect of the EIP on EM is more pronounced for firms with adverse agency problems and poor internal controls. Additional analysis suggests that air quality level is a moderating factor for the impact of the EIP on EM. Collectively, using the natural experiment of the EIP, we find a new determinant of EM. Environmental law enforcement deters EM and enhances financial reporting quality.     

Earnings management strategies in Brazil: Determinant costs and temporal sequence

This paper describes a study that analyses earnings management strategies involving accounting choices or real activities in Brazil. An analysis is conducted of the relationships between earnings management strategies their determinant costs and of the temporal sequence in which these management strategies are applied. The results of empirical tests indicate that adoption of management strategies is dependent on their relative costs. There is a temporal relationship between the two types of strategies for manipulation of year-end results, with real activities preceding accounting choices. It was also observed that the level of manipulation by accruals (real activities) reduced (increased) after adoption of the IFRS in Brazil.     

How Do Experienced Users Evaluate Hybrid Financial Instruments?

Hybrid financial instruments contain features of both liabilities and equity. Standard setters continue to struggle with “getting the classification right” for these complex instruments. In this paper, we experimentally test whether the features of hybrid instruments affect the credit‐related judgments of experienced finance professionals, even when the hybrid instruments are already classified as liabilities or equity. Our results suggest that getting the classification right is not of primary importance for these experienced users, as they largely rely on the underlying features of the instrument to make their judgments. A second experiment shows that experienced users’ reliance on features generalizes to several features that often characterize hybrid instruments. However, we also find that experienced users vary in their beliefs about which individual features are most important in distinguishing between liabilities and equity. Together, our results highlight the importance of effective disclosure of hybrid instruments’ features.     

Explaining CEO retention in misreporting firms

We propose a framework that advances our understanding of Chief Executive Officer (CEO) retention decisions in misreporting firms. Consistent with economic intuition, outside directors are more likely to fire (retain) CEOs when retention (replacement) costs are high relative to replacement (retention) costs. When the decision is ambiguous because neither cost dominates, outside directors are more likely to retain the CEO when they both benefit from selling stock in the misreporting period. We show that joint abnormal selling captures director–CEO alignment incrementally to biographical overlap. This new proxy operationalizes information sharing and trust, making it useful for studying economic decision-making embedded in social relationships.     

Spatial Imaginaries of the Dutch–German–Belgian Borderlands: A Multidimensional Analysis of Cross‐Border Regional Governance

Parallel to the proliferation of cross‐border regional cooperation initiatives in the European Union, increasing scholarly attention has been given to conceptualizing cross‐border governance in recent decades. In line with the recognition that cross‐border regions have not undermined the significance of nation‐state spaces but have added to their complexity, conceptual frameworks of analysis have become more and more refined. However, studies still tend to be framed in one spatial grammar, that of territory, scale or network, and fail to consider the ways in which these different dimensions become interlocked. The aim of this article is to address this lack by developing a multidimensional perspective, in order to finally circumvent state‐centric thinking on cross‐border regions and to offer a more nuanced account of whether and how new imaginaries of spatial governance institutionalize. These arguments are demonstrated by means of a case study of cross‐border regional governance in the Dutch–German–Belgian borderlands.     

我国“兴边富民行动”的经济绩效评估——以广西和云南为样本的双重差分模型分析

利用“兴边富民行动”的实施仅限于边境县所提供的“自然实验”，以广西和云南为样本，采用双重差分模型对其经济绩效进行评估，分析表明：从总体效应看，“兴边富民行动”对边境县人均GDP增长具有显著正向促进作用，有利于第一产业占比的提高，但不利于第三产业占比的提高，对第二产业占比的影响不显著；从动态效应看，“兴边富民行动”对边境县经济发展的促进效应由负转正、逐渐增强，对第一产业占比的影响呈现出持续减弱的趋势，对第二产业占比的影响呈现出持续增强的趋势，对第三产业占比的影响持续为负。我国边境地区经济结构还处于较低级阶段，经济发展水平相对落后，“兴边富民行动”的实施确实促进了边民收入水平的提高和边境地区产业结构的升级，应进一步加大实施力度。     

Whether entering WTO influences U.S. bidders＇ wealth？——Some evidence from U.S. bidders＇ taking over BRIC＇s target firms

With the ever-increasing economic integration of nations, cultural homogenization and relaxation of foreign ownership regulations by many countries, international acquisition has become an important tool for finns＇ globalization. Being important emerging markets, BRIC countries （Brazil, Russia, China ＆ India） are providing international acquirers, many unique opportunities and challenges. Joining in the WTO opens access to the world markets, promotes competition in the domestic market, provides opportunities to settle trade issues and increases trust of the trade partners and investors to the emerging countries. The author tests the wealth effects （i.e how the market react） of U.S. bidding firms on their announcements for taking over BRIC firms. In Brazil and China, significantly positive market reactions are found after their entering WTO, which reflects the sound economic development with the further opening up. Things are different in India, which are most likely caused by the economic depression during 1990s. As the only BRIC country having not joined in WTO, taking over Russian fires lead to vague market reactions in U.S..     

Behavioural Finance: A Review and Synthesis

I provide a synthesis of the Behavioural finance literature over the past two decades. I review the literature in three parts, namely, (i) empirical and theoretical analyses of patterns in the cross‐section of average stock returns, (ii) studies on trading activity, and (iii) research in corporate finance. Behavioural finance is an exciting new field because it presents a number of normative implications for both individual investors and CEOs. The papers reviewed here allow us to learn more about these specific implications.     

Deadlines and distractions

We consider a task, demanding a sequence of efforts, that must be completed by a deadline. Effort is not contractible. Agents face shocks to their opportunity cost of time and are sometimes distracted from work. We show that agents who are often distracted may outperform agents who are distracted less often. The reason is that anticipation of distractions induces agents to start earlier for precautionary reasons. Principals can increase the probability of completion, and achieve higher profits, by strategically setting “tight” deadlines, provided that the deadlines can be extended with some positive probability.     

论标准化在测绘工作中的重要性

为使测绘从业人员充分认识到标准化工作的重要性，从而在测绘工作中自觉执行各类标准，从标准和标准化的定义入手，由浅入深地阐明了标准在测绘工作中的重要性，即执行测绘标准是法治意识的重要体现；标准化是保持测绘科技先进性的重要手段；标准化是测绘成果统一性的重要保障；标准化是维护测绘市场公平竞争的重要工具。论述的观点，对把测绘标准化工作引向深入具有一定的参考价值。