SFAS 133 and income smoothing via discretionary accruals: The role of hedge effectiveness and market volatility

This study investigates whether the Statement of Financial Accounting Standard No. 133 (SFAS 133) influences firms’ income smoothing via discretionary accruals decisions. Moreover, we investigate whether the level of hedge effectiveness and market volatility affects the impact of SFAS 133 on firms’ income smoothing via discretionary accruals decisions. Consistent with our predictions, we find a significant increase in income smoothing via discretionary accruals activity after the adoption of SFAS 133. We also find that income smoothing via discretionary accruals after the adoption of SFAS 133 increases with the level of hedge ineffectiveness. By contrast, we find that perfect hedgers do not engage in more income smoothing via discretionary accruals after the adoption of SFAS 133. Finally, we find that the higher the market volatility is the larger the income smoothing is via discretionary accruals after the adoption of SFAS 133. This implies that higher market volatility makes it more difficult for firms to meet hedge accounting requirements, thereby increasing unmanaged earnings volatility and income smoothing. Prior studies suggest that regulators are expressing concern about the effect of earnings management on the quality of reported earnings and the functioning of capital markets (e.g., Barton, 2001 ). In this regard, our findings imply that accounting standard setters should take into account the trade‐off between transparency and income smoothing.     

金融工具会计准则交易税制设计的思考

为了规范金融工具的确认和计量,反映金融工具对金融机构财务状况和经营成果所带来的真实影响,揭示其潜在风险,提高金融机构的会计信息的质量,新颁布的金融工具会计准则采用公允价值计量,并将损益纳入当期损益。本文分析了此举对我国税制所产生的影响,并对金融工具交易的税制设计提出了设想。     

The Foreign Exchange Exposure Management Practices of Finnish Industrial Firms

This study employs questionnaire survey and financial accounting data to extend earlier empirical work on the foreign exchange (FX) exposure management practices of Finnish industrial firms. The paper concentrates on: (i) the form that FX corporate hedging policy takes; (ii) the control of FX procedures and trading; and, (iii) our respondents' perceptions about their ability to predict FX rate changes for hedging decisions. Our results indicate that the extent to which firms hedge FX exposure depends on the type of exposure and the form that FX hedging policy takes. Also, a significant number of the firms pursue FX hedging strategies on the expectation of attaining trading profits and this strategy appears to be accommodated within their FX policies. This feature is not explicitly demonstrated in previous studies. Finnish firms hedge a much higher proportion of both transaction and translation exposures compared to economic exposure. We partly attribute this emphasis to the requirements of the Finnish Accounting Act, which came into effect in 1993. The organisational, historical and financial settings of the firms also have significant impacts on exposure management practices. The overall implication of those results is that firms respond to changes in the financial, economic and regulatory environments in which they operate.     

Translation Exposure Hedging Post SFAS No. 52

Translation exposure hedging is frequently said to have begun after firms adopted SFAS No. 8 and assumed to have ceased–or at least decreased–after adoption of SFAS No. 52 due to different treatments of translation gains (losses). Based on proprietary data, this study presents evidence from a small sample of firms which would be predicted to cease hedging translation exposure, but of which the majority did not.
The study focuses on eighteen firms which exclude at least 50% and up to 100% of the translation gains (losses) from the income statement after adopting SFAS No. 52. Of those eighteen firms, only seven ceased hedging. The other eleven firms not only continued hedging translation exposure, but hedged translation exposure of only those subsidiaries whose translation gains (losses) are now excluded from the income statement.
Characteristics which might explain the different decision are investigated: proportion of assets which are nonmonetary; the proportion of net assets located abroad; the geographic dispersion of subsidiaries; and the estimated effect on the balance sheet and income statement of changing from the temporal method to the current rate method of translation.
Univariate test results indicate that the geographic dispersion of die foreign subsidiaries as well as the proportion of net assets located abroad differ significantly between firms which ceased hedging and those which continued hedging after adopting the standard. Weak evidence of differential effects of the change to the current rate method on individual firm income statements and of different composition of assets between the two groups also was found. Multivariate analysis, using a linear probability model as well as a randomization procedure, provided weak results corroborating the significance of the proportion of net foreign assets to consolidated assets in differentiating between firms which ceased hedging and those which continued.     

The Use of Forward Contracts for Hedging Currency Risk

This paper derives an optimal rule for hedging currency risk in a general utility framework. Ex ante hedging performance of the forward markets is examined using the optimal hedge ratio derived from the utility model and an optimal rule derived from another model (excess return per unit risk) suggested in the hedging literature. Results of this study indicate a naive (one-to-one) hedge performs similarly to the optimal hedge ratios under either model. An implication of this study is that financial managers of multinational firms should simply follow a one-to-one rule when hedging foreign exchange risk in the forward markets.     

金融资产配置、金融杠杆与现金流风险

金融资产会计安排是企业执行金融工具准则的重要环节,具有显著的经济后果。基于实体企业金融化现象,研究金融资产配置与现金流风险关系,分析金融杠杆的调节功能,探讨非效率资本配置的传导作用,研究发现：金融资产配置与现金流风险之间存在U型关系;金融杠杆能够调节金融资产配置与现金流风险的关系,使关系曲线拐点右移与扁平化。区分金融资产配置类型后发现：交易类金融资产与现金流风险呈U型关系;委托贷款等新兴金融资产负向影响现金流风险;投资性房地产和长期金融股权投资未显著影响现金流风险。考虑企业生命周期后发现,成长期与衰退期企业金融资产配置与现金流风险呈U型关系,成熟期企业金融资产配置负向影响现金流风险;按照产权性质分组检验发现,金融资产配置与现金流风险的关系以及金融杠杆的调节效应在非国有企业中更显著;机制检验发现,非效率资本配置在金融资产配置影响现金流风险的过程中发挥中介作用。     

Corporate income tax and futures hedging

Our research is motivated by the Corn Products vs. Arkansas Best Supreme Court decisions that pitched the controversy of the tax treatment of gains and losses from futures hedging. The use of futures contracts as risk management tools depends on the tax code. In this paper we address complications in the current tax code that allow for asymmetric offset: Ordinary losses can be applied against capital gains; however, capital losses cannot by applied against ordinary gains. Also we consider the issue of tax loss carryover. We investigate the optimal hedge ratios under these scenarios analytically where possible, and numerically where necessary. Michael Metz is an independent commodity market consultant.     

Asset specificity,capital intensity and capital structure: An empirical test

Capital investment and capital financing decisions interact. To resolve current controversies in investment-leverage-growth relationships requires an integrated industrial organization/financial economics empirical model of profit margins, capital investment intensity, leverage and risk. Using cumulative future losses in discontinued operations to measure the asset specificity of the firm's investments, empiricai results support a complementary (positive) relationship between debt and investment, the debt financing of verifiable contemporaneous growth, equity financing of future growth and the debt financing of specific assets. This evidence rejects the transactions cost theory of capital structure in Fortune 500 firms.     

浅析会计利润与应纳税所得额的差异

随着会计准则与税收法规的改革与国际协调,二者之间的关系逐渐倾向于分离模式,因而财务报告披露的会计利润与纳税申报的应纳税所得之间必然存在着与生俱来的差异。本文对这两者主要内容、差异的表现形式及处理方法进行了探讨。     

浅谈我国金融风险成因分析及会计防范措施

银行经营活动的运作过程,与会计工作十分密切,几乎每一笔业务都需要银行会计的核算与操作,防范金融风险的前提是防范银行会计风险。我国金融风险的成因有:商业银行的资产结构不合理,资产的盈利性及流动性差;金融机构采取粗放式经营方式,盲目扩张;金融机构内部管理松弛,运作不规范,约束机制不健全;银行自身风险意识差;中央银行的监管侧重于计划型和行政性、不适应市场经济。     

Quadratic hedging schemes for non-Gaussian GARCH models

We propose different schemes for option hedging when asset returns are modeled using a general class of GARCH models. More specifically, we implement local risk minimization and a minimum variance hedge approximation based on an extended Girsanov principle that generalizes Duan׳s (1995) delta hedge. Since the minimal martingale measure fails to produce a probability measure in this setting, we construct local risk minimization hedging strategies with respect to a pricing kernel. These approaches are investigated in the context of non-Gaussian driven models. Furthermore, we analyze these methods for non-Gaussian GARCH diffusion limit processes and link them to the corresponding discrete time counterparts. A detailed numerical analysis based on S&P 500 European call options is provided to assess the empirical performance of the proposed schemes. We also test the sensitivity of the hedging strategies with respect to the risk neutral measure used by recomputing some of our results with an exponential affine pricing kernel.     

An agent-based model for financial vulnerability

This study addresses a critical regulatory shortfall by developing a platform to extend stress testing from a microprudential approach to a dynamic, macroprudential approach. This paper describes the ensuing agent-based model for analyzing the vulnerability of the financial system to asset- and funding-based fire sales. The model captures the dynamic interactions of agents in the financial system extending from the suppliers of funding through the intermediation and transformation functions of the bank/dealers to the financial institutions that use the funds to trade in the asset markets. The model replicates the key finding that it is the reaction to initial losses, rather than the losses themselves, that determine the extent of a crisis. By building on a detailed mapping of the transformations and dynamics of the financial system, the agent-based model provides an avenue toward risk management that can illuminate the pathways for the propagation of key crisis dynamics such as fire sales and funding runs.     

Explicit formulas for the minimal variance hedging strategy in a martingale case

We explicitly compute closed formulas for the minimal variance hedging strategy in discrete time of a European option and for the variance of the corresponding hedging error under the hypothesis that the underlying asset is a martingale following a geometric Brownian motion. The formulas are easy to implement, hence the optimal hedge ratio can be employed as a valid substitute of the standard Black–Scholes delta, and the knowledge of the variance of the total error can be a useful tool for measuring and managing the hedging risk.     

Tax asymmetry and futures hedging under liquidity constraints

This paper examines the optimal futures hedging decision of a firm facing uncertain income that is subject to asymmetric taxation with no loss‐offset provisions. All futures contracts are marked to market and require interim cash settlement of gains and losses. The firm is liquidity constrained in that it is forced to prematurely close its futures position on which the interim loss incurred exceeds a threshold level. The liquidity risk created by the interim funding requirement of a futures hedge is shown to proffer the firm perverse incentives, thereby making an under‐hedge optimal. This under‐hedging result holds irrespective of whether the firm is risk neutral or risk averse. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

存在交易成本的权证避险策略实证研究

权证发行人在存在交易成本时对冲风险,若按照B—S理论进行动态连续避险操作,将造成巨大的交易成本,致使B-S动态连续避险不可行。因此存在交易成本时,对避险的操作都采用间断性避险。本文在统一均值方差框架下,系统全面的比较了存在交易成本的五种避险策略。在比例交易成本情形下,Whalley—Wilmott避险策略优于其他所有策略,当避险误差的标准差相同时该策略的交易成本最小;其次分别是delta固定避险带避险策略,基于标的资产价格变化的避险策略,Leland避险模型和间断的B—S避险策略。随着波动率σ上升,无风险利率γ下降,基于变动的避险策略相对于基于时间的策略优势更大。     

Determinants of corporate hedging: A (statistical) meta-analysis

While literature provides several hedging theories, evidence on the corporate incentives to hedge remains ambiguous. We synthesize data of empirical studies via statistical meta-analysis to test different hedging hypotheses. To our knowledge, this constitutes the first application of such a methodology in financial economics. Our results imply that financial distress costs induce firms to hedge. We find weak evidence that the underinvestment problem and the dependence on costly external financing influence hedging behavior. Taxes and agency conflicts do not show explanatory power. Because statistical and narrative reviews yield different outcomes, we see various other application possibilities for meta-analysis in financial economics.     

Tax‐loss carryforward and futures hedging

Our research is motivated by the Corn Products vs Arkansas Best Supreme court decisions that brought on the controversy of the tax treatment of gains and losses from futures hedging. The usefulness of a futures contract as risk management tool depends on the tax code. In this paper we address implications of capital treatment of futures positions (disallowing offset for tax purposes) when tax‐loss carryover is allowed. Our analysis utilizes a two‐period model to capture the inter‐temporal effects. We investigate the optimal hedge ratios under these scenarios analytically where possible, and numerically where necessary. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

新企业会计准则中公允价值变动损益对新能源企业股价的影响分析

发展新能源产业是应对环境恶化的重要举措之一。本文选取我国上市公司中395家新能源企业在2007-2009年间的季报数据,运用面板数据分析方法,检验了公允价值变动损益与这类概念股市价的收益率及其波动率之间的相关性,结果表明新会计准则实施以来公允价值变动损益与股价收益率显著正相关,而于收益率的波动显著负相关,进一步表明公允价值变动损益具有信息含量,且并不会增大资本市场的波动风险。     

金融机构高负债率下的资产管理:收益与风险的权衡

负债是金融机构经营的主要资金来源,偏高的资产负债率在财务杠杆、流动性等方面形成金融行业的显著风险,金融机构因此要借助有效的资产管理来实现自身盈利和风险控制。本文分析金融机构高负债风险的成因,提出改善盈利能力、流动性及资产配置等措施,降低负债风险,以实现价值最大化的目标。     

我国资产证券化风险研究

资产证券化是资本市场上广泛应用的一种融资方式,自2004年我国设立首批资产证券化试点以来,这种模式引起了金融机构极大的兴趣,随着资产证券化进程的加快,其中各种问题也初现端倪,证券化风险控制问题也逐渐提上日程。