Knowledge that Transforms

Prior studies show that equity value has convex relations with earnings and book value of equity, respectively, due to growth and adaptation options (Burgstahler and Dichev 1997a; Zhang 2000). However, these studies do not consider the role of institutions in affecting firms' ability to exercise growth and adaptation options. In this study, we investigate whether these convex relations vary with the degree of a country's economic freedom, which may influence the frictions and costs of exercising these options. We develop four hypotheses: In countries with greater economic freedom: (1) a firm's capital investment in response to profitability is greater; (2) the relation between equity value and earnings, given equity book value, is more convex; (3) the relation between equity value and equity book value, given earnings, is more convex; and (4) the relation between stock return and profitability change is more convex. Using the Economic Freedom of the World index from the Fraser Institute, we test our hypotheses with data from 30 countries during the 2000–2010 period. The empirical results are consistent with these hypotheses. The effect of economic freedom that we document is distinct from the effects of GDP level and growth, legal origin, law enforcement, investor protection, and quality of accounting standards. Our results suggest that greater economic freedom enhances equity value through more efficient management of investment options. Data Availability: Data used in this study are available from public sources.

Prior studies find inconsistent evidence regarding the effect of CEO equity incentives on financial misreporting. We argue that this inconsistency stems from not considering detection mechanisms that mitigate the effect of equity incentives on misreporting by limiting the ability of managers to carry out such manipulative activities. Using auditor industry expertise as one such detection mechanism, we document that CEO equity incentives are positively associated with misreporting only in subsamples where auditor expertise is low, but not where expertise is high. The implication of these results is that auditor expertise lowers the cost of granting equity-based incentives and that firms audited by an industry expert grant their CEOs greater equity incentives. We find strong evidence in favor of this implication. Controlling for previously identified determinants of CEO equity incentives, we find that firms audited by an industry expert grant their CEOs 14 percent more equity incentives than firms audited by a non-expert. To address endogeneity concerns, we use the collapse of Arthur Andersen as a quasi-natural experiment and find analogous evidence. Overall, our study documents the critical role of detection mechanisms in the link between CEO contracting and financial misreporting.

Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Search Site Cite View This Citation Add to Citation Manager Citation Nicholas Seybert; Partial Retraction: Section IV: Survey in R&D Capitalization and Reputation-Driven Real Earnings Management. The Accounting Review 1 July 2015; 90 (4): 1707. https://doi.org/10.2308/accr-10453 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentThe Accounting Review Search Advanced Search

This study examines the relationship between accounting credibility and firms' ability to fund their investments. Theory suggests that credible reporting resulting from external audits enables firms to attract external funds needed for their investments. The tests exploit monetary policy tightening that creates a liquidity shortage for banks, which, in turn, either requires banks to raise additional funds to restore liquidity or forces them to restrict their investments in the form of lending. Studying small non-public banks for which external audits are voluntary, I find that audited banks can better access funds during periods of monetary tightening than unaudited banks. As such, adverse liquidity shocks impede the lending of audited banks less. Overall, these findings present new evidence on how accounting credibility affects firms' ability to invest. Data Availability: The data are available from the sources indicated in the text.

We examine a life-cycle cost concept that applies to both manufacturing and service industries in which upfront capacity investments are essential. Borrowing from the energy literature, we refer to this cost measure as the Levelized Product Cost (LC). Per unit of output, the levelized cost aggregates a share of the initial capacity investment with periodic fixed and variable operating costs. We relate this cost measure to the notion of full cost, as commonly calculated in managerial accounting texts. Our analysis identifies conditions under which the LC can be interpreted as the long-run marginal product cost. In particular, the LC is the relevant unit cost that firms should impute for investments in productive capacity.