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Journal of Accounting and Economics Vol. 67 No. 2-3 2019

How does quasi-indexer ownership affect corporate tax planning?

Shuping Chen1; Ying Huang2; Ningzhong Li2; Terry Shevlin3

1 The University of Texas at Austin · 2 The University of Texas at Dallas · 3 University of California, Irvine

open access

Abstract

We study whether, and more importantly, through what mechanisms, quasi-indexers affect portfolio firms’ tax planning by employing the discontinuity in quasi-indexer ownership around the Russell 1000/2000 index cutoff. Using a regression discontinuity design, we find that higher quasi-indexer ownership leads to greater tax saving. With respect to the mechanisms, we find that the greater tax saving is a result of a focus on improved overall firm performance, not a specific focus on improved tax planning. We further find that the documented tax saving effect is partially due to quasi-indexers’ influences on executive equity incentives, corporate governance, and information environment.

DOI
10.1016/j.jacceco.2018.01.001
Volume
67
Issue
2-3
Pages
278-296
Language
en
Sources
semanticscholar openalex crossref

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