We compare characteristics of municipal debt issues in states that mandate GAAP for municipalities with issues in states that impose no annual financial disclosure requirements. Cross-sectional comparisons indicate that the use of public (versus private) debt is greater, and municipal debt costs...

We analyze the first quarter 2007 10-Q filings of 348 Samp;P 500 calendar year-end firms to provide evidence concerning the levels of, and changes in, unrecognized tax benefits (UTBs) resulting from the adoption of FASB Interpretation No. 48 (FIN 48). We draw the following conclusions. First,...

FASB Interpretation No. 48 (FIN 48) requires firms to disclose a forecast of significant changes in unrecognized tax benefits (UTBs) that are reasonably possible to occur within 12 months of the reporting date. According to paragraph 21(d), the “look-forward” disclosure, a firm must disclose...

Although much is known about non-GAAP earnings disclosures, little is known about other non-GAAP measures. Approximately one in five earnings announcements includes a non-GAAP revenue measure, and these disclosures have recently attracted SEC scrutiny. Because revenue, unlike earnings, is a...

This study examines the incremental information in loss firms' non-GAAP earnings disclosures relative to GAAP earnings. Using a large sample obtained through textual analysis and hand-collection, we posit and find that loss firms' non-GAAP earnings exclusions offset the low informativeness of...

We examine the association between I/B/E/S's disclosure of non-GAAP earnings and investor uncertainty around earnings announcements. On one hand, investor uncertainty may decrease with I/B/E/S's non-GAAP disclosure because these disclosures make investors aware of alternative performance...

We hypothesize that firms required by SFAS No. 131 to begin disclosing segment information attempt to counteract potential competitive harm by increasing information redaction. Using a difference-in-difference setting, we find that firms increasing the number of reported segments after the rule...

I examine whether company-implemented disclosure committees help to improve non-GAAP reporting quality. I find that firms with disclosure committees provide higher quality non-GAAP performance metrics and that the exclusions used to calculate their non-GAAP numbers are less persistent for future...

We examine the role of industry-level product market competition on non-GAAP disclosure decisions. We consider traditional measures of industry competition (concentration, price-cost margin, and set up costs), and large reductions in import tariff rates that identify an exogenous increase in...

State and local governments are not subject to Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) regulations requiring compliance with generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP). It was only in 1980 that Standard & Poor's issued a policy statement indicating a failure to conform with GAAP would be...