Debt Covenants and Accounting Conservatism

Using a sample of over 5,000 debt issues, I test whether firms with more extensive use of covenants in their public debt contracts exhibit timelier recognition of economic losses in accounting earnings. Covenants govern the transfer of decision-making and control rights from shareholders to bondholders when a company approaches financial distress and thereby limit managers' abilities to expropriate bondholder wealth. Covenants are expected to constrain managerial opportunism, however, only if the accounting system recognizes economic losses in earnings in a timely fashion. Thus, the demand for timely loss recognition should increase with a contract's reliance on covenants. Consistent with this conjecture, I find evidence that reliance on covenants in public debt contracts is positively associated with the degree of timely loss recognition. I also find evidence that the presence of prior private debt mitigates this relationship.     

Debt Maturity Structure and Accounting Conservatism

This study examines the association between debt maturity structure and accounting conservatism. Short‐maturity debt can mitigate agency costs of debt arising from information asymmetry and suboptimal investment problems inherent in debt financing. As such, debt‐contracting demand for accounting conservatism is expected to be lower in the presence of more short‐maturity debt. We find that short‐maturity debt is negatively associated with accounting conservatism. As firms could commit to more accounting conservatism to gain access to long‐maturity debt, we conduct lead‐lag tests of the direction of causality, and the results suggest that more short‐maturity debt leads to less conservative reporting, rather than the reverse. We also find the negative relation between short‐maturity debt and accounting conservatism is more pronounced among financially distressed firms, where ex ante severity of agency costs of debt are higher. Collectively, our results contribute to our understanding of the role of accounting conservatism in debt contracting and show how debt maturity, a key and pervasive feature of creditor protection in debt contracting, affects accounting conservatism.     

会计稳健性、融资约束与投资效率

会计稳健性是一项备受争议的会计信息质量要求,考虑到我国企业普遍受融资约束影响的背景,本文以2007-2015年A股上市公司为样本,实证检验了会计稳健性、融资约束及投资效率之间的关系。研究发现:(1)会计稳健性对投资过度和投资不足均具有抑制作用,融资约束会抑制投资过度而加剧投资不足;(2)融资约束加强了会计稳健性对投资过度的抑制作用,二者在一定程度上存在协同效应;(3)融资约束加强了会计稳健性对投资不足的抑制作用,会计稳健性表现出治理效应。本文揭示了会计稳健性与融资约束的交互作用对投资效率的影响机制,从而提供了改善投资效率的有效途径,证明了会计稳健性存在的必要性,有利于为企业的决策提供理论指引。     

产权性质、债务融资与会计稳健性——来自中国上市公司的经验证据

本文以我国A股上市公司2002-2006年的数据为样本,采用Basu模型研究了债务(尤其是不同期限的银行借款)对会计稳健性的影响,研究结果表明:银行要求短期借款比例高和长期借款比例低的公司采取更加稳健的会计政策,考虑到两类产权性质时,银行对终极控制人为私有产权控股的公司有更加稳健的要求,且对短期借款比例高的私有产权控股公司会计政策要求更加稳健,而对长期借款比例高的国有产权控股公司会计稳健性的要求相对更低。     

会计稳健性与投资效率——来自中国证券市场的经验证据

会计稳健性是财务报告的一项重要特征,而投资效率则是企业生存和发展至关重要的制约因素,稳健的会计政策对企业投资效率的影响值得深入探讨.通过实证研究发现,会计稳健性越好的企业,在投资机会下降时,会更及时地削减投资,即投资效率更高.     

治理机制、特殊治理水平与财务报告的稳健性

与以往的研究不同,我们将公司治理因素分成管理者可控的和不可控的两个部分,然后研究管理者可控部分即公司特殊治理水平对财务报告稳健性产生的影响。在整合了各种无条件公司治理机制的基础上,控制了其中管理者不可控的部分后得到了公司特殊治理变量。通过对我国A股上市公司2002—2006年的数据的分组检验和坏消息增量反应系数的显著性检验,发现特殊治理水平越高的公司其财务报告的稳健性水平也越高。     

Monitoring and Structure of Debt Contracts

This paper presents a theory of optimal debt structure when the moral hazard problem is severe. The main idea is that the optimal debt contract delegates monitoring to a single senior lender and that seniority allows the monitoring senior lender to appropriate the full return from his monitoring activities. The theory explains (i) why debt contracts are prioritized, (ii) why short-term debt is senior to long-term debt, and (iii) why financial intermediaries usually hold short-term senior debt whereas long-term junior debt is widely held. Another implication of the theory is that covenant and maturity structures will be set to conform to the seniority structure.     

债务抵押契约发展分析

本文分析了资产支持证券的一个品种——债务抵押契约的特点和结构，结合国家开发银行发行的“2005开元一期”债务抵押债券进行了分析，并提出了在发展债务抵押契约等产品时降低利率风险的建议。     

Accounting Conservatism and the Relation Between Returns and Accounting Data

This study adds change in cash investments and change in lagged operating assets to the regression of returns on earnings levels and earnings changes examined in Easton and Harris (1991). We argue that a positive coefficient on change in cash investments captures conservatism associated with investments in positive net present value projects the effects of which will not flow into the accounting statements until the expected future benefits are realized. A positive coefficient on change in lagged operating assets implies accounting conservatism associated with the application of accounting rules to operating assets in place. Our empirical results are, in general, consistent with these arguments. We examine differences in conservatism across samples with different market to book ratios, we compare firms with non-negative returns with firms with negative returns, we compare firms reporting losses with firms reporting profits, and we examine firms in different industries, firms with different levels of research and development expenditure, different amounts of depreciation, different amounts of advertising expense, and firms that adopt LIFO inventory valuation compared with those that adopt an alternative to LIFO.JEL Classification: M41     

产业政策与会计稳健性

会计信息能够为宏微观经济发展提供可靠、精准和有效的决策依据。"十三五"规划强调指出要"提高经济运行信息及时性、全面性和准确性",完善政策实施的效果评估。鉴于此,本文以具有中国特色的产业政策为切入点,研究产业政策是否以及如何影响企业的会计稳健性。结果发现,产业政策显著降低了企业的会计稳健性,而且在非国有企业、年轻企业和低成长性企业中更加显著。另外,与一般性产业政策相比,重点产业政策对企业会计稳健性的影响更大。基于作用路径的检验发现,产业政策缓解了企业的融资约束、税收负担以及诱发非国企高管攫取超额薪酬的行为,从而导致企业会计稳健性的降低。本研究揭示了产业政策对会计稳健性的影响及作用机理,提供了产业政策影响企业会计政策选择的直接证据。     

Managerial Overconfidence and Accounting Conservatism

Overconfident managers overestimate future returns from their firms’ investments. Thus, we predict that overconfident managers will tend to delay loss recognition and generally use less conservative accounting. Furthermore, we test whether external monitoring helps to mitigate this effect. Using measures of both conditional and unconditional conservatism respectively, we find robust evidence of a negative relation between CEO overconfidence and accounting conservatism. We further find that external monitoring does not appear to mitigate this effect. Our findings add to the growing literature on overconfidence and complement the findings by Schrand and Zechman [2011] that overconfidence affects financial reporting behavior.     

国家控股对会计稳健性的影响研究

本文从公司治理角度分析中国上市公司的会计稳健性。利用2001-2004年A股上市公司的大样本数据,实证考察了国家控股对会计稳健性的影响以及它的制度根源。我们发现,国家控股上市公司对应着更低的会计稳健性。进一步的研究表明,内部人控制、债务软约束和政府干预等三大治理弱化是抑制国有公司披露意愿、降低其盈余质量的制度根源。本研究对资本市场的监管设计具有重要的启示:单纯强调准则的改革和外部的管制,对于提高国有公司的会计信息质量只能起到"隔靴搔痒"的效果,要想根本上改善国有公司的信息质量,监管层惟有从解决"内部治理弱化"的根源入手,通过健全国有产权监督机制、深化银行体制改革以及弱化地方政府干预动机等制度变革,从治理层面真正提高国有公司自身的披露意愿。     

Managerial Ownership and Accounting Conservatism

In this paper we examine the effect of managerial ownership on financial reporting conservatism. Separation of ownership and control gives rise to agency problems between managers and shareholders. Financial reporting conservatism is one potential mechanism to address these agency problems. We hypothesize that, as managerial ownership declines, the severity of agency problem increases, increasing the demand for conservatism. Consistent with our hypothesis, we find that conservatism as measured by the asymmetric timeliness of earnings declines with managerial ownership. The negative association between managerial ownership and asymmetric timeliness of earnings is robust to various controls, in particular, for the investment opportunity set. We thus provide evidence of a demand for conservatism from the firm's shareholders.     

公司治理与会计稳健性——基于上市公司的实证研究

会计稳健性是财务报告的一个重要特征和惯例，已成为会计盈余的重要质量特征之一。本文运用basu（1997）模型，将会计稳健性定义为会计报告对坏消息的确认比好消息更及时，探讨了有关公司治理的几个重要因素对会计稳健性的影响。研究发现：在影响会计稳健性的治理因素中，银行借款比例与会计稳健性正相关，国家股比例与会计稳健性负相关，在国家股比例低的分组，会计稳健性较高。发行有B股的企业，会计稳健性与只有A股的企业没有显著差异。研究表明，会计稳健性作为会计报告质量的一种量度，随着会计制度和准则的国际接轨与完善，证券市场监管的加强，取得了一定成效，但是会计准则和会计制度不能保证会计报告的质量，尚需改革国内相关的制度背景，如公司治理、法律实施环境等。     

高管团队背景特征视角下的会计稳健性与投资效率关系研究

本文以2008-2011年沪深A股上市公司为研究对象,区分产权性质,实证检验了会计稳健性对投资效率的影响,以及高管团队背景特征对二者关系的影响。研究发现,会计稳健性会抑制投资过度,加剧投资不足;国有企业的会计稳健性加剧投资不足和抑制投资过度的程度要弱于非国有企业。进一步研究发现,国有企业高管团队的平均年龄、任期异质性、教育背景及其异质性显著影响会计稳健性与非效率投资的关系,非国有企业高管团队的任期及其异质性、教育背景及其异质性显著影响会计稳健性与非效率投资关系。     

多个“大债权人”与会计稳健性

本文考查了企业拥有多个大债权人对其会计稳健性的影响.研究发现,多个大债权人的共同监督显著提高了企业的会计稳健性水平.进一步研究发现:当企业复杂度较高或信息环境较差时,多个大债权人对会计稳健性的提升作用更加明显;但是当金融控股银行在债权人中占比较高时,该提升作用显著弱化.作用机制检验表明,多个大债权人的共同监督促使企业计提更多的资产减值损失和预计负债,进而提高了会计稳健性水平.最后,经济后果检验发现多个大债权人促使会计稳健性提高以后,企业的贷款融资规模显著增大,但融资成本未发生变化.本文提供了非辛迪加贷款模式下“债权人共同监督效果”的本土化证据,研究结论对企业和政策制定者具有重要的参考价值.     

会计稳健性研究述评

越来越多的研究表明,会计稳健性是财务报告最重要的特征。本文系统地评论了会计稳健性研究的最新内容。第一方面为会计稳健性的不同计量方法及各种计量方法之间存在的关系,第二方面为稳健性起因的最新研究,尤其是契约对企业会计稳健性的影响,第三方面为会计稳健性的经济后果,包括会计稳健性对资本成本的影响以及对企业真实经济活动的影响。文章最后指出了会计稳健性未来研究的方向。     

Unexpected Accruals and Conditional Accounting Conservatism

Abstract:  This paper examines the impact of management discretion over accruals on conditional accounting conservatism, defined as the tendency of accountants to recognize bad news on a timelier basis than good news. Prior research suggests that conditional accounting conservatism reflected in earnings is mainly due to the accrual component of earnings, not the cash flow component of earnings. After decomposing total accruals into expected and unexpected accruals, I find that (1) conditional accounting conservatism reflected in accruals is mainly due to unexpected accruals; (2) the negative association between unconditional and conditional accounting conservatism is mainly attributable to unexpected accruals; and (3) firms with higher leverage exhibit conditionally more conservative accounting primarily through unexpected accruals. These results are robust to accrual models that take into account the systematic association between accruals and cash flows and their non-linearity and to the asymmetric persistence of earnings changes specification of conditional accounting conservatism. Taken together, these results suggest that managers exercise their discretion over accruals to expedite the recognition of bad news rather than good news.