We examine whether firms with greater financial statement complexity are more likely to meet or beat analysts' earnings expectations. We proxy for financial statement complexity using the firm's industry and year adjusted accounting policy disclosure length. Firms with more complex financial...

Prior research has documented that the market responds to quarterly updates to annual risk factor disclosures at the time of release, suggesting quarterly risk factor updates provide informational value to investors. In this study, we examine whether future returns are associated with quarterly...

We examine how analysts' earnings forecast properties vary when accounting information is more difficult to process. Specifically, we investigate whether analysts' forecast properties are associated with traditional real earnings management (REM) measures. We hypothesize and find that analysts'...

I explore the effect of accounting complexity on misreporting using a setting of revenue restatements. I measure revenue recognition complexity using a factor score based on the number of words and revenue recognition methods from the revenue recognition disclosure in the 10-K just prior to the...

We examine the impact of disclosure by defendant firms on the outcome of securities fraud class actions. We hypothesize that firms issuing more disclosures will experience more adverse litigation outcomes, given the strict pleading standards of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act...

We examine how various types of accounting policy changes affect financial misstatement risk and the ways auditors mitigate that risk. We find greater misstatement risk for both idiosyncratic and industry-wide accounting policy changes and that auditors play an important role in mitigating these...

We examine the financial reporting quality of Special Purpose Acquisition Corporations (SPACs) following a successful merger. We compare a sample of SPACs with completed mergers from 2006-2020 to initial public offering (IPO) firms in the same industry covering the same period. Compared to...

This study examines the relation between principles-based standards and earnings attributes. We create a firm-year specific variable that measures the extent to which firms' financial reporting is affected by principles-based standards. We find that firms' earnings are more informative and...

We examine the effect of interpretive accounting guidance on a direct and observable cost of financial reporting: audit fees. Many contend that U.S. GAAP has too much interpretive guidance, making it complex and difficult to assimilate. This effect would lead to higher audit effort and higher...