State Ownership and Financial Statement Comparability
William Francis, Xian Gu, Iftekhar Hasan, Joon Ho Kong
Journal of Business Finance and Accounting,
forthcoming
Abstract
This paper investigates how state ownership affects financial reporting practices in China. Using several measures of state (government) ownership, we show that a one-standard-deviation increase in state ownership decreases financial statement comparability by 36.61%, and the impact is more pronounced when the central authority has majority control of the company. Moreover, lower earnings quality and lower levels of accounting conservatism among state-owned enterprises (SOEs) may explain the lower accounting comparability between SOEs and non-SOEs (NSOEs). Additionally, similar (different) managerial objectives converge (diverge) financial statement comparability between SOEs and NSOEs. Last, the geographical locations of firms also contribute to financial statement comparability. We employ a difference-in-differences design, changes regression and entropy balancing to mitigate potential endogeneity bias.
Read article
Alumni
IWH Alumni The IWH maintains contact with its former employees worldwide. We involve our alumni in our work and keep them informed, for example, with a newsletter. We also plan…
See page
Quotations
Quotations IWH: No shortenings of complex facts - but putting things in a nutshell. For interview inquiries please contact Stefanie Müller . Professor Reint E. Gropp "A premature…
See page
Jobs at IWH
Vacancies at IWH The Halle Institute for Economic Research (IWH) – Member of the Leibniz Association was founded in 1992. IWH’s tasks are economic research and science-based…
See page
East Germany
The Nasty Gap 30 years after unification: Why East Germany is still 20% poorer than the West Dossier In a nutshell The East German economic convergence process is hardly…
See page
PD Dr Mirko Titze –
PD Dr Mirko Titze Current Position since 4/14 Head of the Centre for Evidence-based Policy Advice (IWH-CEP) Halle Institute for Economic Research (IWH) – Member of the Leibniz…
See page
Tasks
Tasks of the IWH Guided by its mission statement , the IWH places the understanding of the determinants of long term growth processes at the centre of the research agenda. Long…
See page
Research Clusters
Three Research Clusters Research Cluster "Economic Dynamics and Stability" Research Questions This cluster focuses on empirical analyses of macroeconomic dynamics and stability.…
See page
Heimpold (Interview)
Was Südkorea mit dem IWH zu tun hat ... Gerhard Heimpold über seine Erlebnisse am IWH What South Korea has to do with the IWH ... Gerhard Heimpold about his experiences at IWH…
See page
Jobs at IWH
Stellenangebote des IWH Das Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung Halle (IWH) wurde 1992 gegründet. Zu seinen Aufgaben gehören die wirtschaftswissenschaftliche Forschung sowie…
See page