Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Finance and Financial Management Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Articles 1 - 2 of 2

Full-Text Articles in Finance and Financial Management

Three Essays On Opacity, Corporate Governance, And Credit Ratings, Yiwen Gu Aug 2011

Three Essays On Opacity, Corporate Governance, And Credit Ratings, Yiwen Gu

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In the first essay, utilizing a more recent and expanded 20-year sample 1991-2010 of dual-rated bonds issued, I confirm Morgan's (2002) finding that banks are relatively more opaque than nonbanks. The likelihood of a rating split is higher, and the magnitude of the rating gap is larger, for banks than nonnbanks. Moreover, rating agency disagreements are more significant for banks with relatively higher loan and trading securities holdings and maintain lower capital, and for banks engaged in mortgage securitization. Importantly, I find that rating agency disagreements reflect market proxies of information uncertainty. Further, opacity makes external financing more costly. Equity …


The Unintended Effects Of The Sarbanes-Oxley Act, Vidhi Chhaochharia, Clemens A. Otto, Vikrant Vig Mar 2011

The Unintended Effects Of The Sarbanes-Oxley Act, Vidhi Chhaochharia, Clemens A. Otto, Vikrant Vig

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) was passed in the wake of several scandals that rocked corporate America in 2001 and 2002. The objective behind SOX was to improve corporate governance by improving accounting disclosures. Compliance with Section 404 is considered by many to be the most costly requirement of SOX and has been argued to be a disproportionate burden for small firms. Consequently, firms with a public float below $75 million were granted several exemptions from compliance. We document an unintended effect of these exemptions: a weakening of corporate governance through a weakening of the market for corporate control.