The cyclical effect of default risk on industrial bond yields

This paper examines the determinants of default-risk premiums and the ways in which they change over the business cycle. Seven default-risk factors are constructed from a large number of financial ratio/accounting variables. Factor scores summarizing these variables for a sample of industrial corporations are regressed with bond risk premiums for all years from 1971 to 1977—a complete business cycle. A second sample covering the years 1975 to 1977 is also examined. The main conclusion is that the cyclical movement of business conditions influences investors' assessments of default risk. Bonds issued in periods of economic normalcy have premiums that are significantly associated with earnings instability in addition to sales and size factors. By contrast, firms issuing bonds during recessionary climates must have relatively greater size and profitability to obtain funding at lower-interest costs. Firms with higher sales turnover ratios and, therefore, greater earnings instability with respect to economic downswings, are less likely to issue debt securities during depressed business conditions.     

诉讼风险、审计师选择与盈余质量

本文分析诉讼风险对企业审计师选择决策的影响及其经济后果.检验发现,面临更高诉讼风险的企业,选择高质量审计师的概率越低.同时,高诉讼风险企业披露的盈余信息质量显著更差.但是,如果高诉讼风险企业选择了高质量审计师,那么诉讼风险对盈余质量不再具有显著影响.这表明,高质量审计师能有效缓解诉讼风险对盈余质量的消极效应,提升高诉讼企业的信息披露质量.上述结论为诉讼风险的经济后果提供了新的解释,也进一步丰富和拓展了有关审计师选择决策影响因素的研究.     

Buy,Lie, or Die: An Investigation of Chinese ST Firms’ Voluntary Interim Audit Motive and Auditor Independence

In the Chinese stock market, special treatment (ST) firms are the firms listed as facing imminent danger of delisting, unless they return to profitability after reporting two consecutive annual losses. Some ST firms voluntarily pay substantial fees to their external auditors to conduct interim audits, which are not required by regulations. In this study, we investigate and find that ST firms that pay for voluntary interim audits report greater discretionary accrued earnings, higher non-operating earnings, and higher returns on assets in ensuing annual reports. As a result, these firms are more likely to return to profitability and reduce their delisting risk. Our results, which contribute to the current debate on auditor independence, appear to be consistent with the possibility that ST firms “buy” external auditors’ cooperation to manipulate earnings when faced with the threat of delisting.     

Valuation uncertainty,home and host market uncertainty,and cross-border seasoned equity offerings

This study examines how market timing can affect host market reaction to cross-border seasoned equity offerings (SEOs), an event generally viewed unfavorably by investors. We assume that firms engage in market timing in response to valuation uncertainty (VU), home market uncertainty (HMU) and/or host market uncertainty (HSU), and that raising capital abroad faces higher scrutiny costs and familiarity bias from host market investors. We conjecture that timing strategies provide signals that vary in strength to host market investors and that dual-timing strategies may strengthen an existing signal. Our hypotheses are tested on a sample of 190 cross-border SEOs that were issued on the U.S. stock market between 1990 and 2017 by firms from 29 countries. Using event study methodology, we find that market timing based on VU is negatively related to host market valuation and that a dual-timing strategy with HMU or HSU generally produces a stronger signal. Our results have practical relevance for stock markets that suffer from high uncertainty; we estimate that a high VU firm with a $1 billion valuation suffers a drop of $31.3 million in market valuation during a high host market uncertainty (high HSU) compared with low host market uncertainty (low HSU).     

Auditor Experiences,Accounting Firm Size,and Client Ownership

This study investigates whether accounting firms match the experience level of individual auditors with the risk level of clients in order to control audit risk. We find that accounting firms tend to assign more experienced auditors to non-state-owned clients that typically have higher tendency to engage in earnings management. Such an assignment pattern is more pronounced for non-Big 4 accounting firms. Further analysis suggests that auditors＇ experience helps reduce clients＇ earnings management level, proxied by abnormal accruals, and thus improves the audit quality. This study enriches the literature on the allocation of human resources and the risk control mechanism in the audit services industry, which has been seldom explored in prior studies.     

Unemployment governance,labour cost and earnings management: Evidence from China

This study investigates the effect of labour cost on earnings management based on the panel data of listed firms in China. We use the average wage of employees in firm level as the proxy for labour cost. Firms with rising labour cost become more likely to engage in negative earnings management to conceal profits or report losses. The effect becomes more significant in state-owned enterprises, labour-intensive enterprises, firms in high unemployment-rate regions and firms with political connections. Further research finds that, under the institutional background of Chinese unemployment governance, firms get more government subsidies and tax preferences and reduce the excessive employment through negative earnings management. To a certain extent, this weakens the policy effect of unemployment governance. Overall, our conclusions are meaningful to the reform of unemployment governance, the standardisation of earnings management behaviour, the improvement of the government subsidy policies and the improvement of the efficiency of public resource allocation.     

Earnings persistence,fundamentals, and anticipation of breaking earnings strings

Using a sample of firms with consecutive earnings growth for more than 20 quarters (earnings strings), I assess the relationship between earnings persistence and the extent to which investors are able to anticipate breaks of earnings strings. I find that firm‐specific earnings persistence exhibits a concave trend during earnings strings. Stock returns are significantly and positively associated with earnings persistence. Upon breaks of earnings strings, investors’ reactions are more negative for firms with higher earnings persistence—especially those with smaller institutional holdings and analyst coverage, and those with insider selling activities—before the break. Additional analyses show that variations in firms’ economic performance (fundamentals) explain the varying earnings persistence during earnings strings. Copyright © 2015 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Real earnings management and the cost of new corporate bonds

We examine the association between real earnings management and the cost of new bond issues of U.S. corporations. We consider three types of real earnings management: sales manipulation, overproduction, and the abnormal reduction of discretionary expenditures. We find that overproduction impairs credit ratings and that sales manipulation and overproduction are associated with higher bond yield spreads. Overall, our results imply that credit rating agencies and bondholders perceive real earnings management as a credit risk-increasing factor and thus require high risk premiums.     

Examining Determinants of Foreign Wage Premiums in China

We estimate foreign wage premiums for every 3‐digit manufacturing industry in China and discover a wide range of premiums both for ‘foreign’ ownership and for overseas Chinese ownership. Foreign ownership generates larger and more prevalent wage premiums than overseas Chinese ownership, but both produce premiums that respond similarly in estimates of determinants. Using the number of computers per worker to measure firms' technology levels, we find evidence consistent with the hypothesis that foreign firms pay higher wages to reduce the risk of worker turnover and the accompanying technology leakage in 76 to 78 per cent of industries. However, this determinant explains only 5 to 6 per cent of the foreign wage premium. We find the most intensive support for the ‘fair wage’ hypothesis that foreign firms pay higher wages because they are more profitable than domestic firms and workers in more profitable firms expect to be paid more, otherwise they will shirk. This hypothesis explains an average of 8 to 9 per cent of the foreign wage premiums, with support found in 72 to 75 per cent of the industries. When we consider the best combination of explanatory variables to include in each industry's wage regression, we find evidence consistent with our combined hypotheses in most industries, but we still find large residual foreign wage premiums.     

Audit quality in common-law and code-law emerging markets: Evidence on earnings conservatism, agency costs and cost of equity

This study focuses on firms that are audited by a big auditor and examines the differentiation in the earnings management potential and the level of conservatism. It also investigates whether being audited by a big auditor would lead to lower agency costs and lower cost of equity. The study focuses on emerging common-law South Africa and code-law Brazil, and seeks to identify whether there are material differences given their dissimilar institutional characteristics. The study reports that even though firms may be audited by high quality auditors, their institutional differences influence significantly firms' earnings conservatism, agency costs and cost of equity. Client firms of big auditors in both common-law South Africa and code-law Brazil exhibit lower discretionary accruals. The study has found evidence of more conservative earnings for South Africa but insufficient levels for Brazil. For common-law South Africa, the presence of effective corporate governance mechanisms reduces agency costs. For code-law Brazil, the corporate governance mechanisms generally display an insignificant impact on reducing agency costs. For common-law South Africa, firm-level performance, growth and market determinants tend to lead to a lower cost of equity. For code-law Brazil, it is found that significant discretionary accruals, market beta and analyst forecast dispersion would result in higher uncertainty and would consequently raise the cost of equity.     

盈余管理的诱导因素分析与控制

当华尔街的会计造假事件愈演愈烈的时候,人们对盈余管理、以及与盈余管理相关的“利润操纵”、“会计造假”给予了极大的关注。实际上对盈余管理的理解犹如一个硬币的两面,是管理层对付不确定性和增加个人效用的手段。盈余管理的产生不是偶然的,是多种因素的合力诱导的结果,既有管理层的内在动因,又有外部激励。然而恶意的盈余管理不但影响到会计信息的质量,甚至过度扭曲了有关会计数据,使会计信息严重背离了企业的真实价值。为了提高会计信息的质量,保护财务报告使用者的利益,促进我国市场经济健康发展,要采取有效的措施降低管理层的恶意的盈余管理行为对企业财务信息披露的影响。     

The path-to-profitability of Internet IPO firms

Extant empirical evidence indicates that the proportion of firms going public prior to achieving profitability has been increasing over time. This phenomenon is largely driven by an increase in the proportion of technology firms going public. Since there is considerable uncertainty regarding the long-term economic viability of these firms at the time of going public, identifying factors that influence their ability to attain key post-IPO milestones such as achieving profitability represents an important area of research. We employ a theoretical framework built around agency and signaling considerations to identify factors that influence the probability and timing of post-IPO profitability of Internet IPO firms. We estimate Cox Proportional Hazards models to test whether factors identified by our theoretical framework significantly impact the probability of post-IPO profitability as a function of time. We find that the probability of post-IPO profitability increases with pre-IPO investor demand and change in ownership at the IPO of the top officers and directors. On the other hand, the probability of post-IPO profitability decreases with the venture capital participation, proportion of outsiders on the board, and pre-market valuation uncertainty.     

The Effect of Timeliness and Credit Ratings on the Information Content of Earnings Announcements

This paper investigates the impact of timeliness and credit ratings on the information content of the earnings announcements of Greek listed firms from 2001 to 2008. Using the classical event study methodology and regression analysis, we find that firms tend to release good news on time and are inclined to delay the release of bad news. We also provide evidence that the level of corporate risk differentiates the information content of earnings according to the credit rating category. Specifically, firms displaying high creditworthiness enjoy positive excess returns on earnings announcement dates. In contrast, firms with low creditworthiness undergo significant share price erosions on earnings announcement days. We also observe a substitution effect between timeliness and credit ratings in relation to the information content of earnings announcements. Specifically, we find that as the credit category of earnings-announcing firms improves, the informational role of timeliness is mitigated.     

Do firms manipulate earnings after winning public-private partnership bids? Evidence from China

We examine whether firms manipulate their reported earnings after winning investment project bids. China's adoption of the public-private partnership (PPP) provides a unique setting for our analysis. Using the PPP announcements to identify the firms participating in PPP projects, we find that firms conduct both accrual-based and real earnings management after PPP participation. Our findings survive difference-in-differences design with different matching methods. We document that PPP-participating firms have strong incentives to manipulate earnings because of abnormal administrative expenditure and greater short-term performance pressure than non-PPP-participating firms. The auditors respond by charging higher audit fees due to the increased risk. Moreover, government subsidies relieve performance pressure and decrease the likelihood of earnings management among PPP-participating firms. Overall, this study documents the unintended consequences of PPP participation.     

The impact of target CEO celebrity on M&A premiums

We examine the influence of target-CEO celebrity on the premium paid by bidders using information asymmetry, uncertainty, and resource-based-view perspectives. Studies suggest that CEOs and their firms can suffer from a “burden of celebrity” if they fail to meet heightened performance expectations. We hypothesize that bidders acquire targets led by celebrity CEOs (those who garner significant and widespread media attention) with lower premiums because bidders react to market overvaluation. We also argue that celebrity CEOs who leave post-merger drive premiums even lower because they take their potential integration value with them. A six-year sample of US-based M&A transactions supports our hypotheses.     

The effect of voluntary and mandatory corporate social responsibility on earnings management: Evidence from India and the 2% rule

Utilizing the natural experiment presented by India's Companies Act of 2013, this paper investigates the relationship between corporate social responsibility (CSR) engagement and earnings management. India's Act includes provisions designed to improve governance and financial audits, as well as a unique mandate requiring firms that satisfy size or profitability criteria to spend a minimum of 2% of reported income on CSR initiatives. We examine the earnings management behavior of firms that voluntarily reported CSR expenditures prior to the Act's implementation as well as those firms that began to report CSR spending as a consequence of the mandate. Results indicate that firms which voluntarily reported CSR expenditures before the Act also engaged in more earnings management than other firms, consistent with CSR being used manipulatively in the pre-Act period. Once the Act was in effect, evidence indicates that on average firms engaged in less earnings management. However, the results suggest the CSR mandate did not have a significant marginal impact on earnings manipulations, implying that the observed decrease in earnings management in the post-Act period was primarily due to other provisions of the Act, such as those related to corporate governance.     

Gender differences and managerial earnings forecast bias: Are female executives less overconfident than male executives?

This study examines whether firms with female executives forecast company earnings more conservatively. Consistent with the selectivity hypothesis, the results reveal firms with female CEOs tend to make conservative earnings forecasts in a perceived positive situation and firms with a higher percentage of female directors on the board are more likely to forecast earnings conservatively in a perceived negative situation. The conservativeness of female executives is not caused by lower management ability. This conservative behavior is not caused by personal factors such as military status, level of education, or area of study.     

Mandatory Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Reporting and Financial Reporting Quality: Evidence from a Quasi-Natural Experiment

This study examines the impact of mandatory Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) reporting on firms’ financial reporting quality using a quasi-natural experiment in China that mandates a subset of firms to report their CSR activities starting in 2008. We find that mandatory CSR disclosure firms constrain earnings management after the policy. The result is robust to a battery of sensitivity tests and more prominent for firms with lower analyst coverage. Further analyses reveal that upward earnings management by mandatory disclosure firms is more likely to be caught after the policy. The findings suggest that mandatory CSR disclosure mitigates information asymmetry by improving financial reporting quality.     

Acquisition of Market Information,Returns to Scale and the Viability of Competitive Equilibrium

In this paper the economies of scale arising from the acquisition of costly information and their implications for the existence of a competitive equilibrium are investigated. As is known, the existence of economies in the scale of production undermines the possibility of a competitive equilibrium. This paper demonstrates that this kind of problem arises when firms face market uncertainty, i.e. in competitive markets, uncertainty about the price of production factors or about the price of output. It is shown that, under these circumstances, firms have incentives to purchase market information, i.e. information capable of reducing price uncertainty. In turn, the acquisition of costly information generates economies of scale that prevent the occurrence of a competitive equilibrium, unless such increasing returns to scale are tamed by the decreasing utility of uncertain returns due to risk aversion, or—in the short run—by increasing marginal costs of production.     

Earnings Quality in Private SMEs: Do CEO Demographics Matter?

This study investigates the impact of CEO demographics on earnings quality for private SMEs. Using a 2012 sample of 30,476 French firms, we first find strong empirical support for a gender effect: female‐run firms engage in less earnings management than do male‐run firms. This result is consistent with female CEOs being more risk averse than their male counterparts are when making financial decisions. Second, CEO age is negatively correlated with the magnitude of discretionary accruals, and the relationship between gender and earnings quality is stronger for older CEOs. Overall, our findings suggest that CEO demographics affect the quality of accounting information.