We ask nearly 400 CFOs about the definition and drivers of earnings quality, with a special emphasis on the prevalence and detection of earnings misrepresentation. CFOs believe that the hallmarks of earnings quality are sustainability, absence of one-time items, and backing by actual cash flows....

Based on a unique arrangement of trading and disclosure times around earnings announcements in the Chinese stock market, we provide evidence of a striking overnight-intraday disparity in terms of the reaction to earnings news. Specifically, we find that the overnight period exhibits a strong and...

The present study was designed to determine the relationship between corporate governance and tax avoidance in an international setting. Financial and governance data sourced from the Datastream database for a sample of Japanese and UK firms between 2012 and 2017 are used. First, we examine the...

We study how elected politicians who hold strong bargaining power due to their pivotal position in the legislative process use their leverage to benefit home district firms. U.S. senators from politically-centrist states possess greater political leverage than senators from politically-partisan...

To combat tax avoidance by multinational corporations, the Organisation for Economic Co‐operation and Development introduced country‐by‐country reporting (CbCr), requiring firms to provide tax authorities with a geographic breakdown of their profitability and activities. Treating the...

This paper analyzes the effectiveness of thin-capitalization rules in preventing debt finance by intercompany loans and explores their consequences for corporate decisions. A theoretical discussion emphasizes that limitations of the deduction of interest owed to foreign affiliates would not only...

The spectacular rise of ESG usage in investment decision-making made public companies’ environmental and social attitudes critical more than ever as their shares are sold and bought in stock exchanges. Even though the enlightened shareholder value approach (ESV) by Section 172 (S172) of the...

We estimate the impact of effective profit taxation on the financial leverage of corporations on the basis of a pseudo-panel constructed from corporate tax return micro data for the period 1998-2001, a period which saw the introduction of a major corporate tax reform in Germany. The financial...