Legal Regime and Financial Reporting Quality

This article uses the Canadian environment, where French civil law (FCL) in the province of Quebec coexists with common law (CL) in the Rest of Canada (denoted as bijural), to test the thesis of the neutrality of the legal system with regard to financial reporting quality (FRQ). This single‐country design allows for a better control over other factors that influence FRQ. The FCL environment appears to encourage firms to publish accounting data of better quality due to the greater liability risk faced by auditors and corporate directors under that regime. These findings, based on 10 years of data and seven attributes of FRQ, are robust to different matching procedures and model specifications. This research contributes to the current debates in Canada as to whether financial market regulation under FCL and CL jurisdictions should be unified under a single CL national securities regulator. At the broader level, the results support claims that a more in‐depth understanding of the implementation of civil law and CL is needed rather than gross generalization about the two systems. These results especially call into question that CL regimes are unambiguously superior to civil law regimes in encouraging high‐quality financial reports.     

China's Anti-Corruption Campaign and Financial Reporting Quality

We examine the impact of China's anti-corruption campaign on firm-level financial reporting quality (FRQ). As an important component of the anti-corruption campaign, in October 2013, “Rule 18” was issued to prohibit party and government officials from serving as directors for publicly listed firms. The regulation led to a large number of official directors resigning from their roles as directors involuntarily. As such, Rule 18 has effectively weakened, if not fully discontinued, the political connections of the firms that previously hired officials as directors. Our empirical analyses employ a difference-in-differences research design with firm fixed effects and propensity-score matching to examine the pre- and post-period FRQ around the enactment of Rule 18. We find that, compared to propensity-score-matched control firms, FRQ of firms with resigned official directors increases after Rule 18. Further evidence suggests that the impact is stronger when firms are located in regions with more developed financial markets and in regions with higher judiciary efficiency. We also find that the effect is more pronounced when firms are non-state-owned, received preferential credits, and face refinancing pressure.     

Blockholder Exit Threats and Financial Reporting Quality

Recent theoretical and empirical studies suggest that blockholders (shareholders with ownership ≥ 5 percent) exert governance through the threat of exit. Blockholders have strong incentives to gather private information and sell their shares when managers are perceived to underperform. To prevent blockholders from selling their shares and the firm from suffering a stock price decline, managers align their actions with the interests of shareholders. As a result of the greater manager‐shareholder alignment, managers' actions are more likely to be in shareholders' best interest, and consequently there is less need for managers to manipulate earnings. Consistent with these predictions from economic theory, we find evidence that as exit threat increases, firms have higher financial reporting quality. Theory also predicts that the impact of blockholders' exit threat on financial reporting quality (FRQ) should increase as the manager's wealth is tied more closely to the stock price, and this is what we find. Our study contributes to the research on the impact of shareholders on FRQ and to an emerging literature on the impact of blockholders in financial markets. Blockholders play an important role in managers' reporting outcomes through their actions as informed investors.     

The Interrelation between Audit Quality and Managerial Reporting Choices and Its Effects on Financial Reporting Quality

Two distinct lines of research have been dedicated to empirically testing how financial reporting quality (measured as the earnings response coefficient or ERC) is associated with management's choice of reporting bias and with audit quality. However, researchers have yet to consider how ERCs are affected by either the auditor's reaction to changes in the manager's reporting bias or the manager's reaction to changes in audit quality. Our study provides theoretical guidance on these interrelations and how changes in the manager's or the auditor's incentives affect both reporting bias and audit quality. Specifically, when the manager's cost (benefit) of reporting bias increases (decreases), we find that expected bias decreases, inducing the auditor to react by reducing audit quality. Because we also find that the association between expected audit quality and ERCs is always positive, changes in managerial incentives for biased reporting lead to a positive association between ERCs and expected reporting bias. When the cost of auditing decreases or the cost of auditor liability increases, we find that expected audit quality increases, inducing the manager to react by decreasing reporting bias. In this case, changes in the costs of audit quality lead to a negative association between ERCs and expected reporting bias. Finally, we demonstrate the impact of our theoretical findings by focusing on the empirical observations documented in the extant literature on managerial ownership and accounting expertise on the audit committee. In light of our framework, we provide new interpretations of these empirical observations and new predictions for future research.     

企业财务报告质量问题及其治理对策

近年来,一些企业采用编造、变造、伪造等手法粉饰财务报告,以失真的财务信息误导企业利益相关者的行为十分普遍,严重扰乱了经济秩序,动摇了投资者的信心,对我国经济造成严重损害。本文对该问题产生的原因进行了分析,并根据财务报告应＂客观、充分地反映会计主体的财务状况、经营成果和现金流量,为利益相关者提供有用的财务信息＂的要求提出了治理对策。     

Audit Firm Tenure,Bank Complexity,and Financial Reporting Quality

Theory from organizations and economics research posits that in an inter‐organizational relationship, both parties invest in relationship‐specific knowledge, which in turn facilitates the effectiveness of the relationship while strengthening the attachment between the parties. In complex settings where there are more opportunities for knowledge creation, the investments will be larger and the attachment stronger. Because banks are complex institutions that present unique challenges to auditors, we suggest that effective audits critically depend on the accumulation of significant investments in client‐specific expertise through a long association with the client. We find a positive association between audit firm tenure and financial reporting quality, and this association is particularly strong in banks that are more complex. Also, contrary to recent research we find that benefits of audit firm tenure for complex banks accrue even for long tenure and are not limited to medium tenure. Our findings largely support the notion that a long relationship with the client reflects the underlying demand for expertise, which is critical for high‐quality audits of complex organizations. Imposing short‐term limits on audit firms would adversely affect the investments in client‐specific expertise especially in the cases where this expertise is needed the most. Our findings do not support calls for mandatory audit firm rotation for large complex institutions.     

Target Financial Reporting Quality and M&A Deals that Go Bust*

This study investigates the role of financial reporting quality in merger and acquisition (M&A) deals that are ultimately terminated (i.e., go bust). If a target is a U.S. publicly traded company, an acquirer’s initial assessment of the potential benefits associated with the acquisition of the company is based on publicly available information. Generally, the acquirer obtains limited private information from the target prior to announcing the deal, but engages in transactional due diligence after signing the acquisition agreement to affirm that the financial reporting warranties made by the target are accurate. We construct a low‐quality financial reporting score based on measures prior research identifies as being associated with less reliable, less relevant, and less precise financial reporting. We find that acquirers offer higher premiums for targets with low‐quality financial reporting. However, we also find that low‐quality financial reporting increases the likelihood of deal renegotiation, and contributes to the probability of deals going bust. We document that failed targets are more likely to restate their financial statements after the announcement of the deal, supporting our conjecture that low‐quality financial reporting contributes to deals being terminated. Our research develops a new measure of low‐quality financial reporting, documents that the measure is related to M&A deal outcomes and financial restatements, and provides insights into the consequences of M&A transactional due diligence.     

法律环境、审计质量与公司投资效率——来自我国上市公司的经验证据

结合我国现阶段的制度背景,本文以我国2004—2006年A股上市公司为研究样本,在控制样本自选择偏误的基础上,检验了法律环境、审计质量与公司投资效率后发现：我国上市公司审计质量和公司投资不足显著负相关,即高质量的审计能够有效减少上市公司的投资不足,提高公司投资效率;同时,在我国较好的法律环境地区,高质量审计能够有效减少上市公司投资不足和抑制上市公司的投资过度,从而提高公司投资效率。     

区域金融发展对企业投资效率的影响

基于中国情境探讨区域金融发展水平对企业投资效率的影响及其作用机制意义重大。基于2005—2021年我国A股上市公司年度数据和区域金融发展水平数据,分析地区金融发展水平对企业投资效率的影响,得到以下结论：①区域金融发展水平能够通过缓解企业融资约束显著促进企业投资效率提升,且这一结论具有稳健性;②区域金融发展水平对“投资不足”企业和“投资过度”企业的投资效率均具有显著促进作用,但这种促进作用具有明显的异质性,对东部和中部地区、行业竞争能力越强以及股权较为集中企业的促进作用更大;③经济政策不确定性在区域金融发展促进企业投资效率过程中起到负向调节作用。     

投资效率与政府改革

我国经济在高速发展的同时，经济资源大量消耗和漏失现象日益严重，不解决这个问题，转变增长方式，保证持续发展，维护社会和谐的目标是难以实现的；国有经济能否有效运作，关键在于政府。必须通过政府改革，解决政府自身的运作方式和机制问题，例如重新界定政府职能、建立制度规则、公开政府工作、引进社会监督等，这是保证经济持续发展和杜会长期稳定和谐的重中之重。     

银行贷款、管理者投资行为与公司投资效率

本文从我国制度背景出发,以管理者投资行为和银行贷款行为作为理论基础,检验银行贷款对公司投资效率的影响。研究发现:在整个样本考察期间(2002～2009年),若没获得银行贷款,国有和非国有公司都存在投资不足。获得贷款后,国有公司的投资状况与无贷款时相比发生显著变化,出现过度投资,但非国有公司的改变并不显著,且无显著的过度投资。在金融危机期间(2008～2009年),国有公司获得贷款后出现过度投资,且程度显著高于整个样本期间的平均水平。非国有公司获得贷款后却没有出现过度投资,但没获得贷款时的投资不足程度比整个样本期间更为严重。本文解释了近几年我国大部分国企大规模投资,民企却普遍出现投资不足的现象,并对评估金融危机间银行信贷扩张的实际效应提供理论参考。     

Flight to Quality in International Markets: Investors’ Demand for Financial Reporting Quality during Political Uncertainty Events

We examine whether international equity mutual fund managers shift their portfolios toward stocks with higher financial reporting quality (FRQ) during periods of high political uncertainty. Our study is motivated by two primary factors. First, prior research shows evidence of fund managers’ “flight to quality” (e.g., to less risky securities) during periods of uncertainty. Second, recent theoretical research concludes that stocks with higher FRQ are assessed as less sensitive to systematic risk (such as political uncertainty). We employ national elections as exogenous increases in systematic risk in the local markets and accordingly use an international sample of mutual funds that focus on local markets. We find that mutual fund managers shift their equity holdings to stocks with higher FRQ during election periods when political uncertainty is higher. Such a flight‐to‐quality effect is less pronounced for elections with larger expected electoral margins in the pre‐election period (i.e., when the incumbent is more likely to win the election) and for countries with higher transactions costs. In contrast, the effect is more pronounced when governments have greater involvement in the local economy. Our inferences are robust to alternative proxies for political uncertainty and FRQ and to numerous other sensitivity analyses.     

名人CEO与企业投资效率

本文以 2006 年至 2013 年获得 CCTV、福布斯中国、第一财经频道、财富中国、华夏时报五大权威媒体评选出的各类最佳商业奖项的 CEO 为研究样本,实证检验了名人 CEO 对企业投资效率的影响。研究发现,名人身份将会带来企业投资效率的提升,且主要通过抑制投资过度发挥积极作用,支持了“身份控制假说”。这一效应在控制内生性和样本自选择偏误后依然成立。进一步分析发现,“身份控制效应”仅在媒体曝光度高、男性名人 CEO 与自信程度低的样本组成立。此外,本文的实证结果还表明,多次获奖或连续获奖并不影响名人身份对企业非效率投资的抑制作用,且连续获奖会进一步强化“身份控制效应”。本文的研究结论对于企业选聘名人 CEO、提升投资水平具有一定的指导意义。     

提高投资效率，促进经济稳定发展

中国的经济发展特别是近年的经济增长表现为明显的投资依赖，投资率不断攀高，经济发展中积累的矛盾与风险逐步显性化。鉴于目前中国经济的发展阶段，未来一段时间中国将继续保持较高的投资率。投资率过高无疑存在一定问题，但更关键的问题是投资效率低下。为达致投资与经济发展的良性互动，深化体制改革特别是政府体制改革是基础，同时要切实改变重“硬”轻“软”的投资理念，加大科技教育等“软”投资力度，为经济的可持续发展创造条件，同时，化解投资领域的问题也应注重投资与消费的协调。     

中国投资率与投资效率的国际比较及启示

中国的投资率一直较高，现已达到了改革开放以来的最高水平，几乎是世界平均投资率的两倍。与东亚地区的日、韩等出现过经济起飞的经济体相比，中国投资率的峰值超过了日本、韩国和台湾地区在其高增长时期曾经达到的峰值，与泰国和马来西亚相近，而高投资率持续的时间则远超这些经济体。中国目前的实际增量资本-产出比已接近泰国、马来西亚、印尼和韩国在东亚金融危机爆发前的水平，表明随着投资率的过度上升，宏观投资效率在降低，金融风险在增加。中国应进一步采取宏观调控措施，抑制投资率的过度上升。     

大美临沂的“红管家”——记临沂市财政投资评审

＂人人都说沂蒙山好,沂蒙山上好风光＂。临沂是全国著名革命老区,曾经为新中国的解放事业做出了巨大贡献。如今,156平方公里的主城区和年交易额700多亿元的大市场,共同撑起一个鲁南苏北＂区域性特大中心城市＂的雏型。