Abnormal real operations,real earnings management,and subsequent crashes in stock prices

We study the impact of firms’ abnormal business operations on their future crash risk in stock prices. Computed based on real earnings management (REM) models, firms’ deviation in real operations (DROs) from industry norms is shown to be positively associated with their future crash risk. This association is incremental to that between discretionary accruals (DAs) and crash risk found by prior studies. Moreover, after Sarbanes–Oxley Act (SOX) of 2002, DRO’s predictive power for crash risk strengthens substantially, while DA’s predictive power essentially dissipates. These results are consistent with the prior finding that managers shift from accrual earnings management to REM after SOX. We further develop a suspect-firm approach to capture firms’ use of DRO for REM purposes. This analysis shows that REM-firms experience a significant increase in crash risk in the following year. These findings suggest that the impact of DRO on crash risk is at least partially through REM.     

News-based ESG sentiment and stock price crash risk

From the perspective of ESG news-based sentiment, we examine the impact of ESG performance on stock price crash risk. This paper constructs a sentiment index based on ESG news to measure public opinion of listed firms. First, there is a significant negative relationship between ESG news sentiment and stock price crash risk, indicating that higher ESG news sentiment can reduce the crash risk. Second, heterogeneity analysis demonstrates that ESG sentiment has a greater impact on crash risk reduction for firms with lower analyst coverage, lower information transparency, voluntary ESG information disclosure and non-state-owned. In addition, mechanism tests indicate that ESG sentiment affects stock price crash risk by reducing negative ESG incidents, information asymmetry, and agency costs. This paper examines the research inference that ESG news sentiment is beneficial in reducing stock price crash risk and expands the research on the governance mechanism of stock price crash risk.     

Institutional investors’ information seeking and stock price crash risk: nonlinear relationship based on management’s opportunistic behaviour

This paper examines the influence of management’s opportunistic behaviour on the relationship between institutional investors’ visits and stock price crash risk. We find that the relationship between visit frequency and stock price crash risk is inverted U-shaped because of management’s opportunistic behaviour aiming at avoiding the negative impacts of visit. Institutional investors’ visits raise stock price crash risk when visit frequency is low and it can reduce crash risk just when visit frequency is high enough. This nonlinear relationship is more significant when management’s opportunistic behaviour is highly motivated and the implementation space is larger.     

Institutional investor information network,analyst forecasting and stock price crash risk

In this paper, we construct the information network of fund investors based on the theory of social relationship networks and examine its impact of fund information sharing with analysts on stock price crash risk. Our results show that private information sharing among institutional investors reduces crash risk. Further results show that fund information sharing can alleviate analyst optimism bias and improve analyst forecast accuracy, which further reduces stock price crash risk. Moreover, these identified effects are more pronounced in a bull market than a bear market. Our study contributes to the research on private information transmission in fund information networks, and provides a new perspective for recognizing the relationships among institutional investor behavior, analyst forecasting, and stock price crash risk.     

Economic policy uncertainty and stock price crash risk

This paper studies the impact of economic policy uncertainty on stock price crash risk using data from China. We develop a new index to measure Chinese economic policy uncertainty and find that economic policy uncertainty has a remarkable positive effect on stock price crash risk. However, the effect reverses later. The results also indicate that the positive effect of economic policy uncertainty on stock price crash risk is more prominent for state‐owned enterprises. Moreover, this effect is more prominent for firms with higher information asymmetry and firms with greater disagreement among investors, indicating that economic policy uncertainty affects crash risk through two mechanisms: managers’ concealment of bad news and investors’ heterogeneous beliefs.     

Stock price crash risk and CEO power: Firm-level analysis

This study examines the impact of stock price crash risk on future CEO power. Using a large panel sample with 17,816 firm-year observations, we posit and find a significant negative impact of stock price crash risk on CEO power, suggesting that CEO power becomes smaller after stock price crashes. We also find that our results are stronger for firms with female CEOs and are largely driven by firms with shorter-tenure CEOs. In addition, we find that the significant negative impact of stock price crash risk on CEO power is diminished for firms with strong corporate governance. Our study responds to the call in Habib, Hasan, and Jiang (2018) by providing more empirical evidence on the consequences of stock price crash risk.     

经济政策不确定性、意见分歧与股价崩盘风险

基于中文媒体构建的中国经济政策不确定性指数,研究经济政策不确定性对股价崩盘风险的影响效果和机制。结果显示：经济政策不确定性的提高会显著加剧股价崩盘风险,这表明经济政策不确定性是崩盘风险的诱因之一。通过对影响机制检验发现,经济政策不确定性对股价崩盘风险的正向作用,随着投资者意见分歧的增加而加强。在宏观经济良好时期,非国有股权和规模较大的企业,经济政策不确定性并未明显加剧股价崩盘风险,甚至起到了缓解股价崩盘风险的作用。     

Excess perks and stock price crash risk: Evidence from China

We investigate the impact of excess perk consumption on crash risk in state-owned enterprises in China. To enjoy excess perks, executives in state-owned enterprises have an incentive to withhold bad news for extended periods, leading to higher future stock price crash risk. Consistent with this assertion, we find a positive correlation between excess perks and crash risk. The findings are robust to the inclusion of other determinants of crash risk identified in the literature, such as earnings management, conditional conservatism, and firm-level corporate governance mechanisms. The results still hold after accounting for possible endogeneity issues using a two-stage least squares estimation. Earnings management (conditional conservatism) helps amplify (lessen) this impact. Moreover, better external monitoring mitigates the impact of excess perks on firm crash risk. We further find that the impact of excess perks on crash risk is more pronounced in firms whose executives are approaching retirement and persists for at least two years.     

Comprehensive scenario analysis for mitigation of risks of the maritime traffic in the Strait of Istanbul

In this paper, the results of a scenario analysis are presented using the models developed by the authors in their prior work. Therein an aggregate risk-simulation model of the maritime traffic in the Strait of Istanbul was developed giving consideration to traffic rules, vessel profiles, pilotage services, meteorological, geographical conditions, and vessel scheduling. A risk assessment was carried out by incorporating a probabilistic accident risk model into the simulation model to establish a baseline level of risk. Herein, 16 scenarios are described as modifications of the baseline scenario for the purpose of studying maritime risk mitigation in this geographic context. We have evaluated the impact of several factors such as vessel arrival rates, vessel pursuit distances, number of pilots, local traffic density, and vessel scheduling practices such as the single-lane traffic regime start time on safety risks. We also present a discussion on the impact of each factor on vessel passages and waiting times at both entrances of the Strait. We conclude with risk mitigation recommendations that reduce both risk and waiting times, and thus can be considered ‘win-win’ from both an operational and risk reduction perspective.     

海归高管抑制了股价崩盘风险吗？

以我国A股上市公司2009—2017年数据为样本,研究高管的海外经历对公司未来股价崩盘风险的影响。发现海归高管有助于降低公司未来股价的崩盘风险,在多种稳健性检验并控制内生性问题后,以上结论仍然成立。另外,海归高管降低股价崩盘的效果在分析师关注较少的企业以及外部审计质量较弱的企业中表现得更加明显。机制分析表明,海归高管通过降低公司过度投资以及提高会计信息质量来抑制股价崩盘风险。     

The benefit of being a local leader: Evidence from firm-specific stock price crash risk

This paper investigates whether being a local leader affects a firm's stock price crash risk. We find that local leadership, in terms of being a relatively large firm in a surrounding locality, decreases a firm's stock price crash risk. The results are robust to both an instrumental variable and a difference-in-differences regression approach. We also document that the impact on crash risk depends on the extent to which local communities are likely to be monitoring local firms through their stock market participation rates, the information environment surrounding these firms, and the level of industry competition. Overall, our results highlight a novel benefit of being a local leader, as it is associated with a higher level of local monitoring which renders the firm less prone to crash risk.     

金融创新、公允价值计量与商业银行股票崩盘风险

选取我国沪深两市A股上市商业银行作为研究对象,利用2007—2017年年报数据,实证研究金融创新对商业银行股票崩盘风险的影响。在此基础上,以公允价值计量作为中介变量研究其在金融创新对商业银行股票崩盘风险影响中的作用机理。研究发现：金融创新与商业银行股票崩盘风险负相关,公允价值计量在其中发挥部分中介效应的同时也增加了商业银行股票崩盘风险。在当前鼓励创新和防范化解重大金融风险的背景下,应当大力提倡金融创新,通过公司治理和内部控制来规范公允价值计量的使用。     

Board directors with foreign experience and stock price crash risk: Evidence from China

This study examines the impact of board directors with foreign experience (BDFEs) on stock price crash risk. We find that BDFEs help reduce crash risk. This association is robust to a series of robustness checks, including a firm fixed effects model, controlling for possibly omitted variables, and instrumental variable estimations. Moreover, we find that the negative association between BDFEs and crash risk is more pronounced for firms with more agency problems, weaker corporate governance, and less overall transparency. Our findings suggest that the characteristics of board directors matter in determining stock price crash risk.     

The Reconstitution of Risk Objects

This paper examines the relationship of risk and power through a critical analysis of Crew Endurance Management, an initiative directed at enhancing maritime safety and efficiency. The paper argues that the initiative applies rhetorics of choice and self‐discipline to unite morality with risk, thus casting merchant mariners as risk objects in the shipping industry. This objectification relies on differentials in power rooted in differentially‐valued discourses that delegitimize some kinds of expertise. At the same time, deploying alternative rhetorics keyed to the anxieties of other levels of society allows risk objects to resist their objectification by shifting the relevant social scale for considering risk. The paper concludes by suggesting that imperatives for both productivity and safety will expand the workspace by expanding, through emphasis on personal choices, the environment in which workers must be concerned about risk reduction.     

The impact of COVID-19 on the stock market crash risk in China

This study investigates the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the stock market crash risk in China. For this purpose, we first estimated the conditional skewness of the return distribution from a GARCH with skewness (GARCH-S) model as the proxy for the equity market crash risk of the Shanghai Stock Exchange. We then constructed a fear index for COVID-19 using data from the Baidu Index. Based on the findings, conditional skewness reacts negatively to daily growth in total confirmed cases, indicating that the pandemic increases stock market crash risk. Moreover, the fear sentiment exacerbates such risk, especially with regard to the impact of COVID-19. In other words, when the fear sentiment is high, the stock market crash risk is more strongly affected by the pandemic. Our evidence is robust for the number of daily deaths and global cases.     

Auditor-provided tax services and stock price crash risk

This paper examines whether auditor-provided tax services affect stock price crash risk: an important consideration for stock investors. Provision of tax services by incumbent auditors could accentuate or attenuate crash risk depending on whether such services give rise to knowledge spillover or impair auditor independence. The study investigates two channels through which tax services might affect crash risk: earnings management in tax expenses and tax avoidance. Also examined is whether the association between tax services and crash risk is moderated by the particular business strategy that organizations pursue. A two-stage model is used to control for the potential endogeneity inherent in the selection of auditors for tax services. Empirical findings reveal that auditor-provided tax services attenuate crash risk by constraining both earnings management in tax expenses and tax avoidance. Further evidence shows that auditor-provided tax services reduce crash risk for firms following innovator business strategies. Taken together, empirical findings reported in this study support knowledge spillover benefits, that is, insights gained from tax services can enhance audit effectiveness.     

投资者关注与股价崩盘风险:抑制还是加剧?

本文以2010—2017年中国A股上市公司为样本,考察了投资者关注影响股价崩盘风险的客观表现和传导路径。研究发现,投资者关注度的提高会显著加剧下一期的股价崩盘风险,存在“关注度的崩盘效应”;分组检验发现,关注度的崩盘效应仅在机构持股比例低的公司和市场处于牛市状态下存在;路径检验发现,投资者关注不存在信息路径,没有改善公司信息透明度,但存在部分的情绪路径,提高了股价同步性和投资者情绪,从而加剧了股价崩盘风险。建议监管部门重视投资者关注对股价带来的冲击,通过进一步提高机构者持股比例,缓解情绪过热导致的定价错误程度,降低股价崩盘风险。     

Audit Effort and Stock Price Crash Risk

We examine how stock price crash risk is affected by audit effort, as measured by audit hours. Using a unique dataset of audit hours in China, we find that audit effort is negatively related to crash risk. The negative impact of audit effort on crash risk is more pronounced for listed firms that have higher inherent risks and weaker external monitoring of their information environment. Our findings are robust to various tests, including a two-stage regression analysis, controlling for listed firm-fixed effects and audit firm-fixed effects, and using alternative measures of crash risk. In addition to audit output measures, audit effort has an incremental influence on crash risk. The effects of audit effort on crash risk continue to hold after controlling for auditor industry expertise and auditor tenure.     

董事高管责任保险能否抑制股价崩盘风险——基于中国A股上市公司的经验数据

股价崩盘严重损害投资者利益并阻碍股票市场健康发展,因此,探寻抑制股价崩盘风险的手段成为当前公司治理与企业财务领域关注的热点问题。使用2009~2013年我国 A 股上市公司数据为样本,实证检验董事高管责任保险与公司股价崩盘风险之间的关系。研究发现：上市公司购买董事高管责任保险能有效监督与约束高管利己行为,进而降低股价崩盘风险。该结论有助于深入了解董事高管责任保险,同时也为监管部门遏制股价崩盘现象提供了新的思路。     

Does unionization affect the manager–shareholder conflict? Evidence from firm-specific stock price crash risk

This study examines whether and how labor unionization influences firm-specific stock price crash risk. Using a regression discontinuity design that leverages locally exogenous variation in unionization generated by close union elections, we find that unionization leads to a significant decline in crash risk. We further explore the underlying mechanisms through which unionization affects crash risk and find that unions limit risk-taking, constrain overinvestment, and improve information flow, which in turn reduces crash risk. Overall, our study resolves some of the current debate over the implications of unions and sheds new light on their net impact on shareholder welfare.