Publications

17 Sep 2007
Working Paper Summaries

Evidence on the Effects of Unverifiable Fair-Value Accounting

Keywords: by Karthik Ramanna & Ross L. Watts

August 2011
Teaching Note

Subprime Crisis and Fair-Value Accounting (TN)

By: Paul Healy, Krishna G. Palepu and George Serafeim

Teaching Note for 109-031. View Details

Keywords: Fair Value Accounting; Mortgages; Standards; Financial Crisis

August 2008
Article

The Implications of Unverifiable Fair-value Accounting: Evidence from the Political Economy of Goodwill Accounting

By: Karthik Ramanna

I study the evolution of SFAS 142, which uses unverifiable fair-value estimates to account for acquired goodwill. I find evidence consistent with the FASB issuing SFAS 142 in response to political pressure over its proposal to abolish pooling accounting. The result is... View Details

Keywords: Accounting; Fair Values; Politics; Standard Setting; Fair Value Accounting; Goodwill Accounting; Government Legislation; Agency Theory

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2007
Working Paper

Evidence from Goodwill Non-impairments on the Effects of Unverifiable Fair-Value Accounting

By: Karthik Ramanna and Ross L. Watts

SFAS 142 requires firms to use unverifiable fair-value estimates to determine goodwill impairments. Standard setters suggest managers will use the discretion given by such estimates to convey private information on future cash flows, while agency theory predicts... View Details

Keywords: Fair Value Accounting; Goodwill Accounting; Standards; Agency Theory

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2007
Dissertation

The Implications of Unverifiable Fair-Value Accounting: Evidence from the Political Economy of Goodwill Accounting

By: Karthik Ramanna

Keywords: Fair Value Accounting; Goodwill Accounting

Awards

American Accounting Association. Financial Accounting and Reporting Section. Best Dissertation Award

Received the 2008 Best Dissertation Award from the Financial Accounting and Reporting Section of the American Accounting Association for "The Implications of Unverifiable Fair-Value Accounting: Evidence from the Political Economy of Goodwill Accounting" (Ph.D. diss.,... View Details

2015
Working Paper

Auditor Lobbying on Accounting Standards

By: Abigail Allen, Karthik Ramanna and Sugata Roychowdhury

We examine how Big N auditors' changing incentives impact their comment-letter lobbying on U.S. GAAP over the first thirty-four years of the FASB (1973–2006). We examine the influence of auditors' lobbying incentives arising from three basic factors: managing expected... View Details

Keywords: Auditors; FASB; GAAP; Lobbying; Fair Value Accounting; Accounting Audits

December 2012
Article

Evidence on the Use of Unverifiable Estimates in Required Goodwill Impairment

By: Karthik Ramanna and Ross L. Watts

SFAS 142 requires managers to estimate the current fair value of goodwill to determine goodwill write-offs. In promulgating the standard, the FASB predicted managers will, on average, use the fair value estimates to convey private information on future cash flows. The... View Details

Keywords: Goodwill Impairment; Fair-value Accounting; FASB; SFAS 142; Fair Value Accounting; Standards; Cash Flow; Agency Theory; Motivation and Incentives; Forecasting and Prediction; Goodwill Accounting

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March 2013
Article

Why 'Fair Value' Is the Rule: How a Controversial Accounting Approach Gained Support

By: Karthik Ramanna

For the past two decades, fair-value accounting—the practice of measuring assets and liabilities at estimates of their current values—has been on the ascent. This marks a major departure from the centuries-old tradition of keeping books at historical cost. It also has... View Details

Keywords: Fair Value; FASB; Finance; Politics; Financial History; Accounting; Fair Value Accounting; Financial Reporting; Accounting Industry; Accounting Industry; United States

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September 2007 (Revised January 2008)
Case

Silic (A): Choosing Cost or Fair Value on Adoption of IFRS

By: David F. Hawkins, Vincent Marie Dessain and Andrew Barron

A French real estate firm must choose to report its primary asset (investment property) using either cost or fair-value accounting methods upon adoption of international accounting standards (IAS) in 2005. View Details

Keywords: Cost Accounting; Fair Value Accounting; Financial Reporting; International Accounting; Investment; Standards; Real Estate Industry; France

August 2004 (Revised February 2008)
Case

Land Securities Group (A): Choosing Cost or Fair Value on Adoption of IFRS

A U.K. real estate firm, required to adopt international accounting standards (IAS) by 2005, must change the reporting of its primary asset (investment property) from the revaluation model under U.K. GAAP to either the cost or fair-value model under IAS. This would... View Details

Keywords: Cost Accounting; Fair Value Accounting; Financial Reporting; International Accounting; Investment; Standards; Real Estate Industry; Europe; United Kingdom

January 2010
Case

The Future of Financial Reporting

By: Karthik Ramanna

Multimedia/video case on the SEC's work on improvements to financial reporting. Students review topical audio and video from various sources including SEC footage, and interviews with others involved, such as Bob Pozen, (past head of Fidelity and chairman of the SEC's... View Details

Keywords: Fair Value Accounting; Financial Reporting; Financial Management; Performance Improvement

January 2013 (Revised March 2016)
Case

The Private Company Council

By: Karthik Ramanna and Luis M. Viceira

Financial Accounting Foundation chairman Jack Brennan is under pressure from private-company interests to set up a new body—the Private Company Council—to determine separate GAAP for private companies. PCC advocates—including the US Chamber of Commerce—argue that... View Details

Keywords: FASB; Lobbying; Political Economy; Accounting; Government and Politics; Leadership; Financial Markets; Accounting Industry; Accounting Industry; Accounting Industry

18 Aug 2009
News

Disclose the fair value of complex securities

Towards an Understanding of the Role of Standard Setters in Standard Setting

Journal of Accounting and Economics Vol. 55, No. 1 (February 2013), pp. 66–90.

We investigate the effect of standard setters in standard setting. We examine how certain professional and political characteristics of FASB members and SEC commissioners... View Details

February 2013
Article

Towards an Understanding of the Role of Standard Setters in Standard Setting

By: Abigail M. Allen and Karthik Ramanna

We investigate the effect of standard setters in standard setting: we examine how certain professional and political characteristics of FASB members and SEC commissioners predict the accounting "reliability" and "relevance" of proposed standards. Notably, we find FASB... View Details

Keywords: FASB; Politics; Relevance; Reliability; Standard Setting; Accounting; Standards; Fair Value Accounting; Government and Politics; Personal Characteristics

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March 2011 (Revised March 2014)
Case

The IASB at a Crossroads: The Future of International Financial Reporting Standards (A)

By: Karthik Ramanna, Karol Misztal and Daniela Beyersdorfer

What are the major challenges to the continued growth of IFRS worldwide? Should countries be encouraged to pursue "full adoption" of IFRS or should each country determine its own IFRS "convergence" strategy? Given the limitations of governance and... View Details

Keywords: International Accounting; Emerging Markets; Financial Reporting; Global Strategy; Fair Value Accounting; Corporate Governance; Standards; Adoption; Growth and Development Strategy

2011
Working Paper

Top Executive Background and Financial Reporting Choice

By: Francois Brochet and Kyle Travis Welch

We study the role of executive functional background in explaining management discretion in financial reporting. Taking goodwill impairment as our reporting setting, we focus on top executives (CEOs and CFOs) whose employment history includes experience in investment... View Details

Keywords: Financial Reporting; Goodwill Accounting; Experience and Expertise; Decision Choices and Conditions; Managerial Roles; Agency Theory