Accounting Commons^™

Accounting For Goodwill: The Effectiveness Of Amortization And Impairments Before And After Asc 350, Jessica Cruz

CMC Senior Theses

Prior to the implementation of FAS 142 in 2002, goodwill was amortized annually. Now, companies with goodwill on their books must test it annually for impairment. This paper examines the effectiveness of goodwill amortization and impairment of goodwill both before and after the adoption of FAS 142 by analyzing their effect on abnormal stock returns. My results regarding the effect of goodwill amortization on stock returns are inconsistent, suggesting that goodwill amortization is not useful in determining the value of a company. My results also suggest that the stock market anticipates goodwill impairments before they are announced.

The Effect Of Mandatory Adoption Of Ifrs On Transparency For Investors, Crystal Anderson

CMC Senior Theses

This paper examines the effect of the mandatory adoption of the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) on transparency for investors by measuring the increase in earnings management during the post-adoption period of IFRS. One sign of earnings management is current year earnings being only slightly higher than the previous year’s earnings. An increase in earnings management means a decrease in accounting quality and a decrease of transparency for investors. By comparing firms that mandatorily adopted IFRS to similar benchmark firms in terms of strength of legal enforcement, book-to-market ratios, market values and net incomes, I am able to run empirical …

Blockchain And The Future Of The Audit, Connor Ortman

CMC Senior Theses

“In the future, virtually every function in the world of financial services will be displaced, disintermediated and decentralized. The Internet gave us a powerful way to share and access information. Blockchain now gives us a powerful way to share and access value.”

During a February 2017 AICPA roundtable, Chairman of the Wall Street Blockchain Alliance and previous Global Head of Trading Analytics at Thomson Reuters, Ron Quarantana spoke to the revolutionary scale of blockchain. Quaranta, viewed by many as an expert in financial technology, predicts that the adoption of blockchain, both by the Big Four accounting firms and their clients, …

Institutional Ownership In Relation To The Mandatory Audit Firm Rotation Rule And Its Effect On Audit Quality, Latisha Shah

CMC Senior Theses

Previous studies have concluded that mandatory audit firm rotation (MAFR) has not been successful in controlling the outcomes of the auditor-client relationship. Additionally, the literature concludes that high institutional ownership enhances audit quality through monitoring the management-auditor relationship. This paper hypothesizes that better corporate governance in terms of high institutional ownership percentage will enhance audit quality during a MAFR regime. Since countries that have implemented MAFR in the past have their data in their local languages, I use the special case of Arthur Andersen clients based in the US as my treatment group. I carry out a descriptive statistical analysis …

Is The Accruals Anomaly More Persistent In Firms With Weak Internal Controls?, Kanishk Kapur

CMC Senior Theses

In 1996, Sloan identified the accruals anomaly, in which the negative relationship between the accruals component of current earnings and subsequent stock returns can be exploited to generate excess returns. One would expect the accruals anomaly to dissipate and ultimately disappear as investors take advantage of the now-public information. However, nearly two decades later, it persists as one of the most prominent and contentious anomalies; its magnitude of current and future excess returns still remain controversial. The main reason for its persistence is that extreme accrual firms possess characteristics that are unappealing to most investors. These characteristics, which include insufficient …

The Balance Between Financial And Quality Performance In For-Profit Hospitals Versus Non-Profit Hospitals, Blake Seidner

CMC Senior Theses

Recent trends of financial distress for non-profit hospitals and the uptick in acquisition of these hospitals by for-profit entities indicate different focuses from the management of each type of hospital. Using data on hospital quality and basic financial measures, this study examines shift in the balance of financial and quality performance. The dataset focuses on private non-profit and for-profit hospitals with low bed counts, ranging from 50-200 total beds. Results indicate a positive relationship between for-profit status and basic financial performance measures, such as profitability, and a negative relationship with patient experience, cost reduction for the patient, and overall quality. …

Optimize Your Fitness, Optimize Your Business: The Balanced Scorecard, Analysis And Application For The Crossfit Affiliate, Jordan G. Aronowitz

CMC Senior Theses

The Balanced Scorecard for the CrossFit Affiliate will provide unprepared or inexperienced managers with the necessary information to make informed operational decisions. The Balanced Scorecard incorporates financial data, customer satisfaction, internal operations, and future growth to create a series of cause-and-effect relationships that illustrate how decisions in one aspect of a business affect others. The Balanced Scorecard particularly benefits inexperienced managers leading small businesses. As overall small business growth increased, the boutique fitness industry expanded. The CrossFit brand rose in conjunction, but because corporate leaders insist on a hands-off licensing model, affiliate owners do not receive assistance from CrossFit corporate …

Obscure U: Complexity And Complicity In For-Profit University Financial Statements, Caroline R. Counts

CMC Senior Theses

The prominence and size of For Profit Universities (FPUs) today has led to increased regulation and oversight. One important regulation is the 90/10 rule which states that FPUs cannot receive more than 90% of their revenue from government Title IV funds. The regulations require publicly traded For Profit Universities to not only comply with the 90/10 rule but also to disclose their score on their financial statements. There however, is little research studying the quality of these disclosures. My paper studies the readability and complexity of the 90/10 score disclosure in relation to the 90/10 score. My findings suggest that …

The Effect Of Increased Regulation On Option Use Within The Information Technology Industry, Ahmed H. Eltamami

CMC Senior Theses

Exorbitant executive compensation packages have drawn large criticism from the public eye and with the recent financial crisis and the previous tech bubble opinion on executive incentives has forced government institutions to respond. Over the past two decades the SEC and FASB have aimed to respond to the public and with three large regulation changes in the 2000s, pay for performance compensation has gone through many changes. In this study I build on previous work in an attempt to answer whether or not executives within the Information Technology industry have seen a larger decline in option compensation when compared to …

Player Compensation And Team Performance: Salary Cap Allocation Strategies Across The Nfl, Max Winsberg

CMC Senior Theses

The National Football League’s salary cap constrains the available resources each franchise is allotted to spend on player personnel. I examine the effects of executive management’s compensation allocation strategies on team performance from 2006 to 2013. The findings suggest that spending more than the league-average on offensive lineman hurts overall team performance. Spending above the league average on both the offensive line and quarterback positions negatively affects offensive performance as well. This supports previous research stating that taking a superstar-approach to cap distribution negatively affects team performance. Furthermore, I find evidence of increased compensation inequality among players under the Collective …

From Legally Confidential To Financially Confident: Resolving The Tension Between Lawyers And Auditors Over Contingent Liability Disclosure, Samantha Nicole Kunz

CMC Senior Theses

Auditors review documented financial figures to test for their accuracy and materiality. Lawyers analyze evidential facts and records to build sound legal arguments. These parties work toward a mutual purpose: to present their clients as legitimate and compliant businesses. But what happens when the concrete facts upon which lawyers and auditors base their work are obscured by their inability to see into the future? In other words, how can these professions conjunctively handle potential future obligations brought about by contingent liabilities?

This study will attempt to resolve the tensions that emerge between lawyers and auditors when tasked with estimating the …

10b5-1 Plans And Earnings Management By High-Level Executives, Joshua A. Thomas

CMC Senior Theses

Using historical firm financial and insider trading information, this paper examines whether high-level insiders manipulate earnings ahead of their own 10b5-1 equity transactions. The empirical evidence suggests that high-level executives appear to manipulate earnings through real activities such as abnormal discretionary expenditures and abnormal cash flows from operations to influence equity prices ahead of their own transactions under Rule 10b5-1. Evidence also suggests that executives appear to be unlikely to engage in earnings management through highly scrutinized means such as accruals. An interpretation of these results is that high-level executives may be using 10b5-1 plans as an offensive tool to …

The Value Of Luxury Brand Names In The Fashion Industry, Tricia Wang

CMC Senior Theses

Brand names in the Fashion industry are often times perceived as overpriced and unreasonable. Nevertheless, the success of well-known luxury brands in the industry has been growing domestically and internationally at a breakneck pace. Forbes publishes an annual list on the top 100 most valuable brands annually using a formula of their own making. 8 out of these 100 brands are luxury fashion brands. Why are luxury fashion brands so coveted? It can’t only be because of humans’ desires to own superior goods or even for the sake of their egos. In this paper I will delve into the hidden …

Better Measurement Of Governments Through The Application Of Accrual Accounting For Government-Wide Financial Statements, Caleb D. Cunha

CMC Senior Theses

In this paper, we will look at and discuss the differences and similarities between governmental entities and for-profit business. We will mainly discuss the different goals, purposes, users, and issues between government and for-profit accounting in order to show that changes to governmental accounting standards would lead to more transparency and accountability, which in turn would help determine the success of an individual governmental entity. We will conclude by looking at countries that have implemented accrual accounting for government-wide financial statements, and we will explain how the adoption of accrual accounting for government-wide financial statements in the United States will …

Why Does The U.S. Continue To Use Gaap And Will It Ever Converge To Ifrs?, Hester Lam

CMC Senior Theses

The United States has a long history of doing things differently than other countries. Its accounting standards are no different; to date, it continues to use its own Generally Accepted Accounting Principles and have yet to converge to the International Financial Reporting Standards ("IFRS") as set by the International Accounting Standards Board. In 2008, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC") Chairman Christopher Cox published a press release in which the SEC published for public comment a roadmap towards convergence by 2014. However, in subsequent years, Memorandum of Understandings published by the IASB and the United States' Financial Accounting Standards …

Friends In High Places: Measuring The Effects Of Compensation Committee Characteristics On Ceo Pay Packages In 2013, Danielle M. Knott

CMC Senior Theses

In the past decade, public scrutiny surrounding rising levels of executive compensation has led to more stringent independence requirements for compensation committees. However, there is little research studying the effects of compensation committees on executive pay from the time these new requirements were implemented. My paper studies the effects of compensation committee chair personal ties to the CEO, economic interests, and group committee characteristics on both the level and structure of CEO compensation. My findings suggest that certain committee chair personal ties to the CEO are associated with both a higher level of CEO compensation and a higher percentage of …

Differences Between Ind As And Ifrs: Can Full Convergence Ever Occur Between The Two?, Shoubhik Pal

CMC Senior Theses

Since the turn of the millennium, there have been various attempts by Indian regulators as well as the government to converge the current accounting system in India (tentatively called Indian GAAP) to a system similar to IFRS, considered today to be the prevalent worldwide set of accounting standards. Indian GAAP has had its fair share of criticism, the most telling being that it avoids the principle of substance over form in various topics in its literature. The first announcement of a plan to converge came in July 2007. While suffering various setbacks through delays in recent years, the current roadmap …

Credit Ratings And Firm Litigation Risk, Huixian Xie

CMC Senior Theses

This paper looks at whether firms’ credit ratings are negatively affected by litigation risk after controlling for known factors that affect credit ratings. The conventional wisdom is that litigation risk and credit ratings have an inverse relationship. However, my hypothesis is that the inverse relationship will not be stable if the model of credit ratings has taken other factors into account. The methodology first constructs a model of litigation risk, and then regress the credit ratings on the measurement of litigation risk. Previous empirical research on litigation risk measurement uses industry proxies as indicators for litigation risk. In this paper, …

An Examination Of The Interest Rate Sensitivity Of Business Development Company (Bdc) Stock Returns, Timothy Park

CMC Senior Theses

This paper examines the interest rate sensitivity of Business Development Companies (BDCs). The results of this study are intended to lend insight to investors about the viability and timing of investments in BDCs during the business cycle. Similar to previous research that has examined interest rate sensitivity of financial companies, this paper employs a two-factor market model to see whether BDCs are responsive to changes in short, medium, and long-term interest rates. My particular interest in BDCs is motivated by their unique asset-liability structure and requirements, as well as their high dividend payouts. Monthly data is drawn from the period …

Omni-Channel Retail And The New Age Consumer: An Empirical Analysis Of Direct-To-Consumer Channel Interaction In The Retail Industry, Alec J. Dorman

CMC Senior Theses

It is indisputable that the internet has become a necessary component of contemporary multi-channel retail, as more consumers are choosing to purchase goods online each year. As online spending continues to grow, many have called into question the future of brick-and-mortar retail. This thesis seeks to empirically prove that brick-and-mortar retail remains not only relevant, but indispensable in direct-to-consumer business models. The basis of this conjecture is the idea of channel synergism, in which online and brick-and-mortar operations are complementary. This theory is predicated on the emergence of the omni-channel retail, which is characterized by the integration of the various …

Trends In Pro Forma Reporting During The Great Recession, Dakota W. Mivshek

CMC Senior Theses

Pro forma EPS reporting is a fairly new accounting disclosure; it has since been modified in 2003 by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, to include additional disclosure and filing requirements. This “Regulation G” has been around for nearly a decade and since that time a major financial crises in the United States has occurred. This study attempts to analyze trends in pro forma EPS reporting within the S & P 500 constituents during the Great Recession, and speculate as to whether earnings management was apparent. This study provides evidence that there was a significant increase in the proportion of …

Exploiting The Gaps In Gaap: A Look At The Principles Versus Rules Debate, Nicholas A. Gillette

CMC Senior Theses

The principles versus rules debate has long since been a conversation in the accounting world, but the conversation heated up in the early part of the 21st century on the heels of a few highly publicized accounting frauds. In an increasingly globalized business environment, convergence between the more rules-oriented US GAAP and more principles-oriented IFRS is becoming more and more relevant. This study attempts to better inform that debate, exploring the accounting conceptual framework, United States legal environment, and the costs and benefits of adopting a more principles-oriented set of accounting standards. This study concludes that, though there would likely …

Reducing Employee Turnover In The Big Four Public Accounting Firms, Erin L. Maclean

CMC Senior Theses

Employee turnover is extremely costly to any business in terms of training costs and loss of pertinent knowledge and experience. This paper explores the contributors to the high rates of employee turnover seen in public accounting by focusing on the Big Four accounting firms, Deloitte, EY, KPMG, and PricewaterhouseCoopers. Employee retention is a factor of corresponding employee motivation, as seen through the analysis of popular motivational theories and their applications to a career in public accounting. This paper also delves into the possible contributors to the differences in retention rates between males and females in this occupation. Lastly, an analysis …

Detecting Fraud In Bankrupt Municipalities Using Benford's Law, Allyn H. Haynes

Scripps Senior Theses

This thesis explores if fraud or mismanagement in municipal governments can be diagnosed or detected in advance of their bankruptcies by financial statement analysis using Benford’s Law. Benford’s Law essentially states that the distribution of first digits from real world observations would not be uniform, but instead follow a trend where numbers with lower first digits (1, 2…) occur more frequently than those with higher first digits (…8,9). If a data set does not follow Benford’s distribution, it is likely that the data has been manipulated. This widespread phenomenon has been used as a tool to detect anomalies in data …

Creating A Fog: Can Plain English Be Used To Mislead Investors?, Scott Collins

CGU Theses & Dissertations

A recent growth in textual analysis research in the accounting and finance literature relies heavily on context to draw conclusions about the readability or sentiment of the text under study. Yet the complexity of the text used in the financial disclosure is also relevant in evaluating readability and sentiment. Experimental results in this dissertation thesis show that a change in annual report complexity is associated with a change in the probability that a subject will comprehend the information being communicated in the disclosure. Specifically, increasing the complexity of an annual report disclosure dampens the probability that a subject will understand …

The High Cost And Value Of Patents: Finding The Appropriate Balance Between The Rights Of The Inventor And The Advancement Of Society, Andy Segal

CMC Senior Theses

Property rights are the backbone of Western Civilization. Capitalism can only be successful if individuals feel secure about the ownership of their assets. Patents are the property rights granted to the inventor by the government. Without these rights, inventors will find it extremely difficult monetizing their contributions to society. Thus, in an effort to incentivize innovation and commit society to human progress, our Founding Fathers built our country on a strong set of intellectual property rights.

At the same time, nothing impedes innovation like a monopoly and, in essence, all a patent amounts to is a monopoly, the right to …

Corporate Social Responsibility And Financial Performance: Does It Pay To Be Good?, Harmony J. Palmer

CMC Senior Theses

The prominence of corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives today suggests that the corporate perception of such policies has shifted from an unnecessary addition to a critical business function. Using a reliable source of data on corporate social performance (CSP), this study explores and tests the relationship between CSP and corporate financial performance (CFP). Unlike prior research, this study additionally tests the impact CSP has on sales and gross margin in hopes of providing insight on sales strategies that can be implemented to maximize the impact of the relationship. The dataset includes most of the S&P 500 firms and covers years …

A Structural Analysis Of The European Monetary Union And Its Effect On Greece In Light Of The European Financial Crisis, Stephanie C. Ramos

CMC Senior Theses

The intent of this paper is to analyze the structural composition of the European Monetary Union and its implications for the European Financial Crisis, specifically with respect to Greece. This analysis will be driven by a trend analysis of several economic variables from 1999-2010. These variables range from the four requirements set under the Maastricht criteria, competitiveness indicators, and relative European trade balances, to international investment position. A quantitative and empirical analysis of this data finds that the Greek crisis was a result of structural issues with the EMU and the Greek government. The ECB’s inability to enforce the Maastricht …

Market Value Vs Historical Cost Valuations Of Fixed Assets In The Context Of International Convergence, Alexander Y. Varga

CMC Senior Theses

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the differences between accounting for fixed assets under IFRS and U.S. GAAP.  Primarily the discussion will be driven by the question: which standard should the FASB lobby for in its joint effort with the IASB to converge U.S. GAAP with IFRS?  The paper will start by establishing that financial reporting, as it has evolved in the United States, was developed primarily to assist in the accountability relationships between management and both credit and equity investors.  From there the paper will look at which standard is better suited to fulfill this goal and …

The Impact Of The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act On American Business From 1977-2010, Ajani Harris

CMC Senior Theses

This paper seeks to present the moral and ethical frameworks in which to consider the effect of bribing on business and the great community; confront the cultural differences that lie between American businesses and its potential interest abroad, as well as the growing international move to implementation similar to that of the FCPA; analyze prior anti-bribery legislation and the historical events that prompted the need for a policy like the FCPA, discuss the basic elements of the policy’s two pronged approach of anti-bribery and disclosure regulation; examine several cases in the enforcement of the FCPA on American businesses; and consider …