IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/rqfnac/v54y2020i4d10.1007_s11156-019-00821-8.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The impact of cash flow management versus accruals management on credit rating performance and usage

Author

Listed:
  • Eliza Xia Zhang

    (University of Washington Tacoma)

Abstract

Corporate bond issuers attempt to influence bond ratings through their discretion over reported numbers, which could diminish credit rating quality. I find that cash flow management is negatively associated with rating quality, while accruals management is not. These results suggest that rating agencies fail to adjust for cash flow management, but they undo accruals management. The differential results for cash flow management versus accruals management could be due to the rating agencies’ more skeptical attitude towards accruals and the lower cost of adjusting accruals management. The relation between cash flow management and rating quality is weaker for issuers with high leverage and issuers with prior ratings around the investment-/speculative-grade cutoff. Overall, the evidence suggests that rating management through managerial discretion over reported numbers has a detrimental impact on rating quality, but only via the cash flow component. Fortunately, the bond market understands the implications of cash flow management on rating quality and relies less on ratings in response to cash flow management.

Suggested Citation

  • Eliza Xia Zhang, 2020. "The impact of cash flow management versus accruals management on credit rating performance and usage," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 54(4), pages 1163-1193, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:rqfnac:v:54:y:2020:i:4:d:10.1007_s11156-019-00821-8
    DOI: 10.1007/s11156-019-00821-8
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11156-019-00821-8
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11156-019-00821-8?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Boochun Jung & Naomi Soderstrom & Yanhua Sunny Yang, 2013. "Earnings Smoothing Activities of Firms to Manage Credit Ratings," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 30(2), pages 645-676, June.
    2. Bonsall, Samuel B., 2014. "The impact of issuer-pay on corporate bond rating properties: Evidence from Moody׳s and S&P׳s initial adoptions," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(2), pages 89-109.
    3. Jorion, Philippe & Liu, Zhu & Shi, Charles, 2005. "Informational effects of regulation FD: evidence from rating agencies," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(2), pages 309-330, May.
    4. Malcolm Baker & Jeremy C. Stein & Jeffrey Wurgler, 2003. "When Does the Market Matter? Stock Prices and the Investment of Equity-Dependent Firms," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 118(3), pages 969-1005.
    5. Dechow, Patricia M. & Sloan, Richard G., 1991. "Executive incentives and the horizon problem : An empirical investigation," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(1), pages 51-89, March.
    6. Verrecchia, Robert E., 1986. "Managerial discretion in the choice among financial reporting alternatives," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 8(3), pages 175-195, October.
    7. David A. Ziebart & Sara A. Reiter, 1992. "Bond ratings, bond yields and financial information," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 9(1), pages 252-282, September.
    8. John Y. Campbell & Jens Hilscher & Jan Szilagyi, 2008. "In Search of Distress Risk," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 63(6), pages 2899-2939, December.
    9. Walid M. Alissa & Samuel B. Bonsall Iv & Kevin Koharki & Michael W. Penn Jr., 2013. "Firms' use of accounting discretion to influence their credit ratings," Post-Print hal-01069190, HAL.
    10. Louis H. Ederington & Jess B. Yawitz & Brian E. Roberts, 1987. "The Informational Content Of Bond Ratings," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 10(3), pages 211-226, September.
    11. Badertscher, Brad A. & Collins, Daniel W. & Lys, Thomas Z., 2012. "Discretionary accounting choices and the predictive ability of accruals with respect to future cash flows," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(1), pages 330-352.
    12. Merton, Robert C, 1974. "On the Pricing of Corporate Debt: The Risk Structure of Interest Rates," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 29(2), pages 449-470, May.
    13. Jiang, John (Xuefeng) & Harris Stanford, Mary & Xie, Yuan, 2012. "Does it matter who pays for bond ratings? Historical evidence," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(3), pages 607-621.
    14. Becker, Bo & Milbourn, Todd, 2011. "How did increased competition affect credit ratings?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 101(3), pages 493-514, September.
    15. Roychowdhury, Sugata, 2006. "Earnings management through real activities manipulation," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(3), pages 335-370, December.
    16. Cheng, Mei & Neamtiu, Monica, 2009. "An empirical analysis of changes in credit rating properties: Timeliness, accuracy and volatility," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(1-2), pages 108-130, March.
    17. Caton, Gary L & Goh, Jeremy, 2003. "Are All Rivals Affected Equally by Bond Rating Downgrades?," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 20(1), pages 49-62, January.
    18. Mitchell A. Petersen, 2009. "Estimating Standard Errors in Finance Panel Data Sets: Comparing Approaches," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(1), pages 435-480, January.
    19. Subramanyam, K. R., 1996. "The pricing of discretionary accruals," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(1-3), pages 249-281, October.
    20. Heski Bar-Isaac & Joel Shapiro, 2011. "Credit Ratings Accuracy and Analyst Incentives," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(3), pages 120-124, May.
    21. Jeremy C. Stein, 1989. "Efficient Capital Markets, Inefficient Firms: A Model of Myopic Corporate Behavior," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 104(4), pages 655-669.
    22. Youngtae Yoo & Jaehong Lee & Jinho Chang, 2014. "Distinctive Features of BBB- and BB-Graded Firms Using Earnings Management and Conservatism: Evidence from the Korean Market," Review of Pacific Basin Financial Markets and Policies (RPBFMP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 17(01), pages 1-31.
    23. Jie (Jack) He & Jun (Qj) Qian & Philip E. Strahan, 2012. "Are All Ratings Created Equal? The Impact of Issuer Size on the Pricing of Mortgage-Backed Securities," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 67(6), pages 2097-2137, December.
    24. Dechow, Patricia M. & Kothari, S. P. & L. Watts, Ross, 1998. "The relation between earnings and cash flows," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 25(2), pages 133-168, May.
    25. Hang Luo & Linfeng Chen, 2019. "Bond yield and credit rating: evidence of Chinese local government financing vehicles," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 52(3), pages 737-758, April.
    26. Lamont, Owen & Polk, Christopher & Saa-Requejo, Jesus, 2001. "Financial Constraints and Stock Returns," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 14(2), pages 529-554.
    27. Beaver, William H. & Shakespeare, Catherine & Soliman, Mark T., 2006. "Differential properties in the ratings of certified versus non-certified bond-rating agencies," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(3), pages 303-334, December.
    28. McNichols, Maureen F., 2000. "Research design issues in earnings management studies," Journal of Accounting and Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 19(4-5), pages 313-345.
    29. Fields, Thomas D. & Lys, Thomas Z. & Vincent, Linda, 2001. "Empirical research on accounting choice," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1-3), pages 255-307, September.
    30. Hendrik Bessembinder & Kathleen M. Kahle & William F. Maxwell & Danielle Xu, 2009. "Measuring Abnormal Bond Performance," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(10), pages 4219-4258, October.
    31. Alissa, Walid & Bonsall, Samuel B. & Koharki, Kevin & Penn, Michael W., 2013. "Firms' use of accounting discretion to influence their credit ratings," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(2), pages 129-147.
    32. Rountree, Brian & Weston, James P. & Allayannis, George, 2008. "Do investors value smooth performance?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(3), pages 237-251, December.
    33. Jones, Jj, 1991. "Earnings Management During Import Relief Investigations," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(2), pages 193-228.
    34. Narayanan, M P, 1985. "Managerial Incentives for Short-term Results," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 40(5), pages 1469-1484, December.
    35. Caton, Gary L. & Chiyachantana, Chiraphol N. & Chua, Choong-Tze & Goh, Jeremy, 2011. "Earnings Management Surrounding Seasoned Bond Offerings: Do Managers Mislead Ratings Agencies and the Bond Market?," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 46(3), pages 687-708, June.
    36. Sreedhar T. Bharath & Tyler Shumway, 2008. "Forecasting Default with the Merton Distance to Default Model," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 21(3), pages 1339-1369, May.
    37. Darren J. Kisgen, 2006. "Credit Ratings and Capital Structure," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(3), pages 1035-1072, June.
    38. Kothari, S.P. & Leone, Andrew J. & Wasley, Charles E., 2005. "Performance matched discretionary accrual measures," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 163-197, February.
    39. Dominique C Badoer & Cem Demiroglu, 2019. "The Relevance of Credit Ratings in Transparent Bond Markets," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 32(1), pages 42-74.
    40. Korajczyk, Robert A. & Levy, Amnon, 2003. "Capital structure choice: macroeconomic conditions and financial constraints," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1), pages 75-109, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Ben Angelo & Mitchell Johnston, 2023. "Do investors infer future cash flow volatility based on liquidity?," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 60(1), pages 259-294, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Xia, Han, 2014. "Can investor-paid credit rating agencies improve the information quality of issuer-paid rating agencies?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(2), pages 450-468.
    2. Samuel B. Bonsall & Kevin Koharki & Pepa Kraft & Karl A. Muller & Anywhere Sikochi, 2023. "Do Rating Agencies Behave Defensively for Higher Risk Issuers?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(8), pages 4864-4887, August.
    3. Kedia, Simi & Rajgopal, Shivaram & Zhou, Xing, 2014. "Did going public impair Moody׳s credit ratings?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(2), pages 293-315.
    4. Minkwan Ahn & Samuel B. Bonsall & Andrew Buskirk, 2019. "Do managers withhold bad news from credit rating agencies?," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 24(3), pages 972-1021, September.
    5. Peter Demerjian & John Donovan & Melissa F. Lewis‐Western, 2020. "Income Smoothing and the Usefulness of Earnings for Monitoring in Debt Contracting," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 37(2), pages 857-884, June.
    6. Dechow, Patricia & Ge, Weili & Schrand, Catherine, 2010. "Understanding earnings quality: A review of the proxies, their determinants and their consequences," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(2-3), pages 344-401, December.
    7. Gerald J. Lobo & Luc Paugam & Hervé Stolowy & Pierre Astolfi, 2017. "The Effect of Business and Financial Market Cycles on Credit Ratings: Evidence from the Last Two Decades," Abacus, Accounting Foundation, University of Sydney, vol. 53(1), pages 59-93, March.
    8. Aktas, Nihat & Petmezas, Dimitris & Servaes, Henri & Karampatsas, Nikolaos, 2021. "Credit ratings and acquisitions," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 69(C).
    9. Bonsall, Samuel B., 2014. "The impact of issuer-pay on corporate bond rating properties: Evidence from Moody׳s and S&P׳s initial adoptions," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(2), pages 89-109.
    10. Sumit Agarwal & Vincent Y. S. Chen & Weina Zhang, 2016. "The Information Value of Credit Rating Action Reports: A Textual Analysis," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(8), pages 2218-2240, August.
    11. Crabtree, Aaron & Maher, John J. & Wan, Huishan, 2014. "New debt issues and earnings management," Advances in accounting, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 116-127.
    12. Alissa, Walid & Bonsall, Samuel B. & Koharki, Kevin & Penn, Michael W., 2013. "Firms' use of accounting discretion to influence their credit ratings," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(2), pages 129-147.
    13. Sugata Roychowdhury & Suraj Srinivasan, 2019. "The Role of Gatekeepers in Capital Markets," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(2), pages 295-322, May.
    14. Daniel Cohen & Shailendra Pandit & Charles E. Wasley & Tzachi Zach, 2020. "Measuring Real Activity Management†," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 37(2), pages 1172-1198, June.
    15. Julia Sawicki & Keshab Shrestha, 2014. "Misvaluation and Insider Trading Incentives for Accrual-based and Real Earnings Management," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(7-8), pages 926-949, September.
    16. Theodore E. Christensen & Adrienna Huffman & Melissa F. Lewis‐Western & Rachel Scott, 2022. "Accruals earnings management proxies: Prudent business decisions or earnings manipulation?," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 49(3-4), pages 536-587, March.
    17. Cohen, Daniel A. & Zarowin, Paul, 2010. "Accrual-based and real earnings management activities around seasoned equity offerings," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(1), pages 2-19, May.
    18. Hu, Xiaolu & Shi, Jing & Wang, Lafang & Yu, Jing, 2020. "Foreign ownership in Chinese credit ratings industry: Information revelation or certification?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 118(C).
    19. Cornaggia, Jess & Cornaggia, Kimberly J. & Xia, Han, 2016. "Revolving doors on Wall Street," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(2), pages 400-419.
    20. Andreou, Christoforos K. & Lambertides, Neophytos & Panayides, Photis M., 2021. "Distress risk anomaly and misvaluation," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 53(5).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Cash flow management; Accruals management; Corporate bond rating quality; Credit rating agencies; Bond yield spread;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • M41 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Accounting - - - Accounting
    • G24 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Investment Banking; Venture Capital; Brokerage
    • G18 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Government Policy and Regulation

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:rqfnac:v:54:y:2020:i:4:d:10.1007_s11156-019-00821-8. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.