The Market's Assessment of the Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999

We examine the impact of the events leading up to and including the passage of the Financial Services Modernization Act (FSMA) of 1999 on the stock returns of banks, brokerage firms, and insurance companies. We find that the impact is positive for all institutions. Bank gains are positively related to size and capitalization. Brokerage firms gain regardless of size, but the gains are inversely related to capitalization and insurance companies gain regardless of size or capital position. The strong positive reaction suggests that the market expects the institutions to benefit from the new opportunities created by the FSMA's passage.     

美国Sarbanes-Oxley Act对会计的治理及其启示

为加强对会计的治理,美国出台并通过了SOX Act,该法案对加强注册会计师行业管理、提高注册会计师的独立性、完善会计信息披露制度等方面作出了详细规定.对于国内注册会计师行业治理而言,在继续加强行业自律的同时,借鉴美国的做法,加大对注会行业的外部监管力度,采取有效措施提高注册会计师的独立性,继续坚持以基本原则为基础的准则制订方针,增加披露表外信息、非财务信息等信息内容等.     

《萨班斯法案》孰是孰非:基于成本与效率(收益)的分析视角

《萨班斯法案》的出台堪称注册会计师行业的一件大事，从理论上看，该法案各项条款的出台确实具有积极的意义，但仍然存在缺陷，它更多地强调监管的作用，而监管的效率往往不如制衡的效率；它更多地强调经济处罚和刑事处罚的作用，而这两种处罚却必须以民事赔偿为前提，并最终使作假行为的作假成本大大高于作假收益。     

森林生态效益价值会计核算研究

森林生态效益是有价值的无形资产,这些价值不仅可以计量,而且应作为会计核算的对象。随着人们日益关注环境问题,营林企业应该将纳入企业会计核算的范围。本文着重研究了不同性质的营林企业如何进行森林生态效益价值的会计核算。     

Socioeconomic predictors of forest use values in the Peruvian Amazon: A potential tool for biodiversity conservation

Conservation is a crisis discipline requiring rapid action with limited funds. This study examines the potential of socioeconomic variables to predict forest use values. If natural resource use can be predicted from socioeconomic data, conservation planners could rapidly identify and focus conservation programs on the sectors of local populations that most intensively utilize local flora and fauna. Families in three communities in the northern Peruvian Amazon were surveyed over a 6-month period. Data were collected on use of flora and fauna from six locally determined use categories (food, medicine and poisons, wood, weavings, adornments, and “other”) in forest types of three age classes (fallow fields—very young forests, young secondary forests, and old secondary forests). Forest use values were the dependant variables calculated in $/ha/year. Socioeconomic variables included: age, education, family size, residence time, land worked, land owned, number of fishing nets, chickens, pigs, cows, and/or mules owned (all proxies for productive assets), and level of ecological knowledge (ability of informants to correctly identify forest species and answer basic questions about their biology). Ordinary least square multiple regressions were run independently for each forest type. Regressions were also run separately for the two most valuable use categories, food and wood. Low R² adjusted values (all < 0.3) reflect the difficulty in predicting human behavior due to confounding variables and complex interactions. Residence time and a household's community of residence were the most significant predictors of forest use values. Households in Vista Alegre, the community with the highest density of people and smallest landholdings per household, extracted the highest value of forest products per hectare. The longer a family stayed in any community the higher the value of forest goods they extracted. If families that lived in an area longest are the most intensive extractors of forest products, they should be a major focus for conservation programming. In addition, the higher value of products extracted from forests by some families may make them more open to strategies seeking to protect long-term viability of the resources they utilize. The importance of residence time also indicates that planners need to account for changes in the resource use patterns of stakeholders over time.     

In search of marginal environmental valuations — ecosystem services in Finnish forest accounting

There is currently substantial interest in valuing various services provided by different ecosystems. Concurrently economists have ascribed substantial effort on expanding traditional forest accounting systems by environmental services. This paper contributes to curtailing the existing gap between green accounting theory and applications for valuing forest ecosystem services. The multitude of links between forest ecosystem services and economy are characterized by the theoretical model for forest-economy interactions. By utilizing recently updated data we also incorporate empirical value estimates of these services comparable to other goods into Finnish forest accounting system. Finally, we discuss some problems encountered and clarify the interpretation of some value estimates incorporated to national forest account.     

湖南森林旅游开发与森林公园保护

“回归大自然,走进大森林”是当今世界旅游业的新时尚,也预示了湖南省未来森林旅游的良好前景,本文阐述了湖南省开展森林旅游的资源条件和森林公园的发展概况,探讨了森林公园旅游开发的指导思想、原则、目标、重点和对策,并针对森林公园在旅游开发过程中存在的问题,提出了保护的具体措施。     

A landscape approach for assessing the biodiversity value of indigenous forest remnants: Case study of the Manawatu/Wanganui region of New Zealand

To halt the decline of biodiversity in New Zealand, the government has formulated a strategy of maintaining and restoring a full range of remaining natural habitats to a healthy functioning state. Many indigenous forest remnants exist on private land, and these could be utilised to increase biodiversity. Resources for conservation of forest remnants are limited, so they must be used wisely to deliver the greatest possible biodiversity gain. This paper presents a rapid method for valuing the biodiversity of a region's indigenous forest remnants to help prioritise conservation resources. The region is divided into environmentally distinct areas called land environments. A detailed land-cover map is derived from satellite imagery and used to estimate the proportion of natural habitats remaining in each land environment; from this the biodiversity value of any forest remnant may be calculated. The method is rapid and does not require detailed biodiversity information. When combined with conservation costs, it may be used to create a priority list of forest remnants for conservation. The Manawatu/Wanganui region of New Zealand is used as a case study to demonstrate the method.     

Camouflaged Indicators of Earnings Management†

Abstract

We argue that, in response to increased scrutiny and greater attention to accruals versus sales, firms become more likely to engage in accrual conversion (AC) cash management aimed at aligning cash and accruals with earnings and sales (e.g. by factoring of receivables). In doing so, they reduce the statistical power of standard indicators of accrual-based earnings management – in effect, camouflaging their earnings management activity. This proposition is of interest because many influential papers on earnings management have utilized accrual-based indicators to reach their conclusions. Our results indicate that firms indeed became more likely to engage in AC cash management after the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX), and that this tendency was particularly pronounced among firms with strong incentives (or enhanced ability) to perform and hide earnings management. In particular, our findings suggest that the post-SOX decrease in standard measurements of accrual-based earnings management, identified in prior research, is partially attributable to firms’ increased engagement in AC cash management activity.     

Robust political economy

This paper introduces the idea of “robust political economy.” In the context of political economic systems, “robustness” refers to a political economic arrangement's ability to produce social welfare-enhancing outcomes in the face of deviations from ideal assumptions about individuals' motivations and information. Since standard assumptions about complete and perfect information, instantaneous market adjustment, perfect agent rationality, political actor benevolence, etc., rarely, if ever actually hold, a realistic picture and accurate assessment of the desirability of alternative political economic systems requires an analysis of alternative systems' robustness. The Mises-Hayek critique of socialism forms the foundation for investigations of robustness that relax ideal informational assumptions. The Buchanan-Tullock public choice approach complements this foundation in forming the basis for investigations of robustness that relax ideal motivational assumptions. JEL Code B53, P16, P26