기업지배구조가 회계정보의 보수성에 미치는 영향 = The Effects of Corporate Governance on Conservativeness of Accounting Information

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

This study examines the effects of corporate governance on the conservativeness of accounting information. First, we investigate whether the overall corporate governance index (which is constructed based on the 2002 and 2003 annual survey by the Corporate Governance Service) and the conser- vativeness of accounting information show a positive relationship. Second, we investigate the relationship between the conservativeness of accounting information and the firm`s ownership structures, which are measured by the rates of the controlling owner`s and the foreign investors` ownerships. We found the following empirical evidences. First, the firms with a high overall corporate governance index report more conservative accounting information, as shown in panel 1 of <table 3>. The control variables such as ROA, △ROA and firm size shows the expected sign and significant. Thus we can conclude that the level of corporate governance and accounting conservativeness have a positive relationship. As for the five subindices of overall corporate governance (shareholders` rights, board, disclosure, audit, and distribution of reserves), only the firms with high scores regarding the disclosure part report significantly more conservative accounting information. For the other subindices, there are no significant differences between the level of conservativeness and the scores of corporate governance. The related results are shown in panel 2 of <table 3>. In general, the firms achieve higher scores for disclosure when they voluntarily disclose financial information, such as IR data, monthly earnings data and expectations, do not adjust their disclosures, and disclose detailed information on mandatory annual reports. Specifically, the firms reporting the following information on their annual reports receive high scores for disclosure the activities of the audit committee, the salary of individual directors, the careers of executives, the rate of appearance of executives in BOD meetings, and their activities and evaluations. The above information is related to the corporate governance in general. Thus the score of disclosure does not signify merely the accounting transparency. It represents corporate transparency as a whole. These results show that when the firm voluntarily discloses information regarding the corporate governance and its financial performances, the accounting transparency also can be improved. With these results, we suggest that the regulatory institution should place more emphasis on the disclosure of overall corporate governance as well as financial performance and conditions. Second, we test how the accounting conservativeness has been influenced by the rate of controlling ownership. The results shown in table 4 show that the coefficient on the rate of controlling ownership is not significant. It can be interpreted that the controlling ownership does not affect the accounting conservativeness, contrary to the expectations of hypothesis 2-1. However, we found a positive relationship between the level of foreign investor ownership and the conservativeness of accounting information. It supports hypothesis 2-2 that the foreign investor acts as an efficient monitor and, by doing so, decreases the information asymmetry between outside shareholders and controlling share- holders. In other words, it can be concluded that the foreign investor contributes to improve corporate governance and accounting transparency. Finally, we find that a positive relationship between the rate of controlling ownership and accounting conservativeness is strong in the sub samples having high scores of corporate governance.

참고문헌 (Reference)

1 박종성, "회계제도의 개선과 회계정보의 유용성" 한국회계학회 28 (28): 105-134, 2003

2 김진배, "한국 기업의 회계투명성 측정" 한국공인회계사회 (40) : 31-70, 2004

3 박종일, "기업지배구조와 이익조정: 최대주주 지분율을 중심으로" 한국회계학회 28 (28): 135-172, 2003

4 정구열, "기업소유구조와 이익의 정보효과" 한국경영학회 31 (31): 10-1727, 2002

5 손성규, "감사위원회의 효과: 회계오류를 중심으로" 한국회계학회 29 (29): 61-90, 2004

6 전규안, "감사위원회의 설치와 이익조정사이의 관계" 한국회계학회 29 (29): 143-178, 2004

7 이상철, "감사위원회 도입이 이익조정에 미치는 영향" 한국회계학회 28 (28): 143-172, 2003

8 Watts R. L, "onservatism in Accounting Part I: Explanations and Implications." 17 (17): 207-221, 2003

9 Ramaswamy, K, "Variations in ownership behavior and propensity to diversity: A study of the Indian corporate context" (23) : 345-358, 2002

10 Jensen, M, "Theory of the Firm: Managerial Behavior, Agency Costs, and Ownership Structure" (3) : 305-360, 1976

11 Yoon, J, "The effects of changes in conservativeness on value relevance of accounting information: Evidence from the 1997 financial crisis." (42) : 88-101, 2005

12 Ball, R, "The effect of international institutional factors on properties of accounting earnings" (29) : 1-51, 2000

13 Basu, S, "The conservatism principle and the asymmetric timeliness of earnings." (24) : 3-37, 1997

14 Givoly, D, "The changing time-series properties of earnings, cash flows and accruals: Has financial reporting become more conservative?" (29) : 287-320, 2000

15 Bhattacharya U, "The World Price of Earnings Opacity" 78 (78): 641-678, 2003

16 Berle, A, "The Modern Corporation and Private Property" New York, MacMillan 1932

17 Dechow, P, "The Cause and Consequences of Earnings Management. An Analysis of Firms subject to Enforcement Action by the SEC." (13) : 1-35, 1996

18 La Porta, R, "Law and Finance" (106) : 1113-1155, 1998

19 La Porta, R, "Investor Protection and Corporate Governance" (58) : 3-27, 2000

20 Kochhar, R, "Institutional investors and firm innovation: A test of competing hypotheses" 17 (17): 73-84, 1996

21 Xie, B, "Earnings Management and Corporate Governance: the Role of the Board and the Audit Committee." (9) : 295-316, 2003

22 Black, E. S, "Does Corporate Governance Predict Firms' Market Value? Evidence from Korea. Working Paper." 2003

23 La Porta, R, "Corporate Ownership Around the World" (54) : 471-518, 1999

24 Paek, W, "Conservatism, Earnings Persistence and Equity Valuation." 29 (29): 1-27, 2004

25 Park, J, "Changes in Earnings Timeliness and Conservatism Before and After the 1997 Korean Financial Crisis." 2004

26 Abbott, L, "Auditor Selection and Audit Committee Characteristics. Auditing" (19) : 47-66, 2000

27 Beasley, M, "An Empirical Analysis of the Relation Between the Board of Director Composition and Financial Statement Fraud." 71 (71): 443-465, 1996

28 Penman, S, "Accounting conservatism, the quality of earnings, and stock returns" (77) : 237-264, 2002

29 Mitton, T, "A Cross-Firm Analysis of the Impact of Corporate Governance on the East Asian Financial Crisis" (64) : 215-241, 2002

30 박종찬, "1997년 금융위기 이후 회계제도 개혁에 따른 이익의 적시성과 보수성 변화" 한국회계학회 30 (30): 1-26, 2005