The effect of accounting academics in the boardroom on the value relevance of financial reporting information

We examine whether accounting academics on the board of directors affect their firm's financial reporting quality. While regulations mandate firms to include financial experts as outside directors to enhance transparency, there is also a shortage of suitable individuals with both the relevant expertise and the appropriate management and communication skills. Although increasing evidence suggests that academics as outside directors improve firm performance, previous studies do not focus on the role of accounting professors per se on accounting quality. The prevalence of hiring academics as outside directors renders China a suitable research setting. We observe greater value relevance of reported earnings when accounting academics serve as financial experts in the board, especially in firms where their influence is expected to be more pronounced. Our evidence implies that accounting scholarship contributes to the efficiency of the capital market, and can potentially supply the boardroom demand for financial experts.     

The relevance of the value relevance literature for financial accounting standard setting: another view

This paper explains that value relevance research assesses how well accounting amounts reflect information used by equity investors, and provides insights into questions of interest to standard setters. A primary focus of financial statements is equity investment. Other uses of financial statement information, such as contracting, do not diminish the importance of value relevance research. Value relevance questions can be addressed using extant valuation models. Value relevance studies address econometric issues that otherwise could limit inferences, and can accommodate and be used to study the implications of accounting conservatism.     

The value relevance of major media advertising expenditures: Some U.K. evidence

This study examines whether ACNielsen MEAL major media advertising expenditure measures, that are publicly available at a cost, have value relevance. Our results suggest that these advertising-expenditure measures are positively associated with market value. We also find little difference in the value relevance of these expenditures among different sizes of firms. Value relevance is found to be present only for nonmanufacturing firms. This suggests that the costly information provided by ACNielsen MEAL surveys may be potentially useful to market participants in valuing firms, at least for nonmanufacturing firms.     

The effect of audit committee shareholding,financial expertise and size on interim financial disclosures

In recent years, corporate failures and accounting irregularities have led to concerns about the effectiveness of audit committees in the financial reporting process. In response, corporate governance committees in different countries have made specific recommendations designed to enhance the role of the audit committee in executing its financial reporting oversight duties. We investigate in this study, the effect of some of these recommendations by empirically examining the relationship between selected audit committee characteristics and the level of disclosure in interim reports of a sample of 262 UK listed companies. Specifically, the audit committee characteristics examined are shareholding of audit committee members (as a proxy for audit committee independence), audit committee size and audit committee financial expertise. Employing both a weighted and unweighted index to measure interim disclosure, the results indicate a significant negative association between shareholding of audit committee members and interim disclosure. Our results provide evidence of a significant positive association between interim disclosure and audit committee financial expertise. We find no significant relationship between audit committee size and the extent of disclosure in interim reports. Overall, however, our results suggest that audit committee characteristics have an impact on its monitoring effectiveness of the financial reporting process. These results have important implications for corporate governance policy-makers who have a responsibility to prescribe appropriate corporate governance structures to ensure that shareholders are protected.     

The effect of financial reporting quality on corporate dividend policy

This study examines how financial reporting quality affects corporate dividend policy. We find that higher quality reporting is associated with higher dividends. This positive association is more pronounced among firms with more severe free cash flow problems and among firms with higher ownership by monitoring-type institutional investors. Further analysis of the relation between reporting quality and under?/over-payment of dividends suggests that reporting quality largely mitigates underpayment of dividends. Additionally, both a granger causality test and a difference-in-difference analysis of dividend changes around a quasi-exogenous reporting event yield evidence consistent with the direction of causality going from financial reporting to dividends. Overall, these findings are consistent with financial reporting quality acting as a governance mechanism that induces managers to pay dividends by disciplining free cash flow problems. Our findings support the view that dividends are the result of enhanced monitoring (Jensen 1986; La Porta, Lopez-de-Silanes, Shleifer, and Vishny 2000).     

Initial public offer pricing,corporate governance and contextual relevance: Australian evidence

This study examines the relationship between initial public offer (IPO) corporate governance, IPO pricing and possible contextual relevance. A comprehensive inventory of IPO governance attributes is modelled. A positive association is reported between the inventory and IPO initial returns. This relationship is attenuated for IPOs where a diminished price relevance of governance structure is posited: smaller scale firms and/or those with alternative monitoring agents in place. Relevance appears modified and even supplanted by particular corporate priorities or the presence of other monitoring mechanisms. These contexts inform the motivation of key players regarding whether and how to act in response to the governance signal.     

Suboptimal segmentation: Assessing the use of demographics in financial services advertising

Marketers routinely make use of demographic-based segmentation as a means of targeting customers of financial services. This article builds on growing evidence that a demographic-based approach is ill-founded. Using a large sample we investigate whether demographic information is of use in segmenting customers and find little support for existing practice. Implications for researchers and managers are discussed.     

The transition to IFRS and the value relevance of financial statements in Greece

We examine the combined value relevance of book value of equity and net income before and after the mandatory transition to IFRS in Greece. Contrary to our expectations, we find no significant change in the explanatory power of value relevance regressions between the two periods. The coefficients on book value of equity and net income are positive and significant in both the pre-IFRS and post-IFRS periods. However, the coefficient on book value of equity is significantly greater under IFRS, whereas we find some evidence of a decrease in the coefficient on net income. Finally, we find that market participants viewed the extra information provided by reconciliations between Greek GAAP and IFRS for 2004 figures as incrementally value relevant.     

Suboptimal segmentation: Assessing the use of demographics in financial services advertising

Marketers routinely make use of demographic-based segmentation as a means of targeting customers of financial services. This article builds on growing evidence that a demographic-based approach is ill-founded. Using a large sample we investigate whether demographic information is of use in segmenting customers and find little support for existing practice. Implications for researchers and managers are discussed.     

The spillover effect of fraudulent financial reporting on peer firms' investments

We investigate how high-profile accounting frauds affect peer firms' investment. We document that peers react to the fraudulent reports by increasing investment during fraud periods. We show that this finding is not driven by frauds that have a higher ex ante likelihood of detection or by an association between fraud and investment booms. In addition, we find that peers’ investments increase in fraudulent earnings overstatements, and in industries with higher investor sentiment, lower cost of capital and higher private benefits of control. We also find evidence consistent with equity analysts potentially facilitating the spillover effect.     

The effect of ETFs on financial markets: a literature review

Exchange-traded funds (ETFs) belong to the fastest growing investment products worldwide. Within 15 years, total assets invested in ETFs have twenty-folded, reaching over $3.7 trillion at the end of 2018. Increasing demand for passive investments, coupled with high liquidity and low transaction costs, are key advantages of ETFs compared to their closest substitutes such as traditional index funds. Besides the continuous growth of ETFs, the Flash Crash in 2010 triggered detailed investigations by regulators on how ETFs affect the financial market. This literature review provides a broad overview of recent academic studies analyzing the effect of ETFs on liquidity, price discovery, volatility, and comovement of the underlying securities.

     

The effect of financial leverage on real and accrual-based earnings management

Past research has documented a substitution effect between real earnings management (RM) and accrual-based earnings management (AM), depending on relative costs. This study contributes to this research by examining whether levels of (and changes in) financial leverage have an impact on this empirically documented trade-off. We hypothesise that in the presence of high leverage, firms that engage in earnings manipulation tactics will exhibit a preference for RM due to a lower possibility – and subsequent costs – of getting caught. We show that leverage levels and increases positively and significantly affect upward RM, with no significant effect on income-increasing AM, while our findings point towards a complementarity effect between unexpected levels of RM and AM for firms with very high leverage levels and changes. This is interpreted as an indication that high leverage could attract heavy outsider scrutiny, making it necessary for firms to use both forms of earnings management in order to achieve earnings targets. Furthermore, we document that equity investors exhibit a significantly stronger penalising reaction to AM vs. RM, indicating that leverage-induced RM is not as easily detectable by market participants as debt-induced AM, despite the fact that the former could imply deviation from optimal business practices.     

The effect of information shocks on dividend payout and dividend value relevance

We exploit the mandatory adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) as a source of exogenous shock to the corporate financial information environment to study the potential effect that this information shock might have on the dividend payout policy and dividend value relevance in the UK and France. We employ a difference-in-differences research design, in which our choice of the control and treatment groups is mainly based on the divergence between domestic accounting standards and IFRS, while holding institutional factors constant. The UK domestic accounting standards slightly diverge from IFRS (low-divergence firms), whereas French domestic accounting standards substantially diverge from IFRS (high-divergence firms). Nevertheless, both countries have similar institutional factors that might confound the effect of IFRS adoption. Our theoretical argument is that IFRS adoption is expected to mitigate information asymmetry, a major reason for the free cash flow problem (Jensen, 1986) and cash over-retention (Myers & Majluf, 1984). Our findings suggest that IFRS adoption is a major contributor in increasing dividend payouts among high-divergence firms via reduction of asymmetric information. Moreover, improving the information environment helps investors become more confident about using accounting numbers to assess firm financial performance, which causes a significant reduction in dividend value relevance among high-divergence firms.     

Consumer-generated content and source effects in financial services advertising: An experimental study

Although advertising has previously been under the control of organizations and their advertising agencies, recent advances in technology have seen the emergence of what has come to be known as ‘consumer-generated advertising’. Consumers are now creating their own ads for the brands they love and hate, using inexpensive software and powerful personal computers, and then distributing these via social networks such as YouTube. The consequences for traditional advertisers are profound. Although services marketing scholars have begun to pay attention to this phenomenon, little is known about the source effects of these types of ads, for example whether viewers think they were created by firms, or consumers like themselves. This article describes a series of experiments designed to test source effects in the context of consumer-generated ads in a financial services context, in which it is found that some source effects are present. Implications for marketers as well as future research directions are identified.     

On the intertemporal value relevance of conventional financial accounting in Australia

This paper examines whether the relevance of conventional (earnings focused) accounting information for valuation has declined in Australia over a recent period of 28 years. Motivation is provided by the anecdotal concerns of financial analysts, accounting regulators, and a cluster of US centric academic research papers that conclude that the relevance of financial accounting (and earnings in particular) has declined over time. After controlling for nonlinearities and stock price inefficiencies, we find that the value relevance of core accounting earnings has not declined. A possible exception is found for small stocks. We also observe that net book values are relatively less important in Australia when compared to the USA. Our results are informative for investors who require feedback on valuation issues and the International Accounting Standards Board regulators in any further moves towards a balance sheet focus.     

The effect of trade secrets protection on disclosure of forward-looking financial information

Using the recognition of the Inevitable Disclosure Doctrine (IDD) by US state courts as an exogenous shock to the risk of losing trade secrets, this study examines the effects of trade secrets on disclosure of forward-looking financial information. We find that management earnings forecast frequency and forecast horizon increases after the US state where a firm is headquartered starts to recognize IDD. We also find that the effect of IDD recognition on management forecasts is more pronounced for firms that have larger market shares, higher product market competition, more intensive R&D, shorter distance to their industry rivals, and more employees who possess knowledge of the firms’ trade secrets.     

The effect of financial repression and enforcement on entrepreneurship and economic development

A general equilibrium model with heterogeneous agents (with respect to wealth and ability) shows that differences across countries in intermediation costs and enforcement generate differences in occupational choice, firm size, credit, output and income inequality. Counterfactual experiments are performed for Latin American, European, transition and high growth Asian countries, with empirical estimates of each country's financial frictions and United States values for all other parameters. The results isolate the quantitative effect of these financial frictions in explaining the performance gap between each country and the United States, and depend critically on whether a general equilibrium factor price effect is operative.     

The effect of corporate social responsibility on the branding of financial services

In today's global world, corporate social responsibility (CSR) is increasing public demand for greater transparency from multinational companies. CSR is a new and growing financial risk factor. If it is mismanaged, a firm's corporate reputation can be badly damaged and a direct negative impact on its business and bottom-line may result. Instead of simply campaigning directly against industrial groups and lobbying governments and international organisations to issue new legislation, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) are increasingly putting pressure on the financial services groups and insurance companies. This new global tactic may affect a bank's relationship with its clients and shareholders.There are market benefits and competitive advantages for those companies whose business policies integrate CSR. The growth in socially responsible investments and in CSR awareness among City people persuades some bankers that the most successful firms of the future will be those who proactively balance short-term financial goals with long-term sustainable franchise building. To respond to this challenge, corporations will have to convince citizens they can trust both their brands and the people behind them. In this context, one must recognise that finance brands have been clumsily managed. Nowadays, several big consumer brands are used as societal role models, but they are also the targets of anti-globalisation and anti-logo activists. In order to avoid such an outcome — not to mention corporate mortification — the key social marketing strategy must be to communicate proactively the business activity's raison d'être to opinion leaders and the general public. In general, industry does not yet care enough and many companies are reacting only when put under pressure by public opinion. It is time, however, to market the social raison d'être of a business and indeed to contest its current exclusion from ‘civil society’. Consumer and service sectors lead the field. In view of the downturn of the global economy, more than ever before, CSR branding is of paramount importance to the financial sector if bankers do not want to become the easy scapegoats. It is necessary to make it clear that financial services companies are global citizens too.     

The effect of foreign currency hedging on the probability of financial distress

This paper investigates the effect of foreign currency hedging with derivatives on the probability of financial distress. I use Merton’s (1974) structural default model to compute firms’ distance to default as a proxy for their probability of financial distress. Using an instrumental variables approach to control for endogenous hedging and leverage, I find that the extent of foreign currency hedging is associated with a lower probability of financial distress. Whereas previous research finds that the probability of financial distress is a determinant of a firm’s hedging policy, this paper provides direct evidence supporting the hypothesis that the extent of hedging reduces a firm’s probability of financial distress.