Accounting Commons^™

Firms’ Non-Reliance Judgment, Restatement Venue Choice, And Litigation Risk, Keunho Philip Chung

Theses and Dissertations--Accountancy

This paper examines the determinants of firms’ non-reliance judgment and the effect of restatements disclosure venue choice on future litigation risk. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) requires firms to disclose any error that will undermine investors’ reliance on previously issued financial statements in Item 4.02 of Form 8-K starting on August 23, 2004. The requirements for non-reliance judgments lack clear guidelines; raising concerns that firms are cloaking errors and mistakes through opaque disclosure venues instead of the more prominent Form 8-K.

This paper is the first to investigate the quantitative and qualitative criteria that firms use for non-reliance judgments …

How The Prospect Of Fault Influences Managers' Compliance, Matthew T. Sooy

Theses and Dissertations--Accountancy

The SEC relies heavily on ‘no-fault’ settlements in its enforcement, where targets avoid costly litigation by accepting sanctions without admitting or denying fault. This policy is argued to enable the agency to pursue greater numbers of violators. However, opponents argue that no-fault sanctions may be less effective, reducing fines to a ‘cost of business’. In an experiment, I examine the effects of fault assignment on managers’ cost perceptions, ethical framing and compliance. I manipulate the presence of fault assignment in prospective sanctions, and additionally manipulate sanction strength and sanction target - attributes that commonly vary in sanctions and which may …

Hospital Corporation Of America: An Analysis Of The Financial Statements Of Hca Holdings, Inc., C. Haadsma

Honors Theses

A successful and dynamic hospital management company, Hospital Corporation of America owns, manages, or operates hospitals, freestanding surgery centers, diagnostic and imaging centers, radiation and oncology therapy centers, comprehensive rehabilitation and physical therapy centers, and other facilities. In fact, Hospital Corporation of America is responsible for between four to five percent of all inpatient care delivered in the United States today. In partial fulfillment of the requirements of the Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College at the University of Mississippi, I have researched the healthcare industry, analyzed the company's financial statements, and provided audit and tax recommendations to the company's management. …

Applying Special Purpose Frameworks In State And Local Governmental Financial Statements; Practice Aid Series, American Institute Of Certified Public Accountants (Aicpa)

Guides, Handbooks and Manuals

No abstract provided.

Comparing The Publication Process In Accounting, Economics, Finance, Management, Marketing, Psychology, And The Natural Sciences, David A. Wood

Faculty Publications

I present two types of data about the publication and review process in the accounting, economics, finance, management, marketing, psychology, and natural science disciplines. First, I collect all articles published in 2012 in top tier journals of these disciplines and compare the articles based on word counts, figures and tables included in each article, the time it took to be published, citations, the number of co-authors, and submission fees. I then survey academics in each discipline. Survey questions were designed to evaluate overall perceptions of the review process; changes in the review process in the last 5 years; opinions about …

Do Managers Really Guide Through The Fog? On The Challenges In Assessing The Causes Of Voluntary Disclosure, Travis Dyer, Mark Lang, Lorien Stice-Lawrence

Faculty Publications

Guay e tal. (2016) document that firms with longer and more complex 10-Ks provide  relatively more voluntary disclosure, which they interpret as evidence that managers use voluntary disclosure to mitigate negative effects of complex mandatory disclosure. We review the results of Guay et al. and focus on two main challenges to inferring causality: (1) the coincidence of upward over-time trends in annual report length, complexity, and voluntary disclosure, and (2) the potential for omitted correlated variables, such as changes in firm economics, to drive changes in 10-K textual characteristics and voluntary disclosure. While the results in Guay et al. are …

How Do Firms Use Cash Tax Savings: A Cross-Country Analysis, Danielle Higgins Green, Jon Kerr

Faculty Publications

Cash tax avoidance activities can serves as a significant source of additional cash flows for firms; how managers utilize this additional cash source and the resulting consequences is an empirical question. To answer our research question, we examine the association between the spread between a country’s enacted statutory rate for the year and the cash effective tax rate, and two uses of cash – investment and dividend payout – for an international sample of firms. In the cross-section, we find the firms are more likely to invest cash tax savings rather than distribute them in the form of dividends and …

Does Use Tax Evasion Provide A Competitive Advantage To E-Tailers?, Jeffrey L. Hoopes, Jacob Thornock, Braden M. Williams

Faculty Publications

Many online retail firms (e-tailers) do not collect sales tax from the majority of their customers. This practice provides these firms with a potential competitive advantage over traditional retailers. We examine stock market returns and analysts' sales forecast revisions surrounding federal legislative proposals, such as the Marketplace Fairness Act, that could erode this alleged competitive advantage for e-tailers. Following events that indicated an increased likelihood of federal sales tax legislation, we find negative abnormal stock returns for e-tail firms relative to traditional retail firms. We also find that analysts forecast a future reduction in sales revenue for e-tailers. These findings …

Compensation Or Feedback: Motivating Performance In Multidimensional Tasks, Margaret H. Christ, Scott A. Emett, William B. Tayler, David A. Wood

Faculty Publications

Employees often perform tasks with multiple dimensions. In this study, we examine how employees' performance on multidimensional tasks differs under different control structures. We conduct two experiments in which we manipulate the presence of compensation controls and the presence of feedback controls on multiple task dimensions. Our findings suggest that when employees are compensated on multiple dimensions they commit to multiple goals and divide their attention among those task dimensions. However, when feedback controls are implemented on one task dimension with compensation controls on another dimension, employees can improve performance on individual dimensions as well as their overall task performance. …

Applying Basic Gamification Techniques To It Compliance Training: Evidence From The Lab And Field, Ryan J. Baxter, D. Kip Holderness, David A. Wood

Faculty Publications

Companies depend on strong internal controls to protect the integrity of accounting information systems. IT security and data privacy training are critical controls to safeguarding company information. However, employees often dislike the training, which can cause a lack of attention to and poor understanding of training concepts, leading to less effective internal controls. To improve the training experience, companies are implementing principles of games into employee training modules; a practice known as gamification. Using a laboratory experiment of data privacy training and a field study involving a publicly-traded bank’s rollout of IT security training, we test whether a training environment …

التمايز السلوكي لدى القادة ودوره في التماثل التنظيمي للحد من سلوك العمل المنحرف (دراسة تحليلية في الكلية الاسلامية الجامعة), فاضل راضي غباش الغزالي

Muthanna Journal of Administrative and Economics Sciences

المستخلص تهدف الدراسة الحالية الى إيضاح الدور الذي يمارسه التمايز السلوكي في بلورة التماثل التنظيمي للحد من سلوك العمل المنحرف . وقد جمعت بيانات الدراسة من آراء منتسبي الكلية الاسلامية الجامعة في القادسية وقد بلغ عدد الذين ابدوا آرائهم (55) فرداً ما بين موظف وتدريسي وقائد ادري . تم اختبار فرضيات الدراسة التي تدور حول علاقات الارتباط والتأثير المباشر وغير المباشر بين متغيرات الدراسة . اثبتت نتائج الدراسة صحة اغلب الفرضيات والتي اصيغ بصددها مجموعة من التوصيات التي يمكن الاستفادة منها في تطوير واقع التعليم العالي في العراق بشكل عام وفي المنظمة المبحوثه بشكل خاص .

دور التمكين الإداري في تعزيز الابتكار التنظيمي, حميد سالم الكعبي

Muthanna Journal of Administrative and Economics Sciences

المستخلص تتناول الدراسة الحالية اختبار دور التمكين الإداري في تعزيز الابتكار التنظيمي لعينة مكونة من (118) فرداً ، وكان مجتمع الدراسة كلية الرافدين الجامعة . وقد استخدم الباحث التكرارات ، والنسب المئوية ، والوسط الحسابي ، وتحليل الانحدار البسيط في تحليل فرضيات الدراسة . وقد أثبتت معظم نتائج الدراسة صحة الفرضيات التي تم افتراضها وخلصت الدراسة إلى مجموعة من الاستنتاجات والتوصيات ، ومن أهم تلك الاستنتاجات (يتعزز الابتكار التنظيمي من خلال التمكين الإداري في ظل بيئة الإعمال سريعة التغيير ، والذي أصبح الابتكار جوهرياً من اجل البقاء ، ولان بقاء المنظمة لا يمكن إن يتحقق إلا من خلال مجموعة من …

خارطة تدفق القيمة: كمدخل لمواجهة الهدر دراسة حاله في المعهد التقني/ الديوانية, طاهر حميد عباس

Muthanna Journal of Administrative and Economics Sciences

تتطلع هذه الدراسة إلى توظيف خارطة نشاط العملية بأنَّها أحد أهم أدوات خارطة تدفق القيمة في إعادة تصميم الخدمة في البيئة التعليمية ، وقد تم اختيار المعهد التقني/ الديوانية كونه أحد المؤسسات العلمية الراعية للعلم وتقدم أفرادها بما يسهم في تقديم أفضل الخدمات التي يتطلعون اليها وبذل الجهود من أجل الوصول إلى ميزة تنافسية تنعكس من خلال إزالة الهدر بجميع أنواعه الذي يجعل من وقت انتظار طالب الخدمة عبئاً من الناحيتين المعنوية والمادية. تتمثل مشكلة الدراسة في كثرة وطول الاجراءات لإنجاز معاملة احتساب شهادة ماجستير ومنح القدم واللقب العلمي لمستحقيها ما أدى الى زيادة وقت الانتظار، ما أنعكس سلباً على …

Client Importance And Audit Quality In Highly Connected Jurisdictions, Kelly Grani Yuen

Lingnan Theses

The study focuses on the audit quality issue in three culturally and commercially highly connected jurisdictions with very different legal systems which affect auditors. Hong Kong practices common law, Taiwan practices civil law, and the People’s Republic of China (Mainland China) practices a socialist legal system. Taiwan adopts a civil law system with heavy influence by common law countries. It is therefore motivating to assess how auditors in each of the three connected jurisdictions with distinctive legal environments handle the audit quality for important clients. Accounting scandals and auditing frauds are perceived to be driven by aggressive companies and misrepresentation …

Aicpa Annual Report, 2016; Ready For Next, American Institute Of Certified Public Accountants (Aicpa)

AICPA Annual Reports

No abstract provided.

Foxes In The Henhouse: An Exploratory Inquiry Into Financial Markets Fraud, Joseph Wall, Timothy J. Fogarty

Accounting Faculty Research and Publications

Conventional understandings of fraud are organized around the fraud triangle first developed in the 1950s by Cressey. This conceptual device remains central in our pedagogy and research on this especially timely topic. As long as fraud is imagined to be not much different than a stereotypical act by a single individual out of financial desperation and impulsiveness, the fraud triangle provides a reasonably powerful conceptual organization. However, when applied to abuses that occur in highly organized financial markets, its application takes on new meanings that push the boundaries of its usefulness. Using interviews with traders and other securities market participants, …

Audit Quality Indicators: Perceptions Of Junior-Level Auditors, Veena L. Brown, Jodi L. Gissel, Daniel Neely

Accounting Faculty Research and Publications

Purpose

In an effort to develop an audit quality (AQ) framework specific to the US audit market, the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) recently issued a concept release proposing 28 audit quality indicators (AQIs) along three dimensions: audit professionals, audit process and audit results. Using AQIs initially proposed by the PCAOB, as well as AQIs suggested by prior literature, the authors solicit perceptions from junior-level (senior and staff) auditors to investigate the current state of practice along many of the AQIs relating to audit professionals and audit process.

Design/methodology/approach

In the study, 78 junior-level auditors responded to the survey. …

Re-Thinking The Intentionality Of Fraud: Constructing And Testing The Theory Of Unintended Amoral Behavior To Explain Fraudulent Financial Reporting, Andrew Dill

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

My three-paper dissertation is aimed at applying the concepts of bounded ethicality and ethical fading to accounting fraud. Typical of relatively new fields such as behavioral ethics, theoretical models are scarce (Tenbrunsel & Smith-Crowe, 2008). As such, the purpose of Study 1 is to unify disparate theories and ideas from psychology and behavioral ethics as a means of constructing a theory, the Theory of Unintended Amoral Behavior (TUAB), which includes the concepts of bounded ethicality and ethical fading. In addition, the pressure for management to meet earnings expectations is discussed through the lens of the TUAB as an example of …

Under-Researched Areas Of Audit Quality: Inputs, Firms, And Institutions, Jared Eutsler

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Francis (2011) lists three under-researched units of analysis that affect audit quality: inputs, firms, and institutions. This dissertation analyzes how each of these units of analysis contributes to audit quality. Study 1 examines audit inputs, specifically, characteristics of the individual auditor that affect professional skepticism. Study 2 examines how firm staffing decisions affect audit quality. Study 3 examines how the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board ("PCAOB"), as a regulatory institution, promotes audit quality through their risk-based inspection program. The first study reports the results of two experiments that examine professional skepticism as a function of moral agency. Consistent with the …

Decision Making In Corporate Taxation, Bonnie Brown

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation is comprised of three experimental studies that examine corporate tax aggressiveness through an investigation of judgment and decision making in the corporate tax environment. Studies 1 and 2 examine individual judgment involved in decision making (i.e., assessments of tax positions based upon tax scenario facts and tax authority). Study 1 examines how advice from external tax advisors and a tax advisor's association with the company's audit firm influences the aggressiveness of experienced in-house corporate tax decision makers. Study 2 examines how situational factors in the corporate tax environment interact with individual traits to affect individual-level tax aggressiveness, focusing …