The frequency and magnitude of earnings management in China

Earnings management is an indicator of the corporate governance quality and investor protection standard. We study the frequencies and magnitudes of earnings management under two different thresholds, zero earnings and prior earnings, in the Chinese market from 1997 to 2004. We model earnings as a mixed-normal distribution and obtain parameter estimators that measure the frequency and magnitude of earnings management. We show that the practice of earnings management has gone up both in frequency and magnitude during the post-2000 period. We also find that the frequency and magnitude of earnings management are higher when firms try to avoid negative earnings than when firms try to report earnings increase. Our findings reflect the current economic environment in China and caution investors on the low-disclosure quality in the Chinese stock market.     

中国上市公司盈余管理的频率与幅度

盈余管理频率和幅度是投资者保护程度在现实经济中的具体体现。然而,已有文献在盈余管理频率或者幅度方面所提供的证据还远远不足以揭示客观事实。本文运用所有研究样本的报告盈余信息,通过假设报告盈余服从混合正态分布,运用参数估计的方法对阈值处的盈余管理频率和幅度进行推断。研究结论表明,中国上市公司从1995年至2003年间都存在为避免报告亏损而进行的盈余管理。1996年、1997年以及2001年至2003年的盈余管理频率和幅度较高,并且2001年至2003年逐年呈上升趋势。2001年至2003年平均有64·4%的亏损公司在阈值0点上进行盈余管理并达到避免报告亏损的目的,平均盈余管理幅度为提高ROA数据0·065。研究还发现2001年至2003年期间的盈余管理更加具有隐蔽性。     

负盈余之信息内涵——以台湾上市公司为例

Hayn（1995）研究亏损公司的信息内涵时发现,当公司报导的盈余在某水准之上时,盈余与公司价值间会存在高度相关;当公司报导的盈余在某水准之下时,盈余与公司价值间的相关性趋近于零。过去文献大多强调负盈余公司较无信息内涵,依据Hayn（1995）的研究,在检视盈余与股票报酬时,样本中加入负盈余公司样本,会使盈余与股票报酬间的关系变得薄弱,此因投资人将负盈余视为暂时现象,投资人若不愿意承受企业有负盈余情况时,则可以随时将公司清算。但由于负盈余公司不一定执行清算选择权,使得负盈余可能是暂时现象,也有可能会持续发生。本研究通过探讨暂昤陆负盈余公司与持续性负盈余公司的信息内涵,结果显示暂时性负盈余公司较持续性负盈余公司具信息内涵。     

Analysis of Earnings Management in Chinese Listed Companies

This paper collect earnings management activities for 698 listed companies on the Shanghai Stock Exchange, and the purpose is to test whether Chinese companies use real activities such as asset sales, purchase, exchange and equity sales or purchase to manage earnings to meet or exceed CSRC regulatory thresholds. But we do not observe significant difference in the frequency of earnings management activities. However, with weak evidence, these firms report larger income-increasing contributions to current year earnings from earnings management activities to meet or exceed important thresholds.     

盈余管理程度的估计模型与经验证据:一个综述

盈余管理是一个与投资者保护和会计准则制定紧密相关的重要问题,它已经成为会计乃至金融、经济领域的重要研究课题。要研究在经济上具有意义的盈余管理,其前提是估计盈余管理的程度。本文对盈余管理程度的估计方法及其相应的经验证据进行评述,文献评述结果表明,非预期应计利润模型能够估计出单个公司的盈余管理程度,但它无法估计经济上具有意义的盈余管理程度;盈余分布法是目前估计盈余管理程度的核心方法,它能够估计出整体上的盈余管理程度,但它假设真实盈余分布是光滑的。盈余管理程度估计的未来研究,需要剔除盈余指标选择以及标准化方法选择等因素的影响,解决在同时存在多个阈值情况下不同阈值之间相互关联的影响问题,并放宽模型的假设或者给假设提供直接的证据。     

资本市场开放与企业真实盈余管理——基于“陆港通”的经验证据

资本市场开放不仅是扩大国际融资、更好地利用国际金融市场的需要,而且对我国资本市场发育和上市公司行为具有多重外部治理效应。本文借助我国内地与香港资本市场互联互通机制这一准自然实验,研究资本市场开放对企业真实盈余管理的影响。研究发现:(1)总体上,“陆港通”机制的实施显著降低了标的公司真实盈余管理程度。(2)委托代理问题是企业进行盈余管理的重要原因,而“陆港通”机制开通后,能够缓解标的公司代理矛盾,进而约束管理层的真实盈余管理行为。(3)当资本市场信息环境改善、管理层面临较大股票抛售压力以及大股东监督力度较强时,“陆港通”抑制企业真实盈余管理行为的治理效果更强。本文结果表明,资本市场开放有助于提高我国上市公司财务信息披露质量及公司治理水平。     

资本市场开放与企业真实盈余管理——基于“陆港通”的经验证据

资本市场开放不仅是扩大国际融资、更好地利用国际金融市场的需要,而且对我国资本市场发育和上市公司行为具有多重外部治理效应。本文借助我国内地与香港资本市场互联互通机制这一准自然实验,研究资本市场开放对企业真实盈余管理的影响。研究发现:(1)总体上,“陆港通”机制的实施显著降低了标的公司真实盈余管理程度。(2)委托代理问题是企业进行盈余管理的重要原因,而“陆港通”机制开通后,能够缓解标的公司代理矛盾,进而约束管理层的真实盈余管理行为。(3)当资本市场信息环境改善、管理层面临较大股票抛售压力以及大股东监督力度较强时,“陆港通”抑制企业真实盈余管理行为的治理效果更强。本文结果表明,资本市场开放有助于提高我国上市公司财务信息披露质量及公司治理水平。     

多元化经营、企业价值与收益波动研究——以中国上市公司为例的实证研究

本文指出,马里斯关于企业利润与增长之间存在负相关关系的前提假设不适应于我国上市公司,对处于经济转轨时期的中国上市公司而言,增长与利润之间的关系可能表现出新的特征.本文的研究表明,我国上市公司的多元化对企业价值具有正效应,多元化经营可以提高企业的价值;企业的多元化对企业收益的波动具有负效应,即多元化降低了企业收益的波动程度;没有明显的迹象表明,我国上市公司的多元化经营与绩效关系之间的拐点已经出现.本研究在一定程度上解释了现阶段我国上市公司为什么普遍采取多元化经营这一模式的动机.     

Directors network centrality and earnings quality

This study examines whether firms with network central boards of directors behave differently from other firms in terms of financial reporting quality. We find that earnings quality among firms is low when board networks are channels of incorrect information transmission (including earnings management information) and for firms whose directors are awarded equity-based compensation have connections through boardroom networks, but earnings quality is better for firms with good performance in spite of their networks. These results are robust to controlling for firm information environment, growth, size, age, leverage, performance, volatility in firm operations, and corporate governance.     

The supply of and demand for accounting information

The article analyzes the use of accounting information in Russia. We assess reporting behaviour in the lending process for a sample of Russian companies in the years 1999–2004 and postulate that Russian companies manage their earnings in order to avoid showing losses when applying for bank financing. Once a credit has been granted, companies are predicted to manage earnings because of the bank's monitoring activities. By means of univariate and multivariate analysis we are able to attribute the discontinuity around a zero target in the earnings distribution with firms’ response to the banks’ assessment of accounting performance. This implies that financing considerations affect the reporting incentives of Russian companies.     

The relations among accounting conservatism,institutional investors and earnings manipulation

Most scholars have indicated corporations using accounting conservatism to reduce earnings manipulation, although certain scholars believe that firms have more incentive to increase earnings manipulation. Institutional investors play an important external monitoring role, and affect firm's earnings manipulation. Previous studies adopted accruals as an earnings manipulation proxy to detect the relationship among accounting conservatism, institutional investor shareholdings, and earnings manipulation. We further investigate the relationship among accounting conservatism, institutional investor shareholdings, and earnings manipulation by using Benford's law. Our results indicate that firms with more conservative financial reporting have less probability of engaging in earnings-manipulative activities. We also find the negative association between earnings management and institutional investor shareholdings. However, if corporate financial statements tend toward conservatism, institutional investor shareholdings could increase managers' incentive to manage earnings. Our findings have important implications for investors to make investment decisions.     

Main banks’ influence on financial reporting quality in Japan

This study investigated main banks’ influence on the quality of accounting firms’ audits and corporate firms’ earnings, focusing on companies on Japan’s Nikkei 500 index. We posed three questions in this research study about main banks’ influence on corporate clients’ earnings management. First, does a weakened main bank relationship influence corporate clients’ financial reporting quality? Second, does Japan’s firewall deregulation influence firms’ earnings quality? Finally, does the relationship between accounting firms and main banks affect client firms’ earnings quality? Our main findings were that main banks are not related to client firms’ earnings management; however, main banks mitigate client firms’ earnings management after firewall deregulation. On the other hand, firewall deregulation does motivate firms to manipulate their earnings management. Finally, using Pong and Kita’s (2006) study as a framework, we found that main banks and client firms using the same accounting firms had no influence on earnings management. Based on these evidences presented, our findings suggest that the quality of corporate clients’ financial reporting changes before and after firewall deregulation.     

盈余管理、股权再融资与公司业绩表现*

在公司股权结构集中的情况下，控股股东实施盈余管理并进行股权再融资后会引起公司利润回调，并可能对公司长期经营能力造成影响。本文以沪深两市实施股权再融资的A股上市公司为样本，研究发现盈余管理导致公司股权再融资后业绩下降。进一步地，在热发市场中公司实施盈余管理的幅度更大，引起股票错误定价的程度更高，导致股权再融资后会计业绩和市场业绩下滑的作用更为明显。此外，在发生控股股东股权稀释的公司中，盈余管理引起公司股权再融资后业绩下降的程度更为严重，这表明控股股东利用股价高估的“机会窗口”侵占外部投资者利益的动机非常强烈。     

Outsourcing of accounting tasks and tax management: evidence from a corporate tax rate change

The aim of this article is to investigate if small firms react to a national corporate tax rate reduction by managing their taxable income. In contrast to previous studies, we also analyse whether outsourcing of accounting tasks affects the magnitude of the reaction. Based on a sample of Finnish firms and measures of earnings management, evidence is provided that firms with an internalized accounting function are more active tax planners in this context. This study suggests that outsourcing of accounting tasks increases the corporate tax reporting quality.     

The asymmetric relationship between executive earnings management and compensation: a panel threshold regression approach

Prior research shows that chief executive officers (CEOs) are rewarded for their earnings management. We re-examine this issue using a panel threshold regression approach, which allows the effect of earnings management on the CEO compensation to change across the level of earnings management and CEO compensation. Our results show that the effect of CEOs’ discretionary accounting choices on their compensation is not homogeneous across various degrees of earnings management and compensation. In particular, for firms with moderate (inordinate) levels of earnings management and CEO compensation, earnings management is rewarded (penalized).     

机构投资者持股和会计盈余质量

本文从会计盈余质量的角度来研究机构投资者(’在公司治理中的作用。我们从盈余管理程度、盈余信息含量和盈余稳健性等三个方面来衡量会计盈余的质量。三方面的研究结果显示,机构投资者持股有助于改善会计盈余的质量:机构投资者持股公司的会计盈余质量显著高于其他公司,并且会计盈余的质量随着机构投资者持股比例的增加而增加。进一步研究发现,机构投资者还能够缓解大股东对会计盈余信息含量的恶化,起到一定的制衡作用。本文的研究表明,机构投资者能够在一定程度上改善上市公司的盈余质量,其快速成长有助于公司治理结构的改善,也有助于资本市场信息披露环境的良性发展。     

FDI spillovers in new EU member states

Using an unbalanced panel of firm‐level data in Bulgaria, Poland and Romania, we examine the impact of foreign firms on domestic firms’ productivity. In particular, we try to answer the following research questions: (1) Are there any spillover effects of foreign direct investments (FDI), and if so, are they positive or negative? (2) Are spillover effects more likely to occur within or across sectors? (3) Are the existence, the direction and the magnitude of spillovers conditioned by sector and firm‐specific characteristics? Our findings show that FDI spillovers exist both within and across sectors. The former arise when foreign firms operate in labour‐intensive sectors, while the latter occur when foreign firms operate in high‐tech sectors. Moreover, we find that domestic firm size conditions the exploitation of FDI spillovers even after controlling for absorptive capacity. We also detect a great deal of heterogeneity across countries consistent with the technology gap hypothesis.     

The propensity to hedge using futures contracts: the case of potato futures contracts

This paper studies why UK non-financial firms hedge with potato futures contracts. It is found that the financial characteristics of firms in the sample play an important role in influencing the propensity to hedge. For example, it is found that firms that hedge are on average larger than firms that do not hedge. Firms that hedge also have more volatile earnings. Furthermore, firms that do hedge appear to want to smooth earnings to reduce the costs of financial distress and avoid entering the highest tax threshold.     

公允价值计量模式下的会计政策选择——基于上市公司交叉持股的实证研究

本文以2007年交叉持股上市公司为研究样本,考察了在公允价值计量模式下,公司如何利用股票投资的会计政策选择管理盈余,从而实现其特定目的。实证结果表明,2007年除股票投资外的盈余增幅越高,公司越倾向将股票投资计入不继续增加当期盈余的会计科目,以实现盈余平滑;而短期偿债能力低的公司,更倾向将其股票投资计入不影响流动比率和损益的会计科目,以避免偿债能力和盈余水平的波动;2006年业绩亏损的公司,为避免连续亏损更倾向在2007年年报中将股票投资计入增加当期盈余的会计科目,以实现扭亏;而处于受管制行业的公司,则规避披露较多盈余。     

强制性会计变更与自发性会计变更之相关性研究

研究结果表明，我国强制性会计变更与自发性会计变更具有相关性。在强制性会计变更为调减利润的年度，我国自发性会计变更部分抵消了强制性会计变更的影响；具有特殊目的的上市公司会逆当年强制性会计变更方向而进行能实现其特定目的的自发性会计变更。