The wolves of Wall Street? Managerial attributes and bank risk

We find that chief executive officers and chief financial officers exert significant individual effects on bank risk. Manager transitions, including transitions generated by plausibly exogenous manager departures, lead to abnormally large changes in bank risk. We demonstrate that the effects of managers on bank risk are sizable and manager-specific. The effects are also partly anticipated by the board because they are reflected in managers’ pay. However, wide-ranging personal attributes, including biographical, experience, and compensation data, only explain a small share of managers’ impact on bank risk. This implies that attempts to rein in bank risk-taking by targeting manager characteristics will be challenging for investors and regulators.     

Overconfidence and tax avoidance: The role of CEO and CFO interaction

We investigate how overconfident CEOs and CFOs may interact to influence firms’ tax avoidance. We adopt an equity measure to capture overconfident CEOs and CFOs and utilize multiple measures to identify companies’ tax-avoidance activities. We document that CFOs, as CEOs’ business partners, play an important role in facilitating and executing overconfident CEOs’ decisions in regard to tax avoidance. Specifically, we find that companies are more likely to engage in tax-avoidance activities when they have both overconfident CEOs and overconfident CFOs, compared with companies that have other combinations of CEO/CFO overconfidence (e.g., an overconfident CEO with a non-overconfident CFO), which is consistent with the False Consensus Effect Theory. Our study helps investors, regulators, and policymakers understand companies’ decision-making processes with regard to tax avoidance.     

Upper‐echelon executive human capital and compensation: Generalist vs specialist skills

This study extends current knowledge of upper echelon executive compensation beyond the CEO, specifically CFO compensation, based on whether they possess generalist or specialist skills. We find that “strategic” CFOs with an elite MBA (generalist) consistently command a compensation premium, while “accounting” CFOs (specialist) and CFOs with a non‐MBA master's degree, even from an elite institution, do not. Further, scarce “strategic” CFOs are awarded both higher salaries and higher equity‐based compensation. Our findings support the view that unique complementarities between scarce CFOs and firms increase these executives' bargaining power leading to pay premium. Our results are robust to post‐hiring years, firm sizes, board characteristics, and CFO's insider/outsider status. We contribute at the confluence of upper‐echelon compensation, executive human capital, resource‐based view, and assortative matching literatures. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Can Management Turnover Restore the Financial Statement Credibility of Restating Firms? Further Evidence

This paper investigates the association between management turnover following financial restatements and the probability of subsequent restatements. We find that restating firms that replace management (CEO and/or CFO) are more likely to restate their financial statements again. We also find that subsequent restatements are mainly attributable to the new management. Overall, our results suggest that management turnover following restatements may not be an effective mechanism to remediate financial restatements, but the change to a new management results in a greater possibility of lower earnings quality (i.e., higher probability of subsequent financial restatements and accruals‐based earnings management). Our study supports prior literature's findings that the change in the top management leads to organizational instability and higher accounting information risk. Our findings have implications for internal decisionmaking with regard to top executive replacement.     

Reining in auditors: On the dynamics of power surrounding an “innovation” in the regulatory space

In the aftermath of Enron and the collapse of Arthur Andersen, new “independent” institutions were created to oversee financial auditing. Based on a modified version of Lukes’ multidimensional model of power, we first investigate how the creation of the Canadian Public Accountability Board (CPAB) has affected the dynamics of power among the main players enlisted in Canada’s regulation of public accounting. Our findings strengthen the view that a “form of allegiance” was, at the time of data collection, developing between CPAB and the largest Canadian accounting firms. Through a second analytical movement, we extend the boundaries of our argument, showing that patterns of resistance against the logic of arm’s length regulation operate in a variety of audit regulatory sites. Our conclusion points, in particular, to the spatial gap - and incidentally the limitations - of any attempt to control and supervise a globalized industry from a national or regional perspective.     

CFO审计师经历、旋转门现象与会计稳健性

到客户管理层就职是会计师事务所审计师的一个重要职业选择,但监管机构对审计质量和企业财务报告质量的担忧引发了对此类现象的严格监管.本文基于2002年~2011年我国A股上市公司CFO的变更事件,从审计师的职业谨慎性出发,探讨了CFO审计师经历、"旋转门"现象对上市公司会计稳健性的影响.研究发现:CFO审计师经历能提高会计稳健性;"旋转门"现象并没有削弱公司会计稳健性;相比仅有审计师经历的新聘任CFO,"旋转门"现象下的CFO能更快地融入新公司并发挥作用.     

CFO知识背景、知识外溢与企业绩效关系研究

随着CFO的职能特征由技术性向战略性转变,CFO的知识需求也由专业性逐步转变为综合性。本文阐述了CFO职能变迁与知识需求改变的关系,运用我国A股制造业上市公司的数据对CFO知识背景综合性级别进行评判并开展实证研究。结果表明,CFO知识综合性的提高主要通过对企业发展战略的影响而提升企业绩效。本文认为,借助于知识外溢效应,CFO综合性知识背景有助于促进知识共享,改善组织知识存量,从而影响企业绩效。为此,CFO的培养应该着眼于综合性知识结构的形成。     

首席财务官与首席执行官薪酬的相关性研究——基于沪深两市946家上市公司的数据

在现代公司治理结构中，首席财务官（CFO）发挥着愈来愈重要的职能和作用，在一些方面具有与首席执行官（CEO）同等重要的法律地位。制定合理的CFO薪酬政策，对于协调CFO与CEO在公司治理中的关系，促使CFO积极履行在公司战略决策方面的重要职责具有重要意义。文章以我国946家上市公司为研究样本，全面地对CFO与CEO薪酬的差异及其相关性进行了研究.     

金融学教育应该注重培养CFO人才

中西方大学在金融学课程设置方面存在着巨大的差异。目前我国企业界迫切需要精通投资学与财务学的CFO人才，这对金融学教育提出了新的要求和挑战。金融学专业课程的设置应该能够为培养掌握投资理论和实务、财务管理及分析、税收筹划、公司治理等专业知识的现代化、国际化人才搭建一个坚实的平台。通过借鉴西方大学金融学课程结构安排，大力增加公司财务学方面课程比重，增加实践环节课时数量，努力培养出大批既掌握金融市场投资，又通晓公司财务运作的高级CFO人才。     

浅谈我国CFO角色定位

我国的企业正面临着严峻的挑战,除了具有与世界上别的公司相同的因素外,还包括许多我国市场经济转型体制下所特有的因素。在这种情况下,企业所需要的不是一般的CFO,而是高素质、高水平的 CFO,他们既要具备与世界接轨的先进的财务金融知识和技能,还要充分了解我国的国情。