Prior literature examines the determinants and consequences of tax avoidance in relation to earnings. Extending this research to the role of cash in motivating corporate tax avoidance, I consider a firm's liquidity, as measured by the quick ratio and free cash flows, insufficient cash holdings,...

This study investigates the behavior of sell-side analysts covering firms that are about to experience breaks in strings of consecutive quarterly earnings increases. I offer evidence that analysts downgrade their recommendations and break quarter earnings estimates right before announcement of...

We consider a monopolist selling durable goods to consumers with unit demands but different preferences for quality. The seller can offer items of different quality at the same time to induce buyers to self-select, as in Mussa-Rosen (1978), but is not artificially constrained to offer only one...

This study examines whether the earnings quality of a firm that first announces quarterly earnings in its industry impacts the magnitude of intra-industry information transfers. Prior research shows that higher quality earnings better reflect the operating fundamentals of a firm. I argue that...

The two essays in this dissertation study issues related to debt contracting. The first essay examines whether aspects of debt contracting have been affected by the provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 that increased monitoring of management's activities by independent directors,...