Accounting
Firms Aren’t Living Up to Their Diversity Claims
A new paper co-authored by Professor Edward Watts finds that for many companies, actual diversity efforts bear little resemblance to the claims made in public disclosures. What’s more, funds from socially conscious investors flow more to firms that engage in this “diversity washing.”
Customer Data Can Reveal Revenue Fraud at Supplier Firms
Yale SOM’s Frank Zhang and his co-authors used publicly available information from suppliers and customers to zero in on the firms that were more likely to be cooking the books.
Did Crypto Cause the FTX Collapse?
Yale SOM’s Rick Antle, an accounting scholar who worked on the Bernie Madoff restitution, says that FTX was a toxic combination of a new asset and a failure of corporate controls.
Quickly Disclosing Bad News Could Help Companies Benefit from Market Signals
Consistently releasing negative forecasts promptly could change trader incentives and ultimately help a company gather more strategic information from the market, according to a new study co-authored by Yale SOM’s Zeqiong Huang.
What Is Accounting For?
Prof. Rick Antle explains how accounting serves as the infrastructure for the smooth functioning of society.
Contrary to Conventional Wisdom, Margins Don’t Rise as a Company Grows
Nearly every business plan contains the assumption that as the company grows, its average costs will fall and profit margins will rise. But that isn’t borne out by the numbers.
Keeping a Close Eye on Local Governments’ Finances Can Improve How they Govern
Yale SOM’s Anya Nakhmurina found that fiscal monitoring policies, which require a state office to review local governments’ finances, boosted municipalities’ financial health and reduced corruption convictions of local officials.
For CEOs, Integrity Is the Best Policy
A new study co-authored by Yale SOM’s Thomas Steffen analyzed tens of thousands of shareholder letters to reveal whether executives’ actions typically live up to their promises. It found that firms whose CEOs scored well on this measure of integrity tended to perform better, while facing lower audit fees.
Three Questions: Is This the End of Sears?
After decades of decline, Sears filed for bankruptcy in October. Yale Insights asked bankruptcy expert Stanley Garstka what would remain of the once-dominant retailer and its heritage at the end of the process.
Three Questions: Professor Shyam Sunder on Why We Pay Taxes
It’s nearly Tax Day, which means we're scrambling to find receipts and puzzling through tax forms. Is all this misery really the best way to pay for public goods?
Three Questions: Prof. Rick Antle on Lowering Corporate Taxes
As the Republicans’ $1.5 trillion tax package trundles toward a vote in the Senate, we asked Rick Antle, an expert in financial accounting and corporate governance, on how the corporate tax system could be improved.
