This file is part of IDEAS, which uses RePEc data


[ Papers | Articles | Software | Books | Chapters | Authors | Institutions | JEL Classification | NEP reports | Search | New papers by email | Author registration | Rankings | Volunteers | FAQ | Blog | Help! ]

Earnings Manipilation and Incentives in Firms

Author info | Abstract | Publisher info | Download info | Related research | Statistics
Author Info
Guido Friebel () (University of Toulouse (EHESS and IDEI), CEPR, IZA)
Sergei Guriev () (New Economic School/CEFIR and CEPR)

Additional information is available for the following registered author(s):

Abstract

We show that earnings manipulation destroys incentives within the corporate hierarchy. In the model, top management has incentives to over-report earnings. An insider, for instance, a division manager may gain evidence about over-reporting. We show that the division manager is more likely to have evidence, when the performance of her own division is low. Top management wants to prevent information leakage to the outside world. Hence, when the division manager threatens to blow the whistle, top management pays her a bribe. As this occurs when division output is low, the wedge between payments in high and low states of nature decreases. Earnings manipulation therefore undermines incentives to exert effort and destroys value. We show that earnings manipulation is more likely to occur in flatter hierarchies; we also discuss implications of the auditing and whistle-blowing regulations of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.

Download Info
To download:

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. Information about this may be contained in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help file. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.

File URL: http://www.cefir.ru/papers/WP55earningsmanipulation.pdf
File Format: application/pdf
File Function:
Download Restriction: no

Publisher Info
Paper provided by Center for Economic and Financial Research (CEFIR) in its series Working Papers with number w0055.

Download reference. The following formats are available: HTML, plain text, BibTeX, RIS (EndNote), ReDIF
Length: 35 pages
Date of creation: Jun 2004
Date of revision: Oct 2005
Handle: RePEc:cfr:cefirw:w0055

Contact details of provider:
Postal: 117418 Russia, Moscow, Nakhimovsky pr., 47, office 720
Phone: +7 (495) 105 50 02
Fax: +7 (495) 105 50 03
Email:
Web page: http://www.cefir.ru
More information through EDIRC

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its listing, contact: (Julia Babich).

Related research
Keywords: agency costs Sarbanes-Oxley Act whistleblowing flat hierarchies

Other versions of this item:

Find related papers by JEL classification:
D23 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Organizational Behavior; Transaction Costs; Property Rights
G30 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - General
M40 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting - - Accounting - - - General
M52 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting - - Personnel Economics - - - Compensation and Compensation Methods and Their Effects

This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. Bengt Holmstrom & Jean Tirole, 1998. "Private and Public Supply of Liquidity," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 106(1), pages 1-40, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  2. Desai, Mihir A. & Dharmapala, Dhammika, 2006. "Corporate tax avoidance and high-powered incentives," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(1), pages 145-179, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  3. Paul Povel & Rajdeep Singh & Andrew Winton, 2003. "Booms, Busts, and Fraud," Finance 0312007, EconWPA. [Downloadable!]
  4. Shleifer, Andrei & Vishny, Robert W, 1990. "Equilibrium Short Horizons of Investors and Firms," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 80(2), pages 148-53, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Aghion, Philippe & Tirole, Jean, 1997. "Formal and Real Authority in Organizations," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 105(1), pages 1-29, February.
    Other versions:
  6. Raghuram G. Rajan & Luigi Zingales, 2001. "The Firm As A Dedicated Hierarchy: A Theory Of The Origins And Growth Of Firms," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 116(3), pages 805-851, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  7. Jose A. Scheinkman & Wei Xiong, 2003. "Overconfidence and Speculative Bubbles," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 111(6), pages 1183-1219, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Stein, Jeremy C, 1989. "Efficient Capital Markets, Inefficient Firms: A Model of Myopic Corporate Behavior," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 104(4), pages 655-69, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  9. Louis, Henock, 2004. "Earnings management and the market performance of acquiring firms," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(1), pages 121-148, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  10. David S. Scharfstein & Jeremy C. Stein, 1997. "The Dark Side of Internal Capital Markets: Divisional Rent-Seeking and Inefficient Investment," NBER Working Papers 5969, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  11. Daniel Bergstresser & Thomas Philippon, 2003. "CEO incentives and earnings management," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, issue May, pages 304-335.
  12. Oyer, Paul & Schaefer, Scott, 2005. "Why do some firms give stock options to all employees?: An empirical examination of alternative theories," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(1), pages 99-133, April. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  13. Bengt Holmstrom & Steven N. Kaplan, 2003. "The State of U.S. Corporate Governance: What's Right and What's Wrong?," NBER Working Papers 9613, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  14. Anton, James J & Yao, Dennis A, 1994. "Expropriation and Inventions: Appropriable Rents in the Absence of Property Rights," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(1), pages 190-209, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  15. Kong-Pin Chen & C.Y. Cyrus Chu, 2005. "Internal Control vs. External Manipulation: A Model of Corporate Income Tax Evasion," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 36(4), pages 151-164, Winter.
  16. Patrick Bolton & Jose A. Scheinkman & Wei Xiong, 2003. "Executive Compensation and Short-termist Behavior in Speculative Markets," Levine's Bibliography 506439000000000124, UCLA Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  17. Guido Friebel & Michael Raith, 2004. "Abuse of Authority and Hierarchical Communication," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 35(2), pages 224-244, Summer.
  18. Tirole, Jean, 2001. "Corporate Governance," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 69(1), pages 1-35, January.
    Other versions:
  19. Antoine Faure-Grimaud, 2004. "Public Trading and Private Incentives," Review of Financial Studies, Oxford University Press for Society for Financial Studies, vol. 17(4), pages 985-1014. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  20. Paul M. Healy & Krishna G. Palepu, 2003. "The Fall of Enron," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 17(2), pages 3-26, Spring. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  21. Marilyn Johnson & Karen Nelson & Adam Pritchard, 2002. "Do the Merits Matter More? Class Actions under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act," Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics, Working Paper Series 1069, Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics. [Downloadable!]
  22. Radner, Roy, 1993. "The Organization of Decentralized Information Processing," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 61(5), pages 1109-46, September. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  23. Harrison, J Michael & Kreps, David M, 1978. "Speculative Investor Behavior in a Stock Market with Heterogeneous Expectations," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 92(2), pages 323-36, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  24. Bebchuk, Lucian Arye & Stole, Lars A, 1993. " Do Short-Term Objectives Lead to Under- or Overinvestment in Long-Term Projects?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 48(2), pages 719-29, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  25. Aubert, Cecile & Rey, Patrick & Kovacic, William E., 2006. "The impact of leniency and whistle-blowing programs on cartels," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 24(6), pages 1241-1266, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  26. Raghuram Rajan & Julie Wulf, 2003. "The Flattening Firm: Evidence from Panel Data on the Changing Nature of Corporate Hierarchies," NBER Working Papers 9633, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  27. Michael C. Jensen, 2005. "Agency Costs of Overvalued Equity," Financial Management, Financial Management Association, vol. 34(1), Spring.
  28. Bengt Holmstrom, 1979. "Moral Hazard and Observability," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 10(1), pages 74-91, Spring. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  29. Qian, Yingyi, 1994. "Incentives and Loss of Control in an Optimal Hierarchy," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 61(3), pages 527-44, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
Full references

Statistics
Access and download statistics

Did you know? To receive notification of recent additions to the database, subscribe to the free NEP reports.

This page was last updated on 2008-11-8.

This information is provided to you by IDEAS at the Department of Economics, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Connecticut using RePEc data on a server sponsored by the Society for Economic Dynamics.