The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 brought wide spread changes to financial reporting. Companies now must report on internal control deficiencies. There are criminal penalties for false certification of financial reports. The new Public Company Accounting Oversight Board was established. And audit...

We document negative stock returns and elevated trading volumes around executives' early option exercise disclosures post-SOX but not pre-SOX. This stock price reaction is incomplete, and the negative stock price drift is smaller post-SOX compared to pre-SOX. We also show effects of media...