Search results

Using data from a top-five global executive placement firm, the authors explore how an organization's financial misconduct may affect pay for former employees not implicated in wrongdoing. Drawing on stigma theory, they hypothesize that although such alumni did not participate in the financial misconduct and they had left the organization years before the misconduct, these alumni experience a compensation penalty. The stigma effect increases in relation to the job function proximity to the misconduct, recency of the misconduct, and an employee's seniority. Collectively, results suggest that the stigma of financial misconduct could reach alumni employees and need not be confined to executives and directors that oversaw the organization during the misconduct.

This study aims to examine the real effects of financial misconduct on corporate innovation.

The authors use a sample of Chinese A-share listed firms from 2006 to 2017. This study uses several empirical strategies to deal with endogeneity concerns, including Heckman’s two-stage correction approach, propensity score matching and instrumental variables.

The authors’ findings consistently show that financial misconduct impedes corporate innovation. Furthermore, the authors’ analysis demonstrates that the negative impact of financial misconduct is more pronounced in nonstate enterprises. The authors also show that financial misconduct discourages innovation through information, short-termism and financing channels.

This paper is of particular interest to policymakers, as firm behavior is heavily regulated and altered by securities laws and regulations over time. The authors recommend firms to observe financial regulatory laws to promote capital market integrity and enhance shareholder value through innovation projects. The authors also recommend that regulators provide incentives that encourage corporate transparency and use new technologies to detect financial misconduct quickly.

Few studies in literature investigate the real consequences of financial misconduct on firm investments. Hence, this paper fills this gap by analyzing the implications of financial misconduct on corporate innovation. This study is one of the first to provide new insights into the adverse effects of financial misconduct on firm-level innovation, supported by empirical evidence.

This study reviews and discusses the accounting literature that analyzes the role of auditors and enforcers in the context of fraud.

This literature review includes both qualitative and quantitative studies, based on the idea that the findings from different research paradigms can shed light on the complex interactions between different financial reporting controls. The authors use a mixed-methods research synthesis and select 64 accounting journal articles to analyze the main proxies for fraud, the stages of the fraud process under investigation and the roles played by auditors and enforcers.

The study highlights heterogeneity with respect to the terms and concepts used to capture the fraud phenomenon, a fragmentation in terms of the measures used in quantitative studies and a low level of detail in the fraud analysis. The review also shows a limited number of case studies and a lack of focus on the interaction and interplay between enforcers and auditors.

This study outlines directions for future accounting research on fraud.

The analysis underscores the need for the academic community, policymakers and practitioners to work together to prevent the destructive economic and social consequences of fraud in an increasingly complex and interconnected environment.

This study differs from previous literature reviews that focus on a single monitoring mechanism or deal with fraud in a broadly manner by discussing how the accounting literature addresses the roles and the complex interplay between enforcers and auditors in the context of accounting fraud.

The purpose of this paper is to explore whether the choice of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) vs Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) is associated with the frequency and likelihood of accounting irregularities and fraud in US banks.

The authors examine the relationship between financial reporting standards and accounting irregularities in publicly listed US banks. Using a sample of 4,284 banks with accounting irregularities observed in the USA over the period of 1996–2014. They used logit model to estimate the likelihood of corporate misreporting having been committed in terms of accounting irregularities.

The authors show that banks that use US GAAP exhibit better operating performance than fraudulent banks that use IFRS except for certain variables. They also find that fraudulent banks are more likely to commit accounting irregularities when they have to follow IFRS and banks have relatively better bank performance.

Overall, the empirical findings result consistent with Kohlbeck and Warfield’s (2010) find that accounting standards are linked to fewer accounting irregularities.

In this study, accounting irregularities have a significant effect on bank performance during the Dodd–Frank period. It finds that banks that choose to use IFRS are more likely to have accounting irregularities and to engage in fraud.

We investigate how firms’ responses to misconduct change when the institutional environment becomes more stringent. Organizational theory offers conflicting perspectives on whether new legislation will increase or decrease pressure on firms to take remedial action following misconduct. The dominant perspective posits that new legislation increases expectations of firm behavior, amplifying pressure on them to take remedial action after misconduct. A more recent perspective, however, suggests that the mere necessity to meet more stringent regulatory requirements certifies firms as legitimate to relevant audiences. This certification effect buffers firms, reducing the pressure for them to take remedial action after misconduct. Using a temporary, largely arbitrary exemption from a key provision of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, we show that firms that were not required to meet all the regulatory standards of good governance it required became 45% more likely to replace their CEOs following the announcement of an earnings restatement after Sarbanes-Oxley. On the other hand, those that were required to meet all of Sarbanes-Oxley’s provisions became 26% less likely to replace their CEOs following a restatement announcement. Ironically, CEOs at firms with a legislative mandate intended to increase accountability for corporate misconduct shoulder less blame than do CEOs at firms without such legislative demands.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a summary and synthesis of US Securities and Exchange Commission accounting and auditing enforcement release (AAER)-based research on financial misreporting firms and the firms’ management. Christian virtue ethics (CVE) is used as a framework for this review. Suggestions for future research are presented.

This is a review of the academic literature covering AAERs. The findings are viewed through the lens of CVE.

Several financial misconduct studies use samples developed from AAER targets. These studies commonly focus on specific characteristics of AAER targets. This paper presents and analyzes characteristics of AAER targets and considers how CVE may mitigate fraudulent reporting.

The main limitation of the research is that the literature review is confined to studies of financial fraud that use an AAER-based sample. Nevertheless, the sample is sufficient to provide insight into the common characteristics of AAER target firms and related entities. The benefits of CVE are considered. This study has relevant implications for investors, regulators and researchers concerned with financial reporting quality, fraud, regulatory oversight and business ethics.

This paper provides a set of AAER target features and considers how CVE may mitigate financial fraud. Financial regulators, accounting standards setters and researchers may be interested in the findings presented in this study.

The purpose of this research is to examine the impact of audit committee financial experts on the risk of financial corruption in public companies.

A time-lagged, matched-pairs sample of 352 corporations was utilized to test the study's hypotheses (176 financially corrupt firms plus 176 compliant firms). To uncover financially corrupt firms, 2,895 Accounting and Auditing Enforcement Releases from the Securities and Exchange Commission were thoroughly evaluated.

The results show that financial experts on audit committees generally increased financial corruption. However, the impact was reversed when audit committees had three or more financial experts, showing that having at least three financial experts reduced financial corruption.

The study's findings call into question the long-held practice of appointing at least one financial expert to audit committees. This study offers a novel approach to improve corporate oversight and reduce financial corruption by having at least three financial experts on audit committees.

The purpose of this study is to examine whether female chief financial officers (CFOs) are associated with the occurrences of financial reporting fraud. This study offers new theoretical and empirical evidence on whether firms with more female CFOs are more (less) likely to engage in financial reporting fraud.

This study is based on a sample of US-listed firms from 2011 to 2021. The authors speculate that female CFOs play a weaker role in the occurrences of financial reporting fraud. So, firms with a proportional number of female CFOs should be less likely to commit financial reporting fraud.

The data provide support for the predictions of this study. This study suggests a negative and significant association between the dummy variables for female CFOs and the occurrences of financial reporting fraud. The authors find that this association is contingent on governance mechanisms [e.g. ownership structure, politically connected CEOs and firms' conditions that do (or do not) invest in a gender-diverse board].

This study offers different perspectives on the impact of female CFOs on the occurrences of financial reporting fraud. The results of this study are distinguishable from prior studies. This study moves the analytical focus from the macro level (gender diversity or female corporate leaders) to the micro level (female CFOs) to understand firms' propensity to commit financial reporting fraud. Additionally, this study is based on factual financial reporting fraud cases, considering the US firms' fraud characteristics.

This paper reviews academic literature related to the consequences that outside directors and boards may face in the wake of earnings restatements and suggests directions for future research. We examine loss of board seats; recruitment of new directors; proxy recommendations and shareholder support; pre-emptive director departures; director wealth effects; director reputation, litigation, and sanction risks; international evidence; and legal proposals for reform. The overall picture that emerges from the literature is that directors’ primary risk in the wake of earnings restatements is loss of board seats, in part through adverse proxy advisor recommendations and reduced shareholder support. Directors typically face little risk of legal liability or SEC sanctions, and some directors pre-emptively leave a problem company’s board and reduce their loss of interlocked board seats. Some legal scholars have called for director liability to be increased so as to promote more vigilant board oversight. Companies often focus on increasing the independence of the board in the wake of a restatement in an effort to repair organizational reputation. While researchers have revealed a host of important findings to date, much more can be learned about the effects of restatements on outside directors and boards.