THREE ESSAYS ON ACCOUNTING RESTATEMENTS

Abstract

This thesis is a collection of three essays examining accounting restatements from three different perspectives. The first essay provides empirical evidence regarding the negative effect of accounting restatement on firm’s cost of public debt. I find that accounting restatements result in lower corporate bond ratings and higher yield spreads. Furthermore, the increase in bond yield spreads is significantly larger when the severity of error is greater. The second essay investigates whether restating firms operating in polluting industries improve environmental performance in the afterwards of accounting restatement to restore reputation. Using environmental score provided by ASSET4 database, I find significant improvements in environmental performance in the post-restatement periods. I also find that firms experiencing more severe financial restatement do not take more actions to restore credibility. In the end, additional tests reveal that analyst coverage increases for firms that take more reputation restoration activities. The third essay compares the error severity of family and non-family public firms from 2006 to 2014 using a sample of 201 firms adopting mandatorily IFRSs. I document that family-controlled firms commit lower accounting errors than their non-family counterparts, and that for family firms, a family CEO as board chair and family ownership have a negative impact on error severity.