Contracting and Reporting Conservatism around a Change in Fiduciary Duties*

We exploit an influential 1991 Delaware court ruling to examine simultaneously two types of conservatism that play important roles in resolving creditor–owner agency conflicts: contracting conservatism and reporting conservatism. The ruling expanded managerial fiduciary duties in favor of creditors for Delaware-incorporated firms in the vicinity of insolvency. In those firms, following the ruling, debt contracts are less likely to include conservative adjustments to accounting numbers used for covenant compliance (i.e., contracting conservatism decreases), while public financial reporting becomes more conservative (i.e., reporting conservatism increases). The decrease in contracting conservatism is concentrated in firms that exhibit a greater increase in reporting conservatism, suggesting that reporting conservatism is more cost-effective in resolving agency conflicts. In addition, the substitution effect is more pronounced in firms facing greater business uncertainty and firms with greater board independence.     

Auditors' Responses to Workload Imbalance and the Impact on Audit Quality*

Using detailed data for fieldwork hours and audit hours by rank from audit engagements in Korea, we examine whether audits conducted under workload imbalance, proxied by busy‐season audits, impair audit quality, and how auditors adjust staff assignments for busy‐season audits. We generally find that busy‐season audits are associated with lower audit quality, and that audit firms reduce the involvement of senior auditors during busy‐season audits. In addition, the greater the involvement of senior auditors and junior auditors, the lesser the deterioration in audit quality. Finally, although there is no increase in interim audits in response to workload imbalance during busy seasons, increasing interim audits can mitigate the negative impact of busy‐season audits on audit quality. Our results are relevant to auditors and regulators, who have expressed concerns about the adverse effects of workload imbalance on audit quality.     

When Do Qualitative Risk Disclosures Backfire? The Effects of a Mismatch in Hedge Disclosure Formats on Investors' Judgments

Disclosure standards mandate the quantitative disclosure of hedging‐instrument‐related risks but not the disclosure of hedged‐item‐related risks. We examine how a match (mismatch) in formats, caused by making quantitative (qualitative) hedged item disclosures alongside quantitative hedging instrument disclosures, affects investors' integration of information from these two related disclosures. Our first experiment varies the hedged item disclosure format (quantitative or qualitative) and the portion of risk hedged (small or large). We find that when disclosure formats are mismatched, the less comparable nature of the two disclosures caused investors to neglect the offsetting relationship when assessing net risks. As a result, risk and investment judgments were influenced by the more prominent quantitative hedging instrument disclosures. Our second experiment finds that the use of a qualitative debiaser that clarifies the relationship between the two disclosures led to the integration of information and mitigated this effect.     

Language,knowledge transfer and firm’s strategic assets: the strategic role of language in knowledge transfer to China

This article is intended to examine the exact role of language in intra-firm cross-country knowledge transfer from the perspective of developing firm’s strategic assets. We find that inadequate language ability can lead to communication failures and cultural misunderstanding, and has the potential to destroy the process of knowledge transfer. Hence, language is not an operational issue but of strategic importance to the transfer of knowledge within multinational enterprises. As language ability is uniquely related to the specific technical, managerial and cultural aspects of a firm, hard to substitute and imitate, it should be regarded as one of the firm’s strategic assets and be dealt at strategic level.     

融资融券在我国的发展研究

融资融券交易业务是与证券现货交易对应的一种证券交易业务。融资融券交易业务是证券市场上证券公司同投资者之间发生的资金或证券的借贷关系,可以分为证券市场融资交易和证券市场融券交易两方面。我国刚刚在市场上公开融资融券业务,还有很多不成熟的地方并且面临着融资融券带来的风险。对融资融券进行分析和研究,通过对比和比较的方法,选择适合我国的融资融券发展模式并提出相关对策建议,为我国的证券市场保驾护航,保障投资者的利益。     

当前经济形势与未来发展趋势的几点判断

本文通过对欧债危机以及美国经济、全球通胀、增长动力转换等方面的分析,指出金融危机对中国的影响仍在深化,经济下行和通胀的压力依然存在.作者同时认为,支撑我国长期增长的因素没有消失,后发优势依然存在,估计未来10年中国经济仍有潜力维持年均8％以上的高增长.应对复杂经济形势的基本思路是,长远要防控由高增长转向中速增长出现大幅下滑的战略转型的风险,当前要预防通胀,优化结构,鼓励改革创新,消除经济扭曲,营造更加公平、公正、自由且充满活力的发展环境.     

我国电力行业可持续发展战略研究

我国的电力发展是我国经济发展的重要基础。在目前能源稀缺的环境下,我国的电力行业需要实现可持续发展,才能保证我国电力行业发展的稳定和高效率。本文分析了我国电力行业实现可持续发展的主要路径和战略选择,并提出了相关的政策建议。     

Does educational diversity of managers matter for the performance of team‐managed funds?

We study the effect of the educational diversity of managers on the performance of team‐managed mutual funds using a large sample of U.S. equity funds from 1994 to 2013. We consider diversity in terms of both final educational degree and field of educational specialisation. We find that, in general, both types of diversity have a positive impact on fund performance, and our results are robust over a wide range of performance metrics and changes in market conditions.     

Non-GAAP reporting following debt covenant violations

Review of Accounting Studies - We investigate whether firms change their non-GAAP reporting practices after debt covenant violations. We find that the likelihood that a firm will disclose non-GAAP...     

资本结构、股权结构与中小企业成长性——基于中小企业板数据的实证分析

本文以中小企业板上市企业2004-2009年数据为基础,以资产市值账面比衡量企业成长性,分析了我国中小上市企业资本结构和股权结构对成长性的影响。实证结果表明,资产负债率和长期负债率均对成长性具有显著正向影响,意味着较高的负债能降低外部权益成本,有利于中小上市企业的成长。成长性与股权集中度显著正相关,表明股权集中有利于股东对管理层进行监督,降低代理成本并能促进中小上市企业成长。管理层持股比重的改变对中小上市企业的成长性无显著影响。