This paper examines the differences in accrual-based and real earnings management across countries from the perspective of investor protection. Following prior research (Leuz et al., 2003), we hypothesize that accrual-based earnings management is more constrained by strict discipline in countries with stronger investor protection. For real earnings management in countries with stronger investor...

Earnings non-synchronicity captures the extent to which firm-specific factors determine a firm’s earnings, and has important implications to a firm’s information environment. Prior research shows that high earnings non-synchronicity impedes corporate outsiders’ information processing. Given managers generally possess superior information about their firms’ unique operating and reporting strateg...

Using a data set of Taiwanese female graduates in 2006, this study finds that height and earnings are positively correlated for full-time workers. However, it is not because tall individuals went to better colleges or received better grades (cognitive ability), not because they are gifted with superior physical strength or because they have participated in more extracurricular activities (non-c...

We investigate whether the accruals anomaly (Sloan 1996), characterized by U.S. stock prices over-weighting the role of accrual persistence and under-weighting the role of operating cash flow persistence for future earnings, is a local manifestation of a global phenomenon. Hence, we examine whether stock prices in six other major capital markets and Japan) fully reflect the implications of the ...

The purpose of this paper is to better understand how financial markets use depreciation information that appears in the financial statements . When computing depreciation expense, a firm has discretion in its choice of depreciation method and this choice can impact the amount of depreciation expense and therefore reported earnings. Ceteris paribus, we claim that a firm which reports a low depr...