Numerous empirical studies reveal that accounting numbers – equity as well as earnings’ measures - have lost value relevance, i.e. explanatory power for stock market capitalisation and/or abnormal returns, during the last decades. This effect is of particular significance after the rise of the...

The paper asks if credit rating agencies have incentives to misrepresent their clients’credit quality during an ongoing systemic crisis. Two important elements are essential fora systemic crisis: (1) Investors are not able to distinguish fundamentally healthy debtorsfrom fundamentally unhealthy...

The recent revisions of conceptual frameworks (CFs) by the IASB and the FASB included changes to the status of prudence/conservatism, accompanied by a broader debate about the meaning and role of asymmetry in financial accounting theory (FinAT). This paper adopts a historical perspective to...

Numerous empirical studies reveal that accounting numbers – equity as well as earnings' measures - have lost value relevance, i.e. explanatory power for stock market capitalization and/or abnormal returns, during the last decades. This effect is of particular significance after the rise of the...

Accounting-based profit distribution restrictions have been a key issue of the EU's company law harmonisation efforts. At present, the concept of creditor protection via the maintenance of a minimum level of nominal capital is challenged in several respects: (i) With its recent rulings, the...