Our paper examines how large shareholders manage goodwill impairment to inflate earnings as well as the role of audit functions in this setting. The influence of large shareholders on corporate decisions is well documented, however, overlooked in goodwill literature. Using data from China, we...

In this paper, we investigate whether material asset reorganizations (MARs), a special form of merger and acquisition (M&A) transactions, can affect the acquirers' cost of debt financing. Further, we examine the effect of acquiring firms' accounting information quality on the cost of debt and on...

The rapidly increasing volume of goodwill assets in the capital market generates potential risks due to the possibility of an untimely recognition of goodwill impairment. In this paper, we investigate the financial consequences of goodwill impairment avoidance based on firms' future performance...

Purpose: This paper aims to discuss the application of Big Data analytics to the brainstorming session in the current auditing standards. Design/methodology/approach: The authors review the literature related to fraud, brainstorming sessions and Big Data, and propose a model that auditors can...

Purpose – This study aims to examine the value relevance of ethics information. Design/methodology/approach – This study adopts event study methodology to test the market’s reaction around the announcements of World’s Most Ethical Companies (WME), a ranking based on firms’ overall...

The information gap in the M&A market hinders acquirers from effectively identifying high-quality targets. We examine whether VC/PEs convey information content in the M&A market and whether acquirers can use such information to identify high-quality targets. We show that VC/PEs have significant...

As independent financial advisors, securities firms are the core intermediaries in major asset reorganization (MAR) of listed companies. Furthermore, they play the dual roles of transaction and authentication. Based on this institutional background, this paper studies how listed companies choose...