中国会计与财务研究最新文献

{"title":"Analysts’ foreign ancestral origins and firms’ information environment","authors":"K. Wang, Guqiang Luo, Li Yu","doi":"10.1108/cafr-02-2022-0006","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/cafr-02-2022-0006","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThe purpose of this study is to examine whether and how analysts’ foreign ancestral origins would have an effect on analysts’ earning forecasts in particular and ultimately on firms’ information environment in general.Design/methodology/approachBy inferring analysts’ ancestral countries based on their surnames, this study empirically examines whether analysts’ ancestral countries affect their earnings forecast errors.FindingsUsing novel data on analysts’ foreign ancestral origins from more than 110 countries, this study finds that relative to analysts with common American surnames, analysts with common foreign surnames tend to have higher earnings forecast errors. The positive relation between analyst foreign surnames and earnings forecast errors is more likely to be observed for African-American analysts and analysts whose ancestry countries are geographically apart from the USA. In contrast, this study finds that when analysts’ foreign countries of ancestry are aligned with that of the CEOs, analysts exhibit lower earnings forecast errors relative to analysts with common American surnames. More importantly, the results show that firms followed by more analysts with foreign surnames tend to exhibit higher earnings forecast errors.Originality/valueTaken together, findings of this study are consistent with the conjecture that geographical, social and ethnical proximity between managers and analysts affect firms’ information environment. Therefore, this study contributes to the determinants of analysts’ earnings forecast errors and adds to the literature on firms’ information environment.","PeriodicalId":68382,"journal":{"name":"中国会计与财务研究","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47892431","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"COVID-19 and CSR disclosure: evidence from New Zealand","authors":"Stephen Bahadar, R. Zaman","doi":"10.1108/cafr-03-2022-0017","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/cafr-03-2022-0017","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeStakeholders' uncertainty about firms' value drives their urge to get information, as well as managerial disclosure choices. In this study, the authors examine whether and how an important source of uncertainty – the recent COVID-19 pandemic's effect on corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure – is beyond managerial and stakeholders' control.Design/methodology/approachThe authors develop a novel construct for daily CSR disclosure by employing computer-aided text analysis (CATA) on the press releases issued by 125 New Zealand Stock Exchange (NZX) listed from 28 February 2020 to 31 December 2020. To capture COVID-19 intensity, the authors use the growth rate of the population-adjusted cumulative sum of confirmed cases in New Zealand on a specific day. To examine the association between the COVID-19 outbreak and companies' CSR disclosure, the authors employed ordinary least squares (OLS) regression by clustering standard error at the firm level.FindingsThe authors find a one standard deviation increase in the COVID-19 outbreak leads to a 28% increase in such disclosures. These results remained robust to a series of sensitivity tests and continue to hold after accounting for potential endogeneity concerns. In the channel analysis, the study demonstrates that the positive relationship between COVID-19 and CSR disclosure is more pronounced in the presence of a well-structured board (i.e. a large, more independent board and with a higher proportion of women on it). In further analysis, the authors find the documented relationship varies over the pandemic's life cycle and is moderated by government stringency response, peer CSR pressure and media coverage.Originality/valueThis paper is the first study that contributes to the scant literature examining the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak on CSR disclosure. Prior research either investigates the relationship of the CSR-stock return during the COVID-19 market crisis or examines the relationship between corporate characteristics including the quality of financial information and the reactions of stock returns during COVID-19. The authors extend such studies by providing empirical evidence that managers respond to COVID-19 by increasing CSR disclosure.","PeriodicalId":68382,"journal":{"name":"中国会计与财务研究","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41923349","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Real earnings management, corporate governance and stock price crash risk: evidence from China","authors":"Yuan-hui Li, Yezen H. Kannan, Stephen E. Rau, Shun-Wen Yang","doi":"10.1108/cafr-03-2022-0014","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/cafr-03-2022-0014","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThe aim of this paper is to provide additional insights on the association between real earnings management (REM) and crash risk, particularly from the perspective of an emerging market economy. It also examines the moderation role that internal and external corporate governance may play in this area.Design/methodology/approachRelying on archival data from the RESSET and CSMAR databases over a timeframe from 2010 to 2018 of China listed company, the authors test the hypotheses by regressing common measures of crash risk on the treatment variable (REM) and crash risk control variables identified in the prior crash risk literature. The authors also introduce monitoring proxies (internal controls as an internal governance and institutional ownership as an external governance) and assess how effective internal and external governance moderate the relation between REM and stock price crash risk.FindingsThe results suggest firms with higher REM have a significantly greater stock price crash risk, and that this association is mitigated by external monitoring. That is, greater institutional ownership, particularly pressure insensitive owners, mitigates the impact of REM on stock price crash risk. However, internal control does not mitigate the association between REM and stock price crash risk.Originality/valueFollowing the passage of the Sarbanes–Oxley (SOX) Act, prior research has documented an increase in the use of REM and a positive association between REM and cash risk. The authors demonstrate that they persist in one of the largest emerging markets where institutional regulations, market conditions and corporate behaviors are different from those in developed markets. Also, the assessment of the moderation effect of internal and external governance mechanisms could have meaningful implications for investors and regulators in Chinese and other emerging markets.","PeriodicalId":68382,"journal":{"name":"中国会计与财务研究","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45091226","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The influence of network platform interaction on corporate total factor productivity: evidence from China stock exchange investor interactive platforms","authors":"Yingbing Jiang, Chuanxin Xu, Xu Ban","doi":"10.1108/cafr-03-2022-0015","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/cafr-03-2022-0015","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThe aim of this paper is to study the impact of the questions and answers (Q&A) between investors and enterprises from the China stock exchange investor interactive platforms on the total factor productivity (TFP) of enterprises.Design/methodology/approachTo show how the interaction influences the TFP of enterprises, the authors select Q&A records from the interactive platforms related to production, R&D and technology through the Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) topic model and choose A-share listed companies from 2010 to 2019 in China as a sample. To treat the data and test the proposed hypothesis, the authors applied OLS regression and endogeneity testing methods, such as the entropy balance test, Heckman two-stage model and the two-stage least squares regression.FindingsThis paper finds that interaction between investors and enterprises is positively correlated with TFP, and that improvements in content length and the timeliness of response can promote TFP. Interactive behavior mainly improves the TFP of enterprises by alleviating financing constraints and encouraging enterprises to increase R&D investment. This positive effect is more pronounced in companies with higher agency costs, non-high-tech companies and companies not supported by industrial policy.Originality/valueThe novelty of the research stands in the application of Python's LDA topic model to screen out Q&A records that are directly related to TFP, such as production, R&D, technology, etc., and measures the degree of information interaction between investors and enterprises from multiple dimensions, such as interaction frequency, content length and the timeliness of response.","PeriodicalId":68382,"journal":{"name":"中国会计与财务研究","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47294554","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Institutional quality and dark side of product market competition: a cross-country study","authors":"Yuan Huang, Zilong Song, Lewis H. K. Tam","doi":"10.1108/cafr-02-2022-0008","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/cafr-02-2022-0008","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThe authors examine the joint effect of the country-wide legal institutions and product market competition on stock crash risk in a large sample of international firms.Design/methodology/approachIn the study, the authors examine whether the country-level institutional factors affect product market competition's impact on stock crash risk. Specifically, the authors characterize country-wide institutional quality with individual governance indices developed in earlier studies and also adopt the worldwide board reforms as a proxy for the change in firms' governance environment.FindingsThe authors find that strong institutions mitigate the positive relationship between product market competition and stock crash risk in the international setting. In addition, the authors find that institutional quality moderates the effect of product market competition on stock crash risk via the information channel, i.e. although firms in competitive industries manage and report earnings more aggressively, strong institutions or board reforms, curtail managers' incentive to do so.Originality/valueThe authors’ findings lend support to the dark side of product market competition with a broader sample from 35 countries. In light of this, when earlier studies consider firms from competitive (concentrated) industries as having less (more) severe agency problems, future studies should consider the agency costs associated with product market competition for both the US firms and non-US firms. Furthermore, when it is debatable that regulators are self-interested, captured, uninformed and thus the regulations and institutions may not be fully effective as a result, this study demonstrates the effectiveness of institutions in ex ante mitigating agency conflicts associated with product market competition.","PeriodicalId":68382,"journal":{"name":"中国会计与财务研究","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42359270","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The dual effect of idiosyncratic volatility on stock pricing and return","authors":"Z. Cheng, Jing Fang","doi":"10.1108/cafr-02-2022-0009","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/cafr-02-2022-0009","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThis study aims to examine what underlies the estimated relation between idiosyncratic volatility and realized return.Design/methodology/approachIdiosyncratic volatility has a dual effect on stock pricing: it not only affects investors' expected return but also affects the efficiency of stock price in reflecting its value. Therefore, the estimated relation between idiosyncratic volatility and realized return captures its relations with both expected return and the mispricing-related component due to its dual effect on stock pricing. The sign of its relation with the mispricing-related component is indeterminate.FindingsThe estimated relation between idiosyncratic volatility and realized return decreases and switches from positive to negative as the estimation sample consists of proportionately more ex ante overvalued observations; it increases and switches from negative to positive as the estimation sample consists of proportionately more ex post overvalued observations. In sum, the relation of idiosyncratic volatility with the mispricing-related component dominates its relation with expected return in its estimated relation with realized return. Moreover, its estimated relation with realized return varies with research design choices and even switches sign due to their effects on its relation with the mispricing-related component.Originality/valueThe novelty of the study is evident in the implication of its findings that one cannot infer the sign of the relation of idiosyncratic volatility with expected return from its estimated relation with realized return.","PeriodicalId":68382,"journal":{"name":"中国会计与财务研究","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42296370","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Political uncertainty and cost stickiness: evidence from prefecture-city official turnover in China","authors":"Zheyao Pan, Guangli Zhang, Huixuan Zhang","doi":"10.1108/cafr-02-2022-0007","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/cafr-02-2022-0007","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThe aim of this study is to investigate the impact of local political uncertainty on the asymmetric cost behavior (i.e. cost stickiness) for listed firms in China.Design/methodology/approachIn this study, the authors manually collect the turnover data of prefecture-city officials as a measure of exogenous fluctuations in political uncertainty and obtain firm-level financial information from the China Stock Market Accounting Research (CSMAR) database. To perform the analysis, the authors augment the traditional cost stickiness model by including the interaction terms of the prefecture-city official turnover, and firm-level and prefecture-city level control variables.FindingsThe authors find that political turnover leads to a higher degree of cost stickiness, implying that firms retain slack resources when political uncertainty is high. Moreover, the effect of political turnover on cost stickiness is more pronounced for firms residing in regions with weaker institutional environments, and firms that are privately owned and with smaller size. The authors further provide evidence that policy uncertainty and the threat of losing political connection are two underlying channels. Overall, this study documents that the local political process is an important channel that influences corporate operational decisions.Originality/valueThis study provides the first piece of evidence on the relation between political uncertainty and cost stickiness at the local government level. Moreover, the authors propose and demonstrate two underlying channels through which political uncertainty affects firms' asymmetric cost behavior.","PeriodicalId":68382,"journal":{"name":"中国会计与财务研究","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42656254","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Bond market information disclosure and industry spillover effect","authors":"Xiao-cheng Zhang, Huifang Yin","doi":"10.1108/cafr-02-2022-0003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/cafr-02-2022-0003","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThe aim of this paper is to examine the effect of information disclosure by unlisted bond issuers on the stock price informativeness of listed firms in the same industry.Design/methodology/approachThis paper takes advantage of information disclosure during the bond issuance and examines the spillover effect of unlisted bond issuers' information disclosure on listed firms in the stock market. The sample is composed of A-share firms listed on the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges from 2007 to 2018. All the data are obtained from the China Stock Market and Accounting Research and WIND databases. The impact of bond market information disclosure on price informativeness of listed firms in the same industry is identified through multivariate regression analyses.FindingsEmpirical results show that price informativeness of listed firms has a significantly positive association with the information disclosure of same-industry unlisted bond issuers. Further analyses show that the above finding is more significant when information disclosure of bond issuers is a more important channel for acquiring industry information (i.e. when industry is more concentrated, when economic uncertainty is high, and when industry information is less transparent) and understanding the industry competitive landscape (i.e. when bond issuers are relatively large, when bond issuers and listed firms have more direct product competition, when bond issuance firms are large-scale state-owned business groups), and when there are more cross-market information intermediaries (i.e. more cross-market institutional investors and more sell-side analysts). This paper indicates that information disclosure of bond issuers has a positive spillover effect on the stock market.Originality/valueThe novelty of the research is that the authors examine industry information spillover from unlisted firms to listed firms leveraging on unlisted firms' information disclosure in bond markets.","PeriodicalId":68382,"journal":{"name":"中国会计与财务研究","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47019037","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Why do firms purchase directors' and officers' liability insurance? – perspective from economic policy uncertainty","authors":"Haiyan Jiang, Jing Jia, Yuanyuan Hu","doi":"10.1108/cafr-02-2022-0004","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/cafr-02-2022-0004","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThis study aims to investigate whether firms purchase directors' and officers' liability (D&O) insurance when the country-level economic policy uncertainty (EPU) is high.Design/methodology/approachThis study uses D&O insurance data from Chinese listed firms between 2003 and 2019 to conduct regression analyses to examine the association between D&O insurance and EPU.FindingsThe results show that government EPU, despite being an exogenous factor, increases the likelihood of firms' purchasing D&O insurance, and this effect is more pronounced when firms are exposed to great share price crash risk and high litigation risk, suggesting that firms intend to purchase D&O insurance possibly due to the accentuated stock price crash risk and litigation risk associated with EPU. In addition, the results indicate that the effect of EPU on the D&O insurance purchase decision is moderated by the provincial capital market development and internal control quality.Practical implicationsThe study highlights the role of uncertain economic policies in shareholder approval of D&O insurance purchases.Originality/valueThe study enriches the literature on the determinants of D&O insurance purchases by documenting novel evidence that country-level EPU is a key institutional factor shaping firms' decisions to purchase D&O insurance.","PeriodicalId":68382,"journal":{"name":"中国会计与财务研究","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47577550","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Executive alumni and corporate social responsibility in China","authors":"Yuanyuan Hu, Jiali Fang","doi":"10.1108/cafr-02-2022-0005","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/cafr-02-2022-0005","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThis study investigates whether corporate executives, who are university alumni, influence each other's firm corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance.Design/methodology/approachDrawing on social network theory, the authors hypothesise that a firm's CSR performance is positively associated with its peer firms' average CSR performance when the executives of the firm and its peer firms are university alumni. The study employs data from 1,685 listed firms and 4,906 executives who graduated from 585 different universities in China and runs multivariate regressions.FindingsThe results reveal a sizeable university peer influence on CSR performance. Such influence is even stronger for executives who graduated from elite universities (e.g. 985 or 211 universities), and universities or programmes that provide more opportunities for alumni reunions or networking (e.g. MBAs/EMBAs). Executives who are more influential in making firm decisions (e.g. CEOs/CFOs), as well as firms that are more likely to mimic the behaviour of others, also show higher degrees of university peer influence.Practical implicationsThe results highlight the role of education in ethical decision-making.Originality/valueThis study documents evidence on a new determinant of firm CSR performance. The study sheds light on the impact of non-institutionalised personal ties, for example, university alumni networks, on CSR performance.","PeriodicalId":68382,"journal":{"name":"中国会计与财务研究","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43529175","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}