In this study, we examine whether government regulatory initiatives in China involving IPO by SOEs may have contributed to opportunistic behaviors by the issuer. We focus on two sets of IPO regulations issued between January 1, 1996 and February 11, 1999: pricing regulations, which stipulate...

We examine the consequences of shifting the IPO offer pricing power from securities regulators to market participants in a representative weak investor protection country, China. We show IPO offer prices relative to reported earnings are less depressed when determined by market participants than...

Backed by China's economic growth, the initial public offering (IPO) market in China has been one of the most vigorous in the world. In this market, practicing auditors routinely sit on the regulatory committee responsible for screening prospective IPO firms. Against this backdrop, we examine...

We identify connected auditors as those who attended the same university as the executives of their clients. Using manually collected data from China, we find that connected auditors are more likely to issue favorable audit opinions, especially for financially distressed clients. Moreover,...