The FASB recently issued ASU 2024-03, which requires disaggregation of significant expenses, like cost of goods sold (COGS) and selling, general, and administrative (SG&A) expenses. Proponents argue disaggregation will improve decision usefulness, whereas opponents suggest the information will be costly and provide little value. We provide large-sample evidence on the pre-ASU state of expense disaggregation, analyze whether it appears to provide decision-useful information, and explore differences across disaggregation components. Our findings suggest that disaggregation is relatively common, increasing over time, and correlated with demand for disclosure, disclosure incentives, and firm economics. Further, our evidence is consistent with COGS, but not SG&A, disaggregation providing decision-useful information for investors and analysts, and these benefits accrue via improved processing of expense-related news. Overall, our evidence suggests that not all disaggregation is equal. We also identify novel, large-sample expense disaggregation measures for U.S. firms, which are likely useful for evaluating other implications of disaggregation. Data Availability: Data are available from the public sources cited in the text.

Research has long recognized that institutional investors possess significant information processing advantages. Yet even these investors face limited‐attention constraints, implying that periods of distraction may attenuate their advantage. We examine the effects of a plausibly exogenous shock to institutional attention arising from the annual buy‐side‐focused Equity Research and Valuation (ERV) conference for Chartered Financial Analysts on institutions' information processing at earnings announcements. Validation tests using conference call data indicate that fewer buy‐side analysts are present on earnings calls during ERV conferences and that questions are shorter, consistent with the presence of substitute or backup analysts. In our main analyses, we find that buy‐side analyst inattention reduces information asymmetry among investors and improves liquidity at these earnings announcements, consistent with theory, and observe similar results for non–earnings announcement events. In additional tests, we document slower price formation, but also more profitable retail trading, during these periods. Collectively, we provide novel evidence on the market consequences of institutional inattention during key information events.

This paper explores U.S. public firms’ cryptocurrency holdings and accounting practices from 2013 to 2022 against the backdrop of the recently enacted crypto accounting rule, ASU 2023‐08. Descriptive analyses suggest exponential growth in corporate crypto holdings and significant variation in crypto accounting practices, underscoring the rule's necessity. Hypothesis tests using the pre‐rule data reveal three insights with direct relevance to the rule. First, firms appear to view crypto assets more akin to investments than intangible assets, consistent with the rule's mandate of the fair value model. Second, Big 4 auditors steer firms toward the impairment model and less detailed presentation choices. This conservative approach is unlikely to meet the new rule's goal of providing the most decision‐useful information. Third, increased liquidity of crypto markets prompts the use of the fair value model and a more detailed presentation, consistent with the rule's focus on more actively traded tokens. However, within our sample, we find some evidence consistent with fair value reporting increasing stock return volatility and no evidence that it enhances earnings informativeness.