This paper examines the effects of audit firm mergers and the demise of Andersens on market concentration, competitiveness and audit pricing in the UK. Our results indicate that the large audit firms increased their market share between 1985 and 2002 by merging and expanding into new sectors....

Contrary to prior evidence, we show that corporations don't necessarily follow a systematic trade-off between cash holdings and risk management policies and that cash holdings are not a viable substitute for hedging using derivative instruments. Most importantly, we document an economically...

Institutional theory discusses whether organizations enhance their survival by converging around socially legitimated forms.This study contributes to this literature by examining the evolution of strategic choices among mid-tier and large accounting firms. The results show that the change in...