Extant research on voluntary disclosure about future prospects has focused on two forward-looking disclosure mechanisms: management forecasts and conference calls. This study examines the accelerated filing of material contracts as another type of future-related disclosure that involves no...

Using data from the EDGAR era, we find a significant market reaction surrounding quarterly periodic reports only when their filing coincides with the first public disclosure of earnings, although that for 10-K reports is not subsumed by earnings releases. However, after eliminating incidence of...

We exploit a novel feature of management cash flow forecasts to investigate how managers' discretion over forecast verifiability affects the credibility and stock price effects of such forecasts. Many management cash flow forecasts are issued with an equivocal definition of the cash flow number...

Prior research shows that extant discretionary accrual models are misspecified when applied to firms with extreme performance. Nonetheless, use of such models in tests of earnings management and market efficiency is commonplace in the literature. We examine the specification and power of the...

Economists have long recognized that government regulations often generate unintended consequences.1 The initial Securities Act of 1933 and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 exempted small firms from certain filing requirements. The SEC expanded these exemptions in implementing the Sarbanes...

This paper provides evidence about the unintended consequences arising when small companies are exempted from costly regulations - these firms have incentives to stay small. Between 2003 and 2008, the SEC postponed compliance with Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) for...

We document that CEO cash compensation is twice as sensitive to negative stock returns as it is to positive stock returns. Since stock returns include both unrealized gains and unrealized losses, we expect cash compensation to be less sensitive to stock returns when returns contain unrealized...