Accounting Commons^™

Fair Value And Funding Structures: Motivators Behind Banks' Reclassification Activities., Thomas Walker

CMC Senior Theses

U.S financial regulations and reporting standards are ever-changing and have a significant impact on how banks classify and oversee their assets. The implementation of ASC 320 in 1993, as well as ASC 820 and ASC 825-10 in 2008, altered the effects of fair value accounting. This study examines factors that drive banks to use the held-to-maturity (HTM) and available-for-sale (AFS) classifications following the implementation of ASC 825-10 during the 2008 Global Financial Crisis. I focus on how banks use the HTM classification to obscure the accurate valuation of their securities by failing to disclose unrealized gains or losses, and on …

Audit Pricing Under Asc 606: Evidence From Software-As-A-Service Technology Firms, Donald Weigle

CMC Senior Theses

ASC 606 is an accounting standard issued in May 2014 that fundamentally changed how firms identify performance obligations and recognize revenue. The standard requires a five-step framework that links recognition to the timing of customer contract satisfaction. Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) firms were uniquely affected by this standard due to subscription-based pricing models and multi-element contracts that make revenue recognition more complex. For this thesis, I estimate the impact of adopting ASC 606 on SaaS firm audit fees. I hypothesize that more complex revenue recognition results in more complex audit procedures and, hence, higher fees. I use a Differences-in-Differences (DiD) regression model …

The Impact Of Asu 2023-08 On Reported Profitability Of Cryptocurrency-Exposed Firms, William C. Graff

CMC Senior Theses

This study investigates the performance of corporate cryptocurrency holdings in the context of recent accounting regulation changes. It specifically examines how adopting Accounting Standards Update (ASU) 2023-08 has affected firms with material cryptocurrency exposure. Using a panel of U.S. public firms from 2019–2025, I classified 138 companies as having material crypto exposure if cryptocurrency comprised more than 0.01 percent of total assets, which was manually calculated. Of these firms, 67 were exposed to the rule change (under GAAP), 66 were not, and 5 were excluded from final calculations due to a lack of relevant information.

Results showed statistically significant effects …

Impact Of Attention And Yield Curve On Term Structure Of Equity, Matthew C. Aved

CMC Senior Theses

This paper examines the term structure of equity and specifically focuses on the impact of term spread and market attention. The paper builds on prior work that developed the concept by adding behavioral explanations for differences between the short-term and long-term returns while also attempting to link the term structure of equity and the bond yield curve. The study examines these influences by running t-tests and regressions on dividend strip and S&P 500 return data (1996-2017) and attention data collected by Bloomberg (2010-2017). The results provide some insight into how these variables influence short-term and long-term returns; however, limited instances …

The Financial Effects Of Clinically Significant Readmissions In Florida Hospitals, Brian Patrick Cotton

Doctor of Business Administration Dissertations

This study examines how the financial performance of hospitals in the state of Florida impacts the quality of care. This study used data from 2017-2019 to evaluate how the number of hospital readmissions – a proxy for care quality – are associated with and vary in relation to the stability of the financial resources held by the hospital. The Hospital Readmission Reduction Program (HRRP), a Medicare value-based purchasing program, uses a mandatory pay-for-performance process that was initiated to decrease the 30-day hospital readmission rate. Hospitals with high readmissions are held accountable and financially encouraged to increase their quality of care …

Information Discovery, Interpretation, And Analysis By Institutional Investors Around Earnings Announcements, Sami Keskek, Abdullah Kumas

Accounting Faculty Publications

This study examines how institutional investors allocate trading across the earnings an- nouncement cycle and whether industry trading concentration strengthens that activity. The analysis is motivated by two complementary ideas: public disclosures can increase the value of investors’ prior information, and even sophisticated investors face costly information processing. These perspectives imply that institutional trading need not be concentrated only before disclosure and may be strongest after earnings announcements, when investors combine newly released public information with prior firm- and industry-specific signals. Using daily institutional trading data from Ancerno, we find that institutional net trading is positively related to earnings surprises …

Partisan Local Media And Corporate Voluntary Disclosures: Evidence From Sinclair Acquisitions, Ming Li

Theses and Dissertations

I investigate the impact of local media’s political orientation on firms’ voluntary disclosure, exploiting the acquisitions of local TV stations by Sinclair Broadcast Group, a conservative media conglomerate. Drawing on the media bias theory and implementing a staggered difference‐in‐differences design, I find that the local partisan media affects management earnings forecasts. Specifically, Conservative-leaning CEOs in designated market areas (DMAs) affected by Sinclair’s acquisitions forecast more optimistically, increasing forecast frequency and inflating forecasted earnings. The impact is stronger if the DMAs are more Liberal-leaning before the acquisitions and when firms have weaker corporate governance. I also find that the stock market …

Well, If You Put It That Way Three Studies On Contract Framing In Incomplete Contract Environments, Garrison L. Nuttall

Graduate Studies Theses and Dissertations 2026

This dissertation contains three studies examining contract framing, with implications for how organizations structure and frame performance-based compensation systems. Across all studies, I compare penalty contracts to bonus contracts with gain framing and bonus contracts with loss framing. My first study examines how managers prefer to frame performance-based compensation systems on average and identifies how the traits trust propensity, empathy, personal norm of reciprocity, loss aversion, Machiavellianism, and critical thinking disposition are associated with certain preferences. I find that mangers prefer bonus contracts to penalty contracts on average and that empathy is positively associated with this preference. My second study …

Two Papers Exploring Cognitive Fit Theory And Data Visualization In Accounting, Kelly Wellman

Graduate Studies Theses and Dissertations 2026

This dissertation examines how data visualization design influences judgment and decision making in accounting using cognitive fit theory as a unifying framework. As visualization tools such as dashboards, Excel, Tableau, and Power BI become increasingly prevalent, understanding which design choices improve performance has become critical. The first paper provides a structured literature review of cognitive fit theory from 1991 through 2025, synthesizing research across accounting and related disciplines and tracing its evolution from early graph vs tables comparisons to mor recent work incorporating task complexity, individual differences, and design-specific features. The review identifies key gaps, including limited attention to difference …

The Investor Perspective Of Materiality, Sam Lessinger

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Often auditors are asked to adopt the reasonable investor perspective in their materiality evaluations however, there is no consensus regarding what investors deem to be material. This can lead to confusion in the markets. In fact, past studies have shown how taking an investor perspective can backfire and may result in more leniency and fewer misstatements being deemed material by auditors. This leniency can, potentially, result in financial statements that mislead investors. The aim of this paper is to address the reasonable investor perspective to achieve a more complete understanding of an investor’s viewpoint. This study also incorporates the effect …

Freedom Of Expression Protection And Corporate Concealment Of Bad News: Evidence From State Anti-Slapp Laws, Jimmy Lee, Shaphan Ng, Il Sun Yoo, Liandong Zhang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

The protection of free speech enhances the ability of various public stakeholders to disseminate privately observed adverse information about public firms, making it difficult for corporate managers to conceal negative information about their companies. Using the staggered enactment of anti strategic lawsuit against public participation (anti-SLAPP) laws across U.S. states as a shock that strengthens free speech protection, we show that stronger protection is associated with less concealment of bad news. This is evidenced by a lower likelihood of stock price crashes, a decreased probability of accounting fraud, and an increased frequency of firm-initiated negative press releases. These results are …

Peer Effects Of Corporate Disclosures: Evidence From The Registration-Based Ipo System In China, Ruilin Liu, Beng Wee Goh, Dan Li, Zheyuan Zhang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

China launched the registration-based IPO system in 2019 whereby all firms listed on the newly established STAR board (“peer firms”) are required to disclose specific innovation and industry-related information in their prospectus. Using this event as a quasi-experiment, our study investigates the causal effects of peer firms’ disclosures on individual firms’ disclosure strategy. We find that individual firms’ management earnings forecast (MEF) precision, both its form and width, significantly decreases when peer firms disclose more information during the IPO period. In cross-sectional analyses, we find this effect to be more pronounced for individual firms that are likely to experience greater …

Timing, Targets, And Teaching: How Employee Help-Seeking Influences Downward Knowledge Sharing, Nicholle E. Kovach

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Knowledge sharing between managers and employees is critical for employee development and organizational performance. However, managers differ in whether they share knowledge, and in the type of knowledge shared. While solution-oriented knowledge offers immediate answers to improve short-term performance, process-oriented knowledge promotes long-term learning and employee development. The purpose of my dissertation is to investigate factors that influence managers’ knowledge-sharing decisions.

I conduct two studies to investigate my predictions. In Study 1, I examine how the timing of employee help-seeking requests, the source of performance targets and employee historical performance influence the type and quality of managers’ knowledge-sharing responses. Drawing …

William Ernest Mccarthy [Inducted 2026], American Accounting Association

Accounting Hall of Fame Brochures

No abstract provided.

Richard Victor Alvarus Mattessich [Inducted 2026], American Accounting Association

Accounting Hall of Fame Brochures

No abstract provided.

Eugene (Gene) Louis Dodaro [Inducted 2026], American Accounting Association

Accounting Hall of Fame Brochures

No abstract provided.

Daniel Lee Goelzer [Inducted 2026], American Accounting Association

Accounting Hall of Fame Brochures

No abstract provided.

Donald James Kirk [Inducted 1996], American Accounting Association

Accounting Hall of Fame Brochures

No abstract provided.

External Impacts On Internal Accounting, Maggie E. Boswell

Honors Theses

This thesis examines how external economic, legal, political, and consumer pressures can affect internal operations, accounting, and audit risk, using PepsiCo, Inc. as a case study. The analysis draws on PepsiCo’s annual reports and Form 10-K, company disclosures, government materials, and business and news sources. Attention is given to the Make America Healthy Again initiative, changing health expectations, food regulation, tariffs, and sustainability concerns. The analysis finds that these pressures could increase research and development, production, inventory, legal, and supply-chain costs while also creating opportunities for PepsiCo to expand healthier products and sustainable practices. These operational changes may also increase …

Do Cohort Restatements Generate Contagion? A Re-Examination, Melissa F. Lewis-Western, Timothy Seidel, Michael S. Wilkins

Faculty Publications

Gleason, Jenkins, and Johnson (2008) provide evidence that restatements lead to stock price declines among non-restating industry peer firms, suggesting that investors perceive contemporaneous manipulation within the industry. In contrast, Kedia, Koh, and Rajgopal (2015) find that restatements—especially less severe ones—encourage peer firms to initiate earnings manipulation. These divergent findings, together with the rising prevalence of less severe restatements and advances in monitoring technologies, motivate a re-examination of manipulation contagion. Although we are able to replicate the results of both seminal studies, we find that the results in Kedia, Koh, and Rajgopal (2015) are sensitive to design choices that affect …

Psychological Distance And Auditor Assessment Of The Severity Of An Internal Control Deficiency, Scott C. Jackson, John D. Keyser, Douglas F. Prawitt

Faculty Publications

Auditors often underestimate the severity of internal control deficiencies, particularly when associated misstatements are immaterial. We find that auditors are more likely to correctly classify a material weakness when no misstatement information is provided than when misstatement information is available, and that this finding may unconsciously arise from auditors’ construal level in judging control deficiency severity. Through a series of experiments, we manipulate misstatement information related to an internal control deficiency designed to represent a material weakness. We hold the size of potential misstatement constant and find that auditors and graduate auditing students are less likely to correctly assess the …

Trust, Literacy, And Choice: Exploring How Taxpayers Decide Between Self-Preparation And Professional Assistance, Bethany Jo Elam

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Each year, taxpayers must decide whether to self-prepare their tax return or hire a tax professional. While the decline in paper filing has made electronic filing the standard, the ease of access to both DIY tax software and tax professionals allows taxpayers to switch between these options each year if they wish. While previous research has focused on tangible predictors such as cost and accuracy, psychological factors, such as trust, remain largely unexplored in the modern tax-filing environment. This study investigates the relationship among perceived tax literacy among taxpayers, various dimensions of trust, and the intention to use tax software. …

Exploring The Determinants And The Effects Of Crypto Assets, Qiu Zheng

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

This dissertation consists of three studies that primarily delve into the factors influencing and outcomes of firms’ crypto assets. The first paper examines the association between corporate crypto assets and firms’ credit ratings. Using a large sample of U.S. public firms, we find that firms holding crypto assets receive significantly better future credit ratings, particularly when their activities are related to crypto mining, which generates relatively stable cash flows. However, crypto exposure also increases disagreement among credit rating agencies, reflecting the uncertainty associated with evaluating crypto-related risks. This effect is more pronounced when firms operate in less transparent information environments …

Government Financial Statements: The Influence Of Audit Opinion Type On Attitudes Toward Taxation, Stephanie Ann Vonfintel

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The United States government has a responsibility to American citizens to be a good financial steward of their tax dollars. The inability to fulfill this responsibility is evidenced by 28 consecutive years of audit failures, whereby the Government Accountability Office has been unable to issue an opinion on the United States government’s annual financial statements. An experiment varying audit opinion type is used to evaluate whether the United States government failing (or passing) its annual financial statement audits influences attitudes toward federal taxation. Findings show support for federal taxation is strongest when citizens are told that the United States government …

Out Of The Office: Market Impacts Of Institutional Investor Distraction, S. Owen Davidson, Michael S. Drake, James R. Moon Jr., James D. Warren

Faculty Publications

Research has long recognized that institutional investors possess significant information processing advantages. Yet even these investors face limited attention constraints, implying that periods of distraction may attenuate their advantage. We examine the effects of a plausibly exogenous shock to institutional attention arising from the annual buy-side focused Equity Research and Valuation (ERV) conference for Chartered Financial Analysts on institutions’ information processing. Validation tests using conference call data indicate that fewer buy-side analysts are present on calls during ERV conferences and that questions are shorter, consistent with the presence of substitute or backup analysts. In our main analyses, we find that …

Taxpayers Willingness To Use Ai Conversational Tools, Nessrine Mesto-Assaad

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

With the rapid emergence of Artificial Intelligence Conversational Tools (AICTs), such as ChatGPT and Google Gemini, and their widespread use, the need to understand users’ acceptance of this emerging technology has increased. Prior research has investigated users’ acceptance of AICTs in hospitality, tourism, e-commerce, and retail industries. However, users’ acceptance of the use of AICTs for tax information remains relatively underexplored in the tax context. Therefore, this study investigates taxpayers’ willingness to accept and use AICTs for tax-related questions when e-filing their tax returns. Drawing on the Artificial Intelligence Device Use and Acceptance (AIDUA) model as a research framework, this …