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Accounting Numbers (accounting + number)
Selected AbstractsModeling Goodwill for Banks: A Residual Income Approach with Empirical Tests,CONTEMPORARY ACCOUNTING RESEARCH, Issue 1 2006Joy Begley Abstract This paper uses the residual income valuation technique outlined in Feltham and Ohlson 1996 to examine the relation between stock valuations and accounting numbers for a prototypical banking firm. Prior work of this nature typically assumes a manufacturing setting. This paper contributes to the prior research by clarifying how the approach can be extended to settings where value is created from financial assets and liabilities. Key elements of our model include allowing banks to generate positive net present value from either lending or borrowing activities, and allowing for accounting policy to affect valuation through the loan loss allowance. We validate our model using archival data analysis, and interpret coefficients in light of our modeling assumptions. These results suggest that banks create value more from deposit-taking activities than from lending activities. Vuong tests confirm that our model outperforms adaptations of the unbiased accounting model of Ohlson 1995 and adaptations of the base model proposed by Beaver, Eger, Ryan, and Wolfson 1989. However, our model is outperformed by the popular net income-book value model used in many empirical studies, and we can formally reject one of our key modeling assumptions. These tests of our model suggest future avenues for improving upon the theoretical analysis. [source] Smoothing Mechanisms in Defined Benefit Pension Accounting Standards: A Simulation Study,ACCOUNTING PERSPECTIVES, Issue 2 2009Cameron Morrill ABSTRACT The accounting for defined benefit (DB) pension plans is complex and varies significantly across jurisdictions despite recent international convergence efforts. Pension costs are significant, and many worry that unfavorable accounting treatment could lead companies to terminate DB plans, a result that would have important social implications. A key difference in accounting standards relates to whether and how the effects of fluctuations in market and demographic variables on reported pension cost are "smoothed". Critics argue that smoothing mechanisms lead to incomprehensible accounting information and induce managers to make dysfunctional decisions. Furthermore, the effectiveness of these mechanisms may vary. We use simulated data to test the volatility, representational faithfulness, and predictive ability of pension accounting numbers under Canadian, British, and international standards (IFRS). We find that smoothed pension expense is less volatile, more predictive of future expense, and more closely associated with contemporaneous funding than is "unsmoothed" pension expense. The corridor method and market-related value approaches allowed under Canadian GAAP have virtually no smoothing effect incremental to the amortization of actuarial gains and losses. The pension accrual or deferred asset is highly correlated with the pension plan deficit/surplus. Our findings complement existing, primarily archival, pension accounting research and could provide guidance to standard-setters. [source] On the Relation between Conservatism in Accounting Standards and Incentives for Earnings ManagementJOURNAL OF ACCOUNTING RESEARCH, Issue 3 2007QI CHEN ABSTRACT This paper studies the role of conservative accounting standards in alleviating rational yet dysfunctional unobservable earnings manipulation. We show that when accounting numbers serve both the valuation role (in which potential investors use accounting reports to assess a firm's expected future payoff) and the stewardship role (in which current shareholders rely on the same reports to monitor their risk-averse manager), current firm owners have incentives to engage in earnings management. Such manipulation reduces accounting numbers' stewardship value and leads to inferior risk sharing. We then show that risk sharing, and hence contract efficiency, can be improved under a conservative accounting standard where, absent earnings management, accounting earnings represent true economic earnings with a downward bias, compared with under an unbiased standard where, absent earnings management, accounting earnings represent true economic earnings without bias. [source] Net Present Value-Consistent Investment Criteria Based on Accruals: A Generalisation of the Residual Income-IdentityJOURNAL OF BUSINESS FINANCE & ACCOUNTING, Issue 7-8 2004Thomas Pfeiffer Abstract: In recent years, many firms have favoured residual income for value based management. One main argument for this measure is its identity with the net present value rule and that this compatibility with the net present value rule holds true for all possible depreciation schedules selected. In this article, we analyse whether there are other, undiscussed, accrual accounting numbers that enable net present value-consistent investment decisions for all possible depreciation schedules. Our analysis provides an if-and-only-if characterisation of the entire class of net present value-consistent investment criteria, based on accounting information. This provides new insights into the residual income concept, hurdle rates, opening and closing error conditions achieved by applying more common performance measure structures, and allocation rules. Moreover, our analysis shows the limits of constructing such investment criteria. [source] Where Corporate Governance and Financial Analysts Affect ValuationJOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT & ACCOUNTING, Issue 3 2009Ran R. Barniv We examine whether corporate governance and financial analysts affect accounting-based valuation models for B and H shares traded by foreign investors in China and Hong Kong, respectively. We expect that better corporate governance and more effective analyst activity mitigate potential adverse effects on accounting valuation models generated by country-specific problems in accounting, auditing, and legal systems. We find that valuation models perform better for companies with a greater analyst following, smaller forecast errors, relatively high public ownership and a strong board structure. Valuation models and accounting numbers have only limited explanatory power and valuation role for companies with weak governance and less effective analyst performance. The findings are robust across various market value, return, unexpected return, and other accounting valuation models. The results are consistent with less informed foreign investor clienteles searching for signals of more effective analyst activity and better corporate governance mechanisms. [source] Incentives for Managing Accounting Information: Property-Liability Insurer Stock-Charter ConversionsJOURNAL OF RISK AND INSURANCE, Issue 2 2004David Mayers Incentives to manage accounting information are examined within 63 property-liability insurance company conversions from mutual ownership to common stock charter. In the conversion process, policyholders' embedded equity claims must be valued. Since mutuals have no separately traded equity, accounting numbers are a critical input in this valuation. Incentives for surplus management vary across firms; the strongest evidence of surplus management is observed among firms where the mutual's executives become the firm's principal stockholders following conversion. The evidence suggests that converting firms manage accounting information primarily by adjusting liabilities and selectively establishing investment losses,not by altering claims settlement policy. [source] |