This study is an extension of Leland and Pyle's (1977) signaling model. It introduces, in addition to the retained ownership, the length of the holding period to which the owner commits in the prospectus as a signal of firm value. The length of the holding period is found to be a signaling mechanism that complements ownership retention. Depending on the information structure of the firm, the entrepreneur may prefer to commit to a holding period longer than the minimum required by securities regulations.

Even though there is a worldwide consensus as to the necessity of an audit of annual financial statements for public companies, there is divergence of views as to the review of interim financial statements. While some jurisdictions make it mandatory (e.g., Australia, France, United States ), others allow the review without requiring it (e.g., Canada, United Kingdom ). Using a sample of companies listed in Canada, we examine the costs associated with these reviews and the benefits they generate in terms of improvement in the quality of interim financial statements for the years 2004 and 2005. Controlling for the decision to purchase the reviews, we find that audit fees are 18 percent higher for firms with interim reviews and, contrary to many regulators' assumption, we find no evidence that this cost increase is proportionally higher for smaller firms. Regarding the benefits of interim reviews, we find no significant association between either accruals‐ or nonaccruals‐based measures of earnings management and the fact that the interim statements are reviewed by the auditor, neither in the interim reports nor in those of the fourth quarter. The results suggest that auditors' involvement with interim reports may not be as effective as previously thought at controlling the quality of interim financial statements.

Recently, Penman and Sougiannis (1998) and Francis, Olsson, and Oswald (2000) compared the bias and accuracy of the discounted cash flow model (DCF) and Edwards‐Bell‐Ohlson residual income model (RIM) in explaining the relation between value estimates and observed stock prices. Both studies report that, with non‐price‐based terminal values, RIM outperforms DCF. Our first research objective is to explore the question whether, over a five‐year valuation horizon, DCF and RIM are empirically equivalent when Penman's (1997) theoretically “ideal” terminal value expressions are employed in each model. Using Value Line terminal stock price forecasts at the horizon to proxy for such values, we find empirical support for the prediction of equivalence between these valuation models. Thus, the apparent superiority of RIM does not hold in a level playing field comparison. Our second research objective is to demonstrate that, within each class of the DCF and RIM valuation models, the model that employs Value Line forecasted price in the terminal value expression generates the lowest prediction errors, compared with models that employ non‐price‐based terminal values under arbitrary growth assumptions. The results indicate that, for both DCF and RIM, price‐based valuation models outperform the corresponding non‐price‐based models by a wide margin. These results imply that researchers should exercise care in interpreting findings from models using ad hoc terminal value expressions.

Recently, Penman and Sougiannis (1998) and Francis, Olsson and Oswald (1999) compared the bias and accuracy of the dividend discount model (DDM), discounted cash flow model (DCF), and Edwards-Bell-Ohlson residual income model (RIM) in explaining the relation between value estimates and observed stock prices. Both studies report that, with non price-based terminal values, RIM outperforms DCF and DDM. Our primary research objective is to explore whether, over a five-year valuation horizon, DDM, DCF and RIM are empirically equivalent when Penman's (1998) theoretically terminal value expressions are employed in each model. Using Value Line terminal stock price forecasts at the horizon to proxy for such values, we find empirical support for the prediction of equivalence between these three price-based valuation models. Our secondary research objective is to demonstrate that, within each class of the DCF and RIM valuation models, the model that employs Value Line forecasted price in the terminal value expression will generate the lowest pricing errors, compared to models that employ non price-based terminal value under an arbitrary growth assumption. Results indicate that, for both DCF and RIM, price-based valuation models outperform the corresponding non price-based models by a wide margin. We also revisit the issue of the apparent superiority of RIM, and find that this result does not hold in a level playing field where an approximation of ideal terminal values is employed. In fact, the price-based RIM model is marginally outperformed by the price-based DCF and DDM models, in terms of pricing errors as well as its ability to explain current market price.