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Research Collection School Of Accountancy

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Cross-Industry Information Sharing Among Colleagues And Analyst Research, Allen Huang, An-Ping Lin, Amy Y. Zang Aug 2022

Cross-Industry Information Sharing Among Colleagues And Analyst Research, Allen Huang, An-Ping Lin, Amy Y. Zang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We identify a specific organizational resource in brokerage housesdinformation sharing among analyst colleagues who cover economically related industries along a supply chain. After controlling for brokerage selection effects, we show evidence consistent with the benefit of this resource to analyst research performance. Specifically, we find that analysts whose colleagues cover more economically connected industries have better research performance, especially when their colleagues produce higher-quality research. We further show that colleagues' coverage of downstream (upstream) industries is positively related to the accuracy of only analysts' revenue (expense) forecasts and that analysts and their highly connected colleagues tend to issue earnings forecast …


Accounting Scandals And Implications For Directors: Lessons From Enron, Pearl Hock-Neo Tan, Gillian Yeo Aug 2022

Accounting Scandals And Implications For Directors: Lessons From Enron, Pearl Hock-Neo Tan, Gillian Yeo

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We analyze the Enron case to identify the risk factors that potentially led to its collapse and specific issues relating to its aggressive accounting and high-light the lessons for independent directors. In Enron, the interactions between external stimuli, strategies, corporate culture, and risk exposures possibly created an explosive situation that eventually led to its demise. Much of the post-Enron reforms have been directed towards regulating the roles and responsibilities of executive directors and auditors. However, the role of independent directors has received relatively lesser attention. Independent directors should analyze the risks of their companies and understand the pressures that arise …


Contracting With Controllable Risk, Christopher S. Armstrong, Stephen A. Glaeser, Sterling Huang Jul 2022

Contracting With Controllable Risk, Christopher S. Armstrong, Stephen A. Glaeser, Sterling Huang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We examine how executives' ability to control their firms' exposure to risk affects the design of their incentive-compensation contracts. Our natural experimental evidence shows that exchange-traded weather derivatives allow executives to control their firms' exposure to weather risk. Once these derivatives became available, those executives who use them to hedge experience relative reductions in their total compensation and equity incentives. The decline in compensation is consistent with a reduction in the risk premium that executives receive for exposure to weather risk. The decline in equity incentives is consistent with the relation between risk and incentives shifting in a complementary direction …


Managerial Trustworthiness And Buybacks, Sterling Huang, Kaisa Snellman, Theo Vermaelen Jun 2022

Managerial Trustworthiness And Buybacks, Sterling Huang, Kaisa Snellman, Theo Vermaelen

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

CEO trustworthiness is positively related to long-term excess returns after buyback announcements. When the CEO is trustworthy, statements that the stock is undervalued are more credible. CEO trustworthiness is initially measured by the extent to which people in the county where the company headquarters is located trust each other. Further, the positive impact of trustworthiness on excess returns is higher when the CEO has been a long-term resident of a high-trust county, and correspondingly, trustworthy CEOs are less likely to be accused of financial misreporting. Our conclusions are confirmed when we use alternative measures of trustworthiness such as employee trust …


Short Interest And Corporate Investment: Evidence From Supply Chain Partners, Xia Chen, Guojin Gong, Shuqing Luo Jun 2022

Short Interest And Corporate Investment: Evidence From Supply Chain Partners, Xia Chen, Guojin Gong, Shuqing Luo

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Short interest contains valuable information about a firm’s business fundamentals. We investigate whether such information affects business partners’ real investment decisions in the supply-chain setting. We predict and find that a supplier’s future investments (including inventory, R&D, and tangible asset investments) decrease with its customer’s current short interest. This negative relation is stronger when the supplier faces greater difficulty in assessing its customer’s business fundamentals and when short interest is more likely to indicate longlasting deterioration in the customer’s fundamentals. Additional analysis does not support the alternative explanation that the supplier adjusts investments in response to unfavorable information obtained via …


Active Independent Directors And Earnings Quality, Yuanto Kusnadi, Bin Srinidhi Jun 2022

Active Independent Directors And Earnings Quality, Yuanto Kusnadi, Bin Srinidhi

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We examine the relationship between active independent directors and earnings quality for U.S. firms. We construct measures that proxy for activeness of independent directors and find that the proportion of active independent directors is under half on average. Our finding shows that earnings quality increases with the percentage of active independent directors on the board. Once the active independent directors are separated out, the other independent directors do not have any effect on earnings quality. This finding supports the hypothesis that the activeness of independent directors is incrementally significant over just the proportion of independent directors for the quality of …


5 Ways To Turn The Pandemic Into An Opportunity For E-Commerce Disruption, Yuanto Kusnadi, Gary Pan May 2022

5 Ways To Turn The Pandemic Into An Opportunity For E-Commerce Disruption, Yuanto Kusnadi, Gary Pan

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

It is safe to say that the COVID-19 pandemic had upended life as we knew it. Schools embraced blended learning, brick-and-mortar businesses were shuttered, and mask wearing whilst at indoor venues remains the order of the day. Amid the chaos, one bright spot is the opportunity for e-commerce entrepreneurs to disrupt traditional businesses.


Short Sellers And Insider Trading Profitability: A Natural Experiment, Xia Chen, Qiang Cheng, Ting Luo, Heng Yue May 2022

Short Sellers And Insider Trading Profitability: A Natural Experiment, Xia Chen, Qiang Cheng, Ting Luo, Heng Yue

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We examine the impact of short sellers on insider trading profitability using a natural experiment of a pilot program which relaxed short-selling constraints for randomly selected pilot stocks. We find that pilot firms experienced a significant decrease in insider trading profitability during the pilot program. The results are more pronounced for the pilot firms with poor information quality, and for the pilot firms without corporate restrictions on insider trading. Our evidence suggests that short sellers serve an important market disciplinary role by reducing insider trading profitability.


The Politics Of Bank Opacity, Heng Yue, Liandong Zhang, Qinlin Zhong Apr 2022

The Politics Of Bank Opacity, Heng Yue, Liandong Zhang, Qinlin Zhong

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

The distribution of power in the political system shapes the financial reporting opacity of banks. Specifically, banks located in states with senators on the Senate Banking Committee (BC senators) have greater abnormal loan loss provisions than banks in other states. The result is stronger for larger banks and banks with higher risk. In addition, BC senators have a negative effect on the likelihood of banks in their home states receiving enforcement actions, and, more importantly, this effect is stronger for more opaque banks. These findings suggest that politicians, regulators, and banks use opaque financial reporting to facilitate regulatory forbearance. Moreover, …


Regulatory Interventions In Response To Noncompliance With Mandatory Derivatives Disclosure Rules, Neil Bhattacharya, Hye Sun Chang, Raluca Chiorean Apr 2022

Regulatory Interventions In Response To Noncompliance With Mandatory Derivatives Disclosure Rules, Neil Bhattacharya, Hye Sun Chang, Raluca Chiorean

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We investigate regulatory actions in response to violations of mandatory derivatives disclosure rules (SFAS 161) and the outcomes of these regulatory interventions using a hand-collected sample of derivatives disclosures. Derivatives are used by nearly two-thirds of U.S. nonfinancial firms, and they are one of the most complex types of financial contracts. Consequently, inadequate derivatives disclosures could pose significant challenges to financial statement users in assessing the risk and financial health of enterprises. First, we document that firms with high proprietary and agency costs are less likely to comply with SFAS 161. Next, by examining derivatives-related SEC comment letters, we further …


Developing Future-Ready Talent Through ‘Real-World’ Digital Projects, Gary Pan, Benjamin Huan Zhou Lee, Yuanto Kusnadi Apr 2022

Developing Future-Ready Talent Through ‘Real-World’ Digital Projects, Gary Pan, Benjamin Huan Zhou Lee, Yuanto Kusnadi

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

A close collaboration between university and industry partners through ‘real-world’ digital projects could help develop future-ready accountants


Major Government Customers And Loan Contract Terms, Daniel A. Cohen, Bin Li, Ningzhong Li, Yun Lou Mar 2022

Major Government Customers And Loan Contract Terms, Daniel A. Cohen, Bin Li, Ningzhong Li, Yun Lou

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We examine the relation between the presence of U.S. government as a major customer and a supplier firm’s loan contract terms, using major corporate customers as a benchmark. We find that firms with major government customers are associated with fewer covenants and a lower likelihood of having performance pricing provisions in their loan contracts. In contrast, we do not find such associations for firms with major corporate customers. Further, we find no evidence that the existence of major government customers is related to the supplier firm’s loan spread, security, or maturity. We conjecture that lenders benefit from the stricter monitoring …


Insider Sales Under The Threat Of Short Sellers: New Hypothesis And New Tests, Kemin Wang, Rencheng Wang, K. C. John Wei, Bohui Zhang, Yi Zhou Mar 2022

Insider Sales Under The Threat Of Short Sellers: New Hypothesis And New Tests, Kemin Wang, Rencheng Wang, K. C. John Wei, Bohui Zhang, Yi Zhou

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Using the Regulation SHO program as a quasi-experiment, we document that the threat of short selling has a negative effect on the volume of opportunistic insider selling and a positive effect on its profitability for each transaction. These effects are stronger among firms with higher litigation risk, greater media coverage, and executives who have more of their firms' stock-related holdings. We further find robust evidence when we extend the analyses to short selling deregulations in the Chinese and Hong Kong stock exchanges. Overall, our findings suggest that short sellers play a disciplinary role in opportunistic insider selling.


The Influence Of Corporate Income Taxes On Investment Location: Evidence From Corporate Headquarters Relocations, Travis Chow, Sterling Huang, Kenneth J. Klassen, Jeffrey Ng Feb 2022

The Influence Of Corporate Income Taxes On Investment Location: Evidence From Corporate Headquarters Relocations, Travis Chow, Sterling Huang, Kenneth J. Klassen, Jeffrey Ng

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

This study examines the effects of jurisdictions’ corporate taxes and other policies on firms’ headquarters (HQ) location decisions. Using changes in state corporate income tax rates across time and states as the setting, we find that a one-percentage-point increase in the HQ state corporate income tax rate increases the likelihood of firms relocating their HQ out of the state by 16.8%, and an equivalent decrease in the HQ state rate decreases the likelihood of HQ relocations by 9.1%. Exploiting the unique tax policy features within the state apportionment system lends strong support to the interpretation that taxation drives this effect. …


Analysts' Site Visits And Corporate Innovation, Qiang Cheng, Yutao Wang, Holly I. Yang, Zheyuan Zhang Feb 2022

Analysts' Site Visits And Corporate Innovation, Qiang Cheng, Yutao Wang, Holly I. Yang, Zheyuan Zhang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

While prior studies examine whether analyst coverage affects corporate innovation, there is little research on the mechanism through which financial analysts affect corporate innovation. In this paper, we examine whether and how analysts’ questions about innovation affect corporate innovation activities and outcomes. Using a sample of corporate site visits in China, we find that when analysts ask questions about innovation during site visits, the firms invest more in research and development and file more patent applications in the future. This association is stronger when analysts have a greater information and monitoring role. In addition, consistent with knowledge diffusion between firms, …


Do Managers Learn From Analyst Participation In Conference Calls?, Amanda Aw Zhi Xin Yong, Young Jun Cho, Holly I. Yang Jan 2022

Do Managers Learn From Analyst Participation In Conference Calls?, Amanda Aw Zhi Xin Yong, Young Jun Cho, Holly I. Yang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

While research finds that conference calls are informative to the market and analysts, they can also be informative to managers as analysts’ questions can provide a feedback effect. Using a sample of conference call transcripts from 2002 to 2018, we find that greater analyst participation, as measured by the number of words spoken by analysts relative to the number of words spoken by managers during conference calls, is associated with higher accuracy in managers’ subsequent earnings forecasts. Cross-sectional tests show that this positive association is more pronounced when managers use more uncertain words in conference calls, when analysts use a …


Developing Talent Through Work-Integrated Learning, Poh Sun Seow, Gary Pan Jan 2022

Developing Talent Through Work-Integrated Learning, Poh Sun Seow, Gary Pan

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

No abstract provided.


Postmaterialism And Corporate Tax Avoidance, Yujia Cui, Jiwei Wang, Kangtao Ye Jan 2022

Postmaterialism And Corporate Tax Avoidance, Yujia Cui, Jiwei Wang, Kangtao Ye

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

This paper explores how postmaterialism culture influences corporate tax avoidance behavior. Using a proprietary dataset of China tax audits, we find that firms owned by investors from countries with higher postmaterialism values are less likely to engage in tax avoidance behavior in China. In addition, we find some evidence that the negative association between postmaterialism and tax avoidance is more pronounced when tax enforcement is stronger, indicating that national culture and formal institutions act as complements. To check the external validity of our main results, we further use a cross-country sample from 21 countries over 22 years. The evidence from …


Financial Capacity And The Demand For Audit Quality, Chee Yeow Lim, Gerald J. Lobo, Pingui Rao, Heng Yue Jan 2022

Financial Capacity And The Demand For Audit Quality, Chee Yeow Lim, Gerald J. Lobo, Pingui Rao, Heng Yue

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Prior research documents that financial capacity could be positively or negatively associated with the demand for audit quality. We re-examine this relation using changes in local real estate prices as exogenous shocks to corporate financial capacity. Using auditor size, auditor industry specialisation, and auditor fees as measures of audit quality, we find robust evidence that an increase (decrease) in financial capacity significantly reduces (increases) the demand for audit quality, and that this relation is more pronounced when firms are more financially constrained, when external monitoring by institutional investors and financial analysts is weaker, and when there is more negative news …


Audit Adjustments Matter: What They Reveal About Companies' Financial Reporting, Themin Suwardy, Chu Yeong Lim Jan 2022

Audit Adjustments Matter: What They Reveal About Companies' Financial Reporting, Themin Suwardy, Chu Yeong Lim

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

This study investigates the characteristics, nature and extent of proposed audit adjustments to the financial statements of listed companies in Singapore. Data was gathered from the 2018 to 2020 financial statements of 412 companies, along with views of close to 280 audit committee chairs and heads of finance (or similar designations) on the effectiveness of their companies’ finance function.


The Impact Of The Ifrs 9 Expected Loss Approach On Accounting Conservatism, Clarence Goh, Chu Yeong Lim, Kevin Ow Yong Dec 2021

The Impact Of The Ifrs 9 Expected Loss Approach On Accounting Conservatism, Clarence Goh, Chu Yeong Lim, Kevin Ow Yong

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Using an experimental setting, this paper examines the impact of the International Financial Reporting Standard (IFRS 9) expected credit loss (ECL) approach on accounting conservatism. The ECL approach enables banks to incorporate loan loss provisions (LLP) on a timelier basis and help bank regulators anticipate weaknesses in banks’ loan portfolios. Conversely, the ECL model could be more susceptible to managerial discretion. More conservative bank managers might make excessivecredit provisions. Our findings show that high conservatism is positively associated with higher levels of LLP. In addition, the effect of accounting conservatism is contingent upon the type of loan loss model. We …


Executive Tweets, Richard M.Crowley, Wenli Huang, Hai Lu Dec 2021

Executive Tweets, Richard M.Crowley, Wenli Huang, Hai Lu

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We explore the tweeting behavior of S&P 1500 firms’ executives (CEOs and CFOs) and its market consequences during the period of 2011 to 2018. We document that executives tweet financial information related to their firms and time these tweets to firms’ major events, and that investors respond to executive tweets in addition to firm tweets. Using the latest machine learning techniques, we develop an innovative construct measuring the content similarity between executive tweets and firm tweets. We use this measure to disentangle whether the market reaction comes from new information or trust. We show evidence consistent with the view that …


Beyond Shareholder Value? Why Firms Voluntarily Disclose Support For Black Lives Matter, A. J. Chen, Patricia M. Dechow, Samuel T. Tan Dec 2021

Beyond Shareholder Value? Why Firms Voluntarily Disclose Support For Black Lives Matter, A. J. Chen, Patricia M. Dechow, Samuel T. Tan

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We investigate why firms voluntarily disclose support for the Black Lives Matter movement (BLM firms) even though these disclosures have little impact on shareholder value. We examine two competing explanations: that managers are acting in the interests of a broad set of stakeholders, or that they are engaging in “woke-washing.” Our evidence supports the stakeholder perspective since we find that BLM firms have more inclusive cultures on multiple dimensions – from their board members, to employees, to the rights of shareholders, and to the compensation structure of top executives. Furthermore, BLM firms face less risk in speaking out since they …


Bundled Earnings Guidance And Analysts' Forecast Revisions, Charles Hsu, Rencheng Wang Dec 2021

Bundled Earnings Guidance And Analysts' Forecast Revisions, Charles Hsu, Rencheng Wang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Bundling managerial earnings guidance with quarterly earnings announcements (EAs) has become an increasingly common practice. This study investigates the impact of bundled guidance on analysts' forecast revisions. Our findings indicate that analysts respond more to bundled guidance than non-bundled guidance. This effect increases with analysts' time pressure and cognitive constraints around the EA. Analysts' revisions also incorporate more of the bundled management guidance when accompanied by additional information, such as conference calls. We further find that analysts revise their forecasts more quickly following bundled guidance than non-bundled guidance. Together, these findings are consistent with the notion that analysts place more …


Transforming Businesses With E-Commerce Intelligence, Yuanto Kusnadi, Gary Pan Nov 2021

Transforming Businesses With E-Commerce Intelligence, Yuanto Kusnadi, Gary Pan

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

2020 had been an extraordinary year as the Covid-19 pandemic struck almost all countries in the world and created an extraordinary impact on businesses worldwide. Singapore and many other Southeast Asian countries were not spared and had to implement lockdowns swiftly. To cope with physical store closures and the increased volume of online transactions, most businesses tried to revamp their business models and set up online stores to capitalise on the rise of the e-commerce wave. With the growing trend of online transactions, it has become imperative for companies operating in the Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) industry to track …


Data Analytics And Audit Quality, Ru Gao, Sterling Huang, Rencheng Wang Nov 2021

Data Analytics And Audit Quality, Ru Gao, Sterling Huang, Rencheng Wang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We examine the impact of data analytics on audit quality. Using hand-collected information on data analytics skills of employees of audit firms, we find that human capital investment in data analytics improves audit quality. The analytics capability of both frontline and back-office employees contributes to audit quality. The effect is more pronounced for audit clients with complex business operations, for clients with complicated accounting estimates, and for clients that are more digitalized. Taken together, our findings suggest that an audit office’s analytics capability represents an important office attribute that can affect audit quality.


Do Firms Respond To Peer Disclosures? Evidence From Clinical Trial Disclosures, Vedran Capkun, Yun Lou, Clemens A. Otto, Yin Wang Nov 2021

Do Firms Respond To Peer Disclosures? Evidence From Clinical Trial Disclosures, Vedran Capkun, Yun Lou, Clemens A. Otto, Yin Wang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We examine whether a firm’s decision to disclose non-financial proprietary information depends on peer disclosures of similar information. Using a sample of 5,035 unique clinical trials by U.S. pharmaceutical firms over the 2007-2014 period, we find that the firm is less likely to disclose its own clinical trial results if peers have published clinical trial results pertaining to the same medical condition. Conditional on disclosing clinical trial results, the firm is also less likely to disclose the trial results on time when peers have disclosed their clinical trial results. Our cross-sectional tests suggest that proprietary costs of disclosure play an …


Accounting For A Hopeful World, Themin Suwardy Nov 2021

Accounting For A Hopeful World, Themin Suwardy

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

In a commentary, SMU Associate Provost for Postgraduate Professional Education and Associate Professor of Accounting (Practice) Themin Suwardy noted that environmental reporting has become more common in the last 10 years and that companies are embracing sustainability reporting despite the challenging myriad of seemingly different models, frameworks and regulations. He opined that the IFRS Sustainability Disclosure Standards to be issued by the International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB) will enable companies to provide comprehensive sustainability information for the global financial markets. He urged accounting professionals to embrace the development wholeheartedly and to help organisations do and report good.


Non-Gaap Earnings And Stock Price Crash Risk, Charles Hsu, Rencheng Wang, Benjamin C. Whipple Oct 2021

Non-Gaap Earnings And Stock Price Crash Risk, Charles Hsu, Rencheng Wang, Benjamin C. Whipple

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We investigate whether non-GAAP earnings disclosures increase stock price crash risk. Consistent with non-GAAP disclosures allowing managers to inflate investors’ perceptions about firm performance, our results indicate that income increasing non-GAAP reporting increases crash risk. We also find that managers can use non-GAAP reporting as a substitute for earnings management to withhold bad news from investors (the traditional explanation for crashes). Finally, we find a positive association between non-GAAP reporting and the likelihood of subsequent events that can trigger a crash. Overall, our evidence is consistent with some non-GAAP disclosures exposing investors to risks of large and sudden price declines.


Local Political Corruption And M&As, Chun Liu, Yang Chen, Shanmin Li, Liang Sun, Mengjie Yang Oct 2021

Local Political Corruption And M&As, Chun Liu, Yang Chen, Shanmin Li, Liang Sun, Mengjie Yang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We examine the relation between local political corruption and firms' cross-province M&As using provincial-level data on corruption in China. The results show that firms in more corrupt regions are less likely to engage in cross-province M&As. Further analyses reveal that the effects of local corruption on the probability of cross-province M&As are stronger when corrupt officers have greater impeding benefits or lower impeding costs. Meanwhile, Both ex-ante intervention and ex post punishment are important channels through which corrupt officers hinder firms' cross province M&As. Moreover, informal institutions, such as social capital and informal networks can help to alleviate the negative …