IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jaecon/v69y2020i1s016541011930031x.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A theoretical analysis connecting conservative accounting to the cost of capital

Author

Listed:
  • Penman, Stephen
  • Zhang, Xiao-Jun

Abstract

We connect conservative accounting to the cost of capital by developing an accounting model within an asset pricing framework. The model has three distinctive features: (1) transaction-cycle-conformity, where the book value equals the value of cash at the beginning and the end of a cash-to-cash transaction cycle; (2) a revenue recognition principle, where uncertainty affects the amount of revenues recognized; (3) a matching principle, where expenses are matched with revenue with a conservative bias due to uncertainty. We demonstrate how the growth rate of expected earnings, the accruals-to-cash ratio, and the expected earnings yield relate to the expected stock return.

Suggested Citation

  • Penman, Stephen & Zhang, Xiao-Jun, 2020. "A theoretical analysis connecting conservative accounting to the cost of capital," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(1).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jaecon:v:69:y:2020:i:1:s016541011930031x
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jacceco.2019.101236
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S016541011930031X
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jacceco.2019.101236?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. Kevin Aretz & Peter F. Pope, 2018. "Real Options Models of the Firm, Capacity Overhang, and the Cross Section of Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 73(3), pages 1363-1415, June.
    2. Basu, Sanjoy, 1983. "The relationship between earnings' yield, market value and return for NYSE common stocks : Further evidence," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 129-156, June.
    3. Devine, Ct, 1963. "The Rule Of Conservatism Reexamined," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 1(2), pages 127-138.
    4. Daniel Kahneman & Amos Tversky, 2013. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Leonard C MacLean & William T Ziemba (ed.), HANDBOOK OF THE FUNDAMENTALS OF FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING Part I, chapter 6, pages 99-127, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    5. Basu, S, 1977. "Investment Performance of Common Stocks in Relation to Their Price-Earnings Ratios: A Test of the Efficient Market Hypothesis," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 32(3), pages 663-682, June.
    6. Stephen H. Penman & Francesco Reggiani & Scott A. Richardson & İrem Tuna, 2018. "A framework for identifying accounting characteristics for asset pricing models, with an evaluation of book‐to‐price," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 24(4), pages 488-520, September.
    7. Qintao Fan & Xiao†Jun Zhang, 2012. "Accounting Conservatism, Aggregation, and Information Quality," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 29(1), pages 38-56, March.
    8. Zhang, Xiao-Jun, 2000. "Conservative accounting and equity valuation," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 125-149, February.
    9. Ball, Ray, 1978. "Anomalies in relationships between securities' yields and yield-surrogates," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 6(2-3), pages 103-126.
    10. Frederick R. Macaulay, 1938. "Some Theoretical Problems Suggested by the Movements of Interest Rates, Bond Yields and Stock Prices in the United States since 1856," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number maca38-1.
    11. Ohlson, JA & Zhang, XJ, 1998. "Accrual accounting and equity valuation," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36, pages 85-111.
    12. Mark Rubinstein, 1976. "The Valuation of Uncertain Income Streams and the Pricing of Options," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 7(2), pages 407-425, Autumn.
    13. John Christensen & Joel S. Demski, 2004. "Asymmetric Monitoring: Good Versus Bad News Verification," Schmalenbach Business Review (sbr), LMU Munich School of Management, vol. 56(3), pages 206-222, July.
    14. Fama, Eugene F., 1977. "Risk-adjusted discount rates and capital budgeting under uncertainty," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 5(1), pages 3-24, August.
    15. Maureen McNichols & Madhav V. Rajan & Stefan Reichelstein, 2014. "Conservatism Correction for the Market-To-Book Ratio and Tobin's q," CESifo Working Paper Series 4626, CESifo.
    16. Basu, Sudipta, 1997. "The conservatism principle and the asymmetric timeliness of earnings," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(1), pages 3-37, December.
    17. Aretz, Kevin & Pope, Peter F., 2018. "Real options models of the firm, capacity overhang, and the cross-section of stock returns," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 85963, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    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. Stephen Penman, 2023. "Accounting for Intangible Assets: Thinking It Through," Australian Accounting Review, CPA Australia, vol. 33(1), pages 5-13, March.
    2. Jakub Horak & Petr Suler & Jaroslav Kollmann & Jan Marecek, 2020. "Credit Absorption Capacity of Businesses in the Construction Sector of the Czech Republic—Analysis Based on the Difference in Values of EVA Entity and EVA Equity," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(21), pages 1-16, October.
    3. Atif Ellahie, 2021. "Earnings beta," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 26(1), pages 81-122, March.
    4. Zihang Peng, 2023. "Do risk exposures explain accounting anomalies? A new testing method," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 63(3), pages 2965-2983, September.
    5. Stephen Penman & Julie Zhu & Haofei Wang, 2023. "The implied cost of capital: accounting for growth," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 61(3), pages 1029-1056, October.
    6. Ratna Puji Astuti KRISMIAJI, 2021. "Accounting Conservatism and Cost of Equity Capital – Evidence from Indonesia," CECCAR Business Review, Body of Expert and Licensed Accountants of Romania (CECCAR), vol. 2(2), pages 64-72, February.
    7. Dr. Asad Abbas & Dr. Asif Saeed & Asad Abbas, 2023. "Does Ownership Structure and Financial Health Affect Firm’s Earnings Quality? Evidence from Emerging Economy," Bulletin of Business and Economics (BBE), Research Foundation for Humanity (RFH), vol. 12(4), pages 665-671.
    8. Ray Ball & Gil Sadka & Ayung Tseng, 2022. "Using accounting earnings and aggregate economic indicators to estimate firm-level systematic risk," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 27(2), pages 607-646, June.
    9. Beyer, Anne & Smith, Kevin C., 2021. "Learning about risk-factor exposures from earnings: Implications for asset pricing and manipulation," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 72(1).
    10. Stephen H. Penman & Xiao-Jun Zhang, 2021. "Connecting book rate of return to risk and return: the information conveyed by conservative accounting," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 26(1), pages 391-423, March.
    11. Cao, Viet Nga & Pham, Anh Viet, 2021. "Behavioral spillover between firms with shared auditors: The monitoring role of capital market investors," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    12. Glover, Jonathan & Xue, Hao, 2023. "Accounting conservatism and relational contracting," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(1).
    13. Penman, Stephen & Zhu, Julie, 2022. "An accounting-based asset pricing model and a fundamental factor," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 73(2).

    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. Stephen H. Penman & Xiao-Jun Zhang, 2021. "Connecting book rate of return to risk and return: the information conveyed by conservative accounting," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 26(1), pages 391-423, March.
    2. Fernando Rubio, 2005. "Eficiencia De Mercado, Administracion De Carteras De Fondos Y Behavioural Finance," Finance 0503028, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 23 Jul 2005.
    3. Committee, Nobel Prize, 2013. "Understanding Asset Prices," Nobel Prize in Economics documents 2013-1, Nobel Prize Committee.
    4. S. P. Kothari & Charles Wasley, 2019. "Commemorating the 50‐Year Anniversary of Ball and Brown (1968): The Evolution of Capital Market Research over the Past 50 Years," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(5), pages 1117-1159, December.
    5. Eero Pätäri & Timo Leivo, 2017. "A Closer Look At Value Premium: Literature Review And Synthesis," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(1), pages 79-168, February.
    6. Schwert, G. William, 2003. "Anomalies and market efficiency," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, in: G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Finance, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 15, pages 939-974, Elsevier.
    7. Trabelsi, Mohamed Ali, 2010. "Choix de portefeuille: comparaison des différentes stratégies [Portfolio selection: comparison of different strategies]," MPRA Paper 82946, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 01 Dec 2010.
    8. Francesco Campanella & Mario Mustilli & Eugenio D¡¯Angelo, 2016. "Efficient Market Hypothesis and Fundamental Analysis: An Empirical Test in the European Securities Market," Review of Economics & Finance, Better Advances Press, Canada, vol. 6, pages 27-42, February.
    9. Dmitry Livdan & Alexander Nezlobin, 2017. "Accounting rules, equity valuation, and growth options," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 22(3), pages 1122-1155, September.
    10. Jang Youn Cho, 1994. "Determinants Of Earnings‐Price Ratios: A Reexamination," Review of Financial Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 3(2), pages 105-120, March.
    11. Kothari, S. P., 2001. "Capital markets research in accounting," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1-3), pages 105-231, September.
    12. Gabriel Hawawini & Donald B. Keim, "undated". "The Cross Section of Common Stock Returns: A Review of the Evidence and Some New Findings," Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research Working Papers 08-99, Wharton School Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research.
    13. Dewandaru, Ginanjar & Masih, Rumi & Bacha, Obiyathulla Ismath & Masih, A. Mansur. M., 2015. "Combining momentum, value, and quality for the Islamic equity portfolio: Multi-style rotation strategies using augmented Black Litterman factor model," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 205-232.
    14. Patricia M. Fairfield & Trevor S. Harris, 1993. "Price†Earnings and Price†to†Book Anomalies: Tests of an Intrinsic Value Explanation," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 9(2), pages 590-611, March.
    15. Artmann, Sabine & Finter, Philipp & Kempf, Alexander, 2010. "Determinants of expected stock returns: Large sample evidence from the German market," CFR Working Papers 10-01, University of Cologne, Centre for Financial Research (CFR).
    16. John Y. Campbell & Christopher Polk & Tuomo Vuolteenaho, 2010. "Growth or Glamour? Fundamentals and Systematic Risk in Stock Returns," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 23(1), pages 305-344, January.
    17. Chi, Wuchun & Wang, Chenchin, 2010. "Accounting conservatism in a setting of Information Asymmetry between majority and minority shareholders," The International Journal of Accounting, Elsevier, vol. 45(4), pages 465-489, December.
    18. Madiha Kazmi & Umara Noreen & Imran Abbas Jadoon & Attayah Shafique, 2021. "Downside Beta and Downside Gamma: In Search for a Better Capital Asset Pricing Model," Risks, MDPI, vol. 9(12), pages 1-14, December.
    19. David Hirshleifer, 2001. "Investor Psychology and Asset Pricing," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(4), pages 1533-1597, August.
    20. Rocciolo, Francesco & Gheno, Andrea & Brooks, Chris, 2022. "Explaining abnormal returns in stock markets: An alpha-neutral version of the CAPM," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Conservative accounting; Risk and return; Earnings growth; Accruals; Earnings yield;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • M41 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Accounting - - - Accounting
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates

    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:eee:jaecon:v:69:y:2020:i:1:s016541011930031x. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jae .

    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.