Regional growth and finance in Europe: Is there a quality effect of bank efficiency?

In this study, we test whether regional growth in 11 European countries depends on financial development and suggest the use of cost- and profit-efficiency estimates as quality measures of financial institutions. Contrary to the usual quantitative proxies of financial development, the quality of financial institutions is measured in this study as the relative ability of banks to intermediate funds. An improvement in bank efficiency spurs five times more regional growth then an identical increase in credit does. More credit provided by efficient banks exerts an independent growth effect in addition to direct quantity and quality channel effects.     

On the prediction of financial distress in developed and emerging markets: Does the choice of accounting and market information matter? A comparison of UK and Indian Firms

We examine differences in price delay for a sample of real estate investment trust (REIT) and non-REIT matched pairs. Results suggest an economically and statistically higher level of price delay for REIT securities, which implies heightened frictions that increase the time needed for new information to be impounded into the prices of REIT shares. The primary drivers for the observed delay differential include differences in idiosyncratic volatility, market risk, and the number of days traded. Within-REIT determinants of delay confirm findings for the pooled sample of matched pairs. Importantly, we infer find that REIT investors are not compensated for restricted information flow, as excess returns are unrelated to the price delay.     

A Standard setter’s framework for selecting between fair value and historical cost measurement attributes: a basis for discussion of “Does fair value accounting for nonfinancial assets pass the market test?”

This paper describes an income-statement-focused framework for selecting between between the fair value and historical cost measurement attributes that differs from the balance-sheet-focused relevance versus reliability tradeoff perspective that is common to most academic research. This income-statement-focused framework is then applied to the Christensen and Nikolaev setting in Rev Account Stud 18(3), (2013) to suggest that most of the study’s findings are not surprising and can be explained by differences in the income-relevance of fair value and historical cost measures for nonfinancial assets rather than issues with the reliability of fair value measurements, which is the perspective taken by the authors. The paper closes by suggesting additional research on the use of fair value and historical cost measures for nonfinancial assets that would be most relevant to current standard-setting activities of the Financial Accounting Standards Board.