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The effects of SFAS 157 disclosures on investment decisions

Journal of Accounting and Economics 2017 63(2-3), 404-427
This paper examines whether public bank managers change both the composition and classification of their investment portfolios after SFAS 157. We first show that non-agency mortgage-backed securities (MBSNA) are the asset class most likely to be measured using level 3 inputs, which are based on unobservable information. We then find that relative to a control sample of private banks, public banks altered their investment portfolios in a manner that reduced the percentage of MBSNA holdings for which SFAS 157 disclosures are required. Taken together, this evidence is consistent with public banks attempting to avoid disclosure of level 3 assets through changes in both asset composition and classification.