Accounting Commons^™

The Equity-Financing Channel, The Catering Channel, And Corporate Investment: International Evidence, Yuanto Kusnadi, John K. C. Wei

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We examine how stock market mispricing affects corporate investment in an internationalsetting. We find that investment is more sensitive to stock prices for equity-dependent firms thanfor non-equity-dependent firms in our international sample. Investment is also more sensitive tostock prices for firms located in countries with more developed capital markets (i.e., lower costsof raising capital), higher share turnover (i.e., shorter shareholder horizons), and higher R&Dintensity (i.e., more opaque assets). More importantly, the positive relation between equitydependence and the sensitivity of investment to stock prices is more pronounced for firmslocated in these same countries. These findings are consistent with the equity-financinghypothesis and …

How Do Accounting Practices Spread? An Examination Of Law Firm Networks And Stock Option Backdating, Teck Meng Junior Tan, Patricia M. Dechow

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We hypothesize that one way that accounting practices spread is through law firm connections. We investigate this prediction by examining companies that avoided reporting compensation expense by engaging in stock option backdating. We hypothesize that executives engaged in backdating because they were desensitized to its inappropriateness when they learned through their legal counsel that other companies were engaging in this practice. We identify backdating companies through backdating-related restatements of earnings. Using network analysis, we document that backdating companies are more highly connected with other backdating companies via shared law firms. Logistic regressions indicate that the odds of a company backdating …

Commentary: Wanted - A New Generation Of Accountants, Poh Sun Seow, Gary Pan, Clarence Goh

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Facing a new wave of automation, young accountants must redefine their role and their value-add to their company, say three Singapore Management University observers.

Heineken's Acquisition Of Asia Pacific Breweries: Accounting For Business Combinations And Ownership Interests, Pearl Hock Neo Tan, Chu Yeong Lim

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

On July 20, 2012, Heineken, a Dutch brewery offered S$5.125 billion (Singapore dollars; approximately US$4.1 billion) to buy Asia Pacific Breweries Ltd (APB; formerly, Malayan Breweries Limited) from its Singapore-based joint venture partner, Fraser and Neave, Limited. (F&N). At that point, Heineken and F&N had joint control over APB through the joint venture vehicle Asia Pacific Investments Pte Ltd (APIPL). Brewery business under the joint arrangement had moved on quite predictably from the time APB was formed in 1931. However, the calm changed to high drama when Thai Beverage, owned by one of Thailand's tycoons, made a bid for F&N …

What Does It Take To Become A Partner At An Accountancy Firm?, Qiang Cheng, Yang Hoong Pang, Gary Pan, Poh Sun Seow, Kwong Sin Leong

Perspectives@SMU

Having ‘hard’ skills are important but one cannot do without the soft skills that will advance your career

Inside Accountancy: What It Takes To Become A Big 4 Partner, Qiang Cheng, Yang Hoong Pang, Gary Pan, Poh Sun Seow, Kwong Sin Leong

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Reaching partnership at a Big 4 firm is regarded as the pinnacle ofachievement for any accountant. Ask any early-career employee in a Big 4 firmwhether he or she wants to make partner one day. Many of them will say yes, unequivocally.

Non-Competes, Career Concerns, And Debt Covenants, Yun Lou, Rencheng Wang, Yi Zhou

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We study the impact of managers’ career concerns from non-competes enforcement on the design of debt covenants in private debt agreements. Using exogenous changes in the enforceability of managers’ non-compete clauses over the period of 1992-2004 across states in the United States, we show that borrowers headquartered in U.S. states with strong enforcement of non-compete clauses have fewer debt covenants compared to those headquartered in states with weak enforcement after controlling for reporting quality, risk taking, and firm performance. Our evidence is consistent with the argument that reduced job mobility and enhanced career concerns incentivize managers to ex ante avoid …

Automation And The Accounting Profession, Clarence Goh, Poh Sun Seow, Gary Pan

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Automation poses a threat to many of the tasks that are performed by accountants today. Certainly, many emerging technologies have already begun to perform tasks that have traditionally been performed by accountants. For example, advancements in cloud-based accounting software now make it much easier for small businesses to easily and accurately enter and edit financial information on their own without the input of accountants. Looking further into the horizon, newer technologies can now turn hard-copy receipts into a machine-readable format, encrypt them,and allocate them to an account without any input from a human. Such developments will continue to reduce the …

What Does It Take To Become A Partner At An Accountancy Firm?, Qiang Cheng, Yang Hoong Pang, Gary Pan, Poh Sun Seow, Kwong Sin Leong

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Having ‘hard’ skills are important but one cannot do without the soft skills that will advance your career.

An Examination Of The Statistical Significance And Economic Relevance Of Profitability And Earnings Forecasts From Models And Analysts, Mark E. Evans, Kenneth Njoroge, Keng Kevin Ow Yong

Research Collection School of Accountancy

In this paper, we propose and empirically test a cross-sectional profitability forecasting model which incorporates two major improvements relative to extant models. First, in terms of model construction, we incorporate mean reversion through the use of a two-stage partial adjustment model and inclusion of a number of additional relevant determinants of profitability. Second, in terms of model estimation, we employ least absolute deviation (LAD) analysis instead of ordinary least squares (OLS) because the former approach is able to better accommodate outliers. Results reveal that forecasts from our model are more accurate than three extant models at every forecast horizon considered …

How Singapore Investors Can Profit From Unstructured Data, Clarence Goh

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Data that is collected in the business environment can be structured or unstructured. In general, structured data refers to information which is highly organised and which can easily be stored in rows and columns within database systems. On the other hand, unstructured data does not have a strict data structure, and is also not organised in a pre-defined manner.

The Effects Of Risk Management On Management Forecast Behavior, John L. Campbell, Sean Cao, Hye Sun Chang, Raluca Chiorean

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Prior research examines several reasons why managers voluntarily disclose information, but provides relatively little evidence as to whether day-to-day operational decisions influence a manager’s disclosure choice. In this study, we examine whether a particular operational activity – risk management through the use of derivatives – affects whether a manager decides to issue earnings forecasts. Using a large hand-collected sample of derivatives users and non-users, we find that derivatives users are more likely to issue earnings forecasts relative to non-users. We then find that this result is stronger when the use of derivatives makes it less costly for managers to issue …

Gender And Connections Among Wall Street Analysts, Lily Hua Fang, Sterling Huang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We examine how alumni ties with corporate boards differentially affect male and female analysts’ job performance and career outcomes. Connection improves men’s job performance — forecasting accuracy and recommendation impact — significantly more than women’s. Controlling for performance, connection further contributes to men’s, but not women’s, likelihood of being voted by institutional investors as “star” analysts, a marker of career success. These asymmetric effects are stronger in more opaque firms and among younger analysts, but is absent from a placebo test. Our evidence indicates that men reap higher benefits from social networks than women in both job performance and subjective …

The Predictive Audit: Why Prevention Is Better Than A Cure, Clarence Goh

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Foreseeing potential problems can save your business from long-term headaches.

The Predictive Audit: Why Prevention Is Better Than A Cure, Clarence Goh

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Foreseeing potential problems can save your business from long-term headaches.

The Real Effect Of The Initial Enforcement Of Insider Trading Laws, Zhihong Chen, Yan Huang, Yuanto Kusnadi, K. C. John Wei

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Based on a difference-in-differences approach, we find strong evidence that the initial enforcement of insider trading laws improves capital allocation efficiency. The effect is concentrated in developed markets and manifests shortly after the enforcement year. Further analysis shows that the improvement is positively associated with the increase in liquidity around the enforcement year and the opaqueness of the information environment before the enforcement year. The improvement is more pronounced for firms operating in more competitive markets, being more financially constrained, and with more severe agency problems. Finally, we find increased accounting performance after the enforcement and the increase is positively …

Do High Ceo Pay Ratios Destroy Firm Value?, Qiang Cheng, Tharindra Ranasinghe, Sha Zhao

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

There is growing public concern over the rapid growth in CEO pay relative to average worker pay (CEO pay ratio). Critics contend that high CEO pay ratios could destroy firm value by damaging employee morale and/or signal CEO rent extraction. In this paper, we use a proprietary dataset to examine the relationship between CEO pay ratio and firm value/performance. Contrary to critics’ arguments, we find that industry-adjusted CEO pay ratios are positively associated with both firm value and performance. We also find that high CEO pay ratios are associated with higher quality acquisitions and stronger CEO turnover-performance sensitivity. Our results …

Does Director Interlock Impact The Diffusion Of Accounting Method Choice?, Jie Han, Nan Hu, Ling Liu, Gaoliang Tian

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

This paper examines the influence of director interlock on firms' discrete accounting method choices from the perspective of behavior diffusion. We argue that firm managers will imitate their interlocked-partner firm's accounting method choices when choosing their own accounting methods. We find that when there is an interlock relationship between two firms, their accounting method choices, including inventory and depreciation methods, are similar to each other, indicating that accounting method choices can diffuse across firms through director interlock. In addition, such similarity is greater the longer the interlock relationship between the two firms is and as uncertainty increases. Further, the interlock …

Effects Of Informal Institutions On The Relationship Between Accounting Measures Of Risk And Bank Distress, Kiridaran Kanagaretnam, Jimmy Lee, Chee Yeow Lim, Gerald J. Lobo

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We investigate the effects of informal institutions (trust, religiosity and the media) on the relationship between accounting-based risk measures and bank distress. We conduct our analysis in two stages. In the first stage, we extend the prior literature by documenting a link between accounting-based risk measures and bank distress during the 2008-2009 financial crisis. In particular, given the environment characterized by rapid growth in financial innovation and complex financial transactions prior to the crisis, simple accounting-based risk measures continue to predict bank distress during this crisis period. In the second stage, we address our main research question related to the …

Critical Evaluation Of Action 14 Recommendations And The Suggested Way Forward For Singapore, Luis Coronado, Jerome Van Staden

Research Collection School Of Economics

The final report on Action 14 of the Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) project, Making Dispute Resolution Mechanisms More Effective presents a commitment by countries to implement certain “minimum standards” on dispute resolution. In many ways, Action 14 is the linchpin to the success of the entire BEPS project. To implement the significant changes developed under the BEPS project and make certain that there is neither unintended double taxation nor double non-taxation, there must be a strong and effective mechanism in place when disputes do (inevitably) arise. While the goal of the BEPS project is to create a more …

Ceo Contractual Protection And Debt Contracting, Qiang Cheng, Xia Chen, Alvis K. Lo, Xin Wang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

CEO employment agreements and severance pay agreements are prevalent among S&P1500 firms. While prior research has examined their impact on corporate decision from shareholders’ perspective, there is little research on their impact from debtholders’ perspective. We examine the effect on debt contracting of CEO contractual protection, in the form of employment agreements and severance pay agreements. We find that compared with other loans, loans issued by firms with CEO contractual protection contain more financial covenants, particularly performance covenants, are more likely to have performance pricing provisions, and have higher loan spreads. We further find that this effect increases with the …

Sharing Risk With The Government: How Taxes Affect Corporate Risk Taking, Alexander Ljungqvist, Liandong Zhang, Luo Zuo

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Using 113 staggered changes in corporate income tax rates across U.S. states, we provide evidence on how taxes affect corporate risk-taking decisions. Higher taxes reduce expected profits more for risky projects than for safe ones, as the government shares in a firm's upside but not in its downside. Consistent with this prediction, we find that risk taking is sensitive to taxes, albeit asymmetrically: the average firm reduces risk in response to a tax increase (primarily by changing its operating cycle and reducing R&D risk) but does not respond to a tax cut. We trace the asymmetry back to constraints on …

Impact Of Oecd Beps Action 7 Proposals On Modification Of Articles 5(4), 5(5) And 5(6) Of Oecd Model Convention - An Evaluation Of Action 7 On The Future Of Intra-Group Transactions And Business Models Of Mnes In Their Cross-Border Investments, Ching Khee Tan, Henry Syrett

Research Collection School Of Economics

The notion of permanent establishment (PE) is one of the most important issues in treaty-based international fiscal law; it is perhaps the single most important and dynamic one, too.

With openness in economies, globalisation and rapid development of e-commerce business models, there is a complete change in the way business is carried out throughout the world by multinational companies (MNE). Traditional ways of doing business have given way to modern and rather flexible ways of operating globally. Naturally, taxing rules need to keep up the pace at which businesses are evolving. It is extremely crucial that taxes are paid at …

Valuation Implications Of Fas 159 Reported Gains And Losses From Fair Value Accounting For Liabilities, Sung Gon Chung, Gerald J. Lobo, Keng Kevin Ow Yong

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

This study examines the economic implications of fair value liability gains and losses arising from the adoption of Statement of Financial Accounting Standards No. 159 (hereafter, FAS 159). Consistent with the notion that gains and losses contain value-relevant information, we find a positive correspondence between a firm’s FAS 159 fair value liability gains and losses and current period stock returns. However, further analysis indicates that fair value gains and losses from liabilities have a negative association with future returns, suggesting that investors misprice this earnings component. This negative association is stronger for firms with low levels of institutional ownership. While …

Using Student-Generated Videos To Learn Internal Control In Accounting Information Systems Courses, Poh Sun Seow, Gary Pan

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Educators consider the video learning approach an effective method to deliver educational content as compared to the traditional method of books and written materials. This paper presents a project that involves student-generated videos to learn internal control in an undergraduate accounting information systems course. We believe that this video learning approach is an engaging way for students to be self-directed learners in learning internal control and complements the written materials in the textbook. The survey results show that most of the respondents viewed the learning experience of the video project positively. The results also indicate that the video project was …

Why Do Publicly Listed Firms Evade Taxes: Evidence From China, Travis Chow, Bin Ke, Hongqi Yuan, Yao Zhang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Taking advantage of the mandatory disclosure of detected corporate tax evasions in China, we examine why publicly listed firms evade taxes. Different from most prior studies that focus on corporate income tax avoidance, we consider tax evasions related to both income taxes and non-income taxes. We also use a bivariate probit model to account for the partial observability of corporate tax evasion. Many of our regression results using the bivariate probit model are different from the results using the reduced form probit model that ignores the partial observability of tax evasion. Many of our results are also different from those …

Another Look At The Macroeconomic Information Content Of Aggregate Earnings: Evidence From The Labor Market, Congcong Li, Rebecca Hann, Maria Ogneva

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

In this paper we examine the macroeconomic information content of aggregate earnings from the labor market’s perspective. We use insights from the labor economics literature to characterize the information contained in aggregate GAAP earnings and its components that is relevant for predicting aggregate job creation and destruction, labor income, and unemployment. Our results suggest that not only does aggregate earnings news convey information about future labor market aggregates, but its information content is incremental to other macroeconomic variables at near-term horizons. Further, the source of this information stems primarily from two earnings components: aggregate core earnings and special items. Core …

Messaging Without A Message: Executive Value And Social Media Activity, Ru Gao, Gilles Hilary, Rencheng Wang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We show that executives who start tweeting benefit from better career options. We motivate this finding using the well-established theory of limited attention. Consistent with this explanation, we find that content is irrelevant. Comparative statics are also consistent with our framework. In particular, the effect of Twitter is greater for executives who were largely unrecognized and who were underpaid before they started tweeting, who garner greater public attention from their social media activity, who enjoy higher professional mobility, and who operate in environments where compensation setting is less structured.

Corporate In-House Human Capital Tax Investments, Xia Chen, Qiang Cheng, Travis Chow, Yanju Liu

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

In-house human capital investment in the tax function is a significant input to a firm’s tax planning. Yet, due to lack of data, there is little empirical evidence on whether corporate in-house tax departments are associated with effective tax planning. We examine this issue using hand-collected data on corporate tax employees in S&P1500 firms. We find that firms with larger in-house tax departments are more effective in tax planning: they have lower tax rates, report lower uncertain tax benefits, and exhibit less volatile tax rates. The results are stronger for firms with in-house tax departments that have a higher proportion …

Grooming The Future Disruptive Accounting Professionals, Gary Pan, Gan Hup Tan, Poh Sun Seow

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

In this chapter, we will discuss how SMU brought about innovation changes in the university’s learning environment. In 2011, a steering committee was set up by SMU President, Professor Arnoud De Meyer to develop strategies that focused on innovation in learning pedagogy at the university. Subsequent brainstorming sessions led to the evolution of the SMU-X programme, which aimed to broaden the scope of university education by encompassing real life problems and problem-solving skills in the curriculum. The concept encompassed three key elements: mindset, pedagogy, and physical space. The challenge was to offer more applied learning with close coordination between classroom …