IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/una/unccee/wp0208.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Fundamentals and the accruals puzzle

Author

Listed:
  • Javier Gómez Biscarri

    (IESE Business School)

  • Germán López Espinosa

    (Universidad de Navarra)

Abstract

We investigate whether there is an economic relationship between accruals and fundamentals. Our study is the first one to evaluate the profitability and persistence of an accrual factor, to analyze whether changes in fundamentals are explained by changes in accruals, and whether an accrual factor in fundamentals is the source of the accrual factor in returns, that is, if the accrual factor in fundamentals is driving stock returns. Our results show evidence of a relationship between fundamentals and accruals, a relationship that is persistent over time. Furthermore, we find that a Size, BTM and an accrual factor in sales seem to be driving stock returns: returns are driven by changes in sales and not by other fundamentals. Also, we show that future sales growth is correlated with stock returns and that accruals and cash flows contain valuable information for predicting future changes in sales. Finally, our results indicate that the accrual factor behaves similarly to the Size and BTM factors in terms of sensitivities and risk premiums. A natural corollary of the study reconciles some conflicting results obtained by the accruals literature: our results imply that the performance of an accruals-based strategy is not comparable directly to an OCF-based strategy because the former is adjusted by accounting quality risk whereas the latter is not.

Suggested Citation

  • Javier Gómez Biscarri & Germán López Espinosa, 2008. "Fundamentals and the accruals puzzle," Faculty Working Papers 02/08, School of Economics and Business Administration, University of Navarra.
    • Handle: RePEc:una:unccee:wp0208
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.unav.edu/documents/10174/6546776/1212685288_Fundamentals_and_Accruals_Vfinal2.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Francis, Jennifer & LaFond, Ryan & Olsson, Per & Schipper, Katherine, 2005. "The market pricing of accruals quality," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(2), pages 295-327, June.
    2. David Hirshleifer & Kewei Hou & Siew Hong Teoh, 2012. "The Accrual Anomaly: Risk or Mispricing?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 58(2), pages 320-335, February.
    3. Richardson, Scott A. & Sloan, Richard G. & Soliman, Mark T. & Tuna, Irem, 2005. "Accrual reliability, earnings persistence and stock prices," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(3), pages 437-485, September.
    4. Ralitsa Petkova, 2006. "Do the Fama–French Factors Proxy for Innovations in Predictive Variables?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(2), pages 581-612, April.
    5. 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.
    6. Ashbaugh, Hollis, 2001. "Non-US Firms' Accounting Standard Choices," Journal of Accounting and Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 20(2), pages 129-153.
    7. David Aboody & John Hughes & Jing Liu, 2005. "Earnings Quality, Insider Trading, and Cost of Capital," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 43(5), pages 651-673, December.
    8. Konan Chan & Narasimhan Jegadeesh & Theodore Sougiannis, 2004. "The Accrual Effect on Future Earnings," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 22(2), pages 97-121, March.
    9. Fama, Eugene F & French, Kenneth R, 1995. "Size and Book-to-Market Factors in Earnings and Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 50(1), pages 131-155, March.
    10. Daniel, Kent & Titman, Sheridan, 1997. "Evidence on the Characteristics of Cross Sectional Variation in Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(1), pages 1-33, March.
    11. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1993. "Common risk factors in the returns on stocks and bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 3-56, February.
    12. Mashruwala, Christina & Rajgopal, Shivaram & Shevlin, Terry, 2006. "Why is the accrual anomaly not arbitraged away? The role of idiosyncratic risk and transaction costs," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(1-2), pages 3-33, October.
    13. 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.
    14. Fama, Eugene F & MacBeth, James D, 1973. "Risk, Return, and Equilibrium: Empirical Tests," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 81(3), pages 607-636, May-June.
    15. Victor Bernard & Jacob Thomas & James Wahlen, 1997. "Accounting†Based Stock Price Anomalies: Separating Market Inefficiencies from Risk," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 14(2), pages 89-136, June.
    16. Collins, Daniel W. & Hribar, Paul, 2000. "Earnings-based and accrual-based market anomalies: one effect or two?," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 101-123, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Richardson, Scott & Tuna, Irem & Wysocki, Peter, 2010. "Accounting anomalies and fundamental analysis: A review of recent research advances," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(2-3), pages 410-454, December.
    2. David Hirshleifer & Kewei Hou & Siew Hong Teoh, 2012. "The Accrual Anomaly: Risk or Mispricing?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 58(2), pages 320-335, February.
    3. Mohanram, Partha & Rajgopal, Shiva, 2009. "Is PIN priced risk?," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(3), pages 226-243, June.
    4. Khan, Mozaffar, 2008. "Are accruals mispriced Evidence from tests of an Intertemporal Capital Asset Pricing Model," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(1), pages 55-77, March.
    5. Terry Shevlin, 2013. "Some personal observations on the debate on the link between financial reporting quality and the cost of equity capital," Australian Journal of Management, Australian School of Business, vol. 38(3), pages 447-473, December.
    6. Kai Du & Xin Daniel Jiang, 2020. "Connections between the Market Pricing of Accruals Quality and Accounting‐Based Anomalies," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 37(4), pages 2087-2119, December.
    7. Core, John E. & Guay, Wayne R. & Verdi, Rodrigo, 2008. "Is accruals quality a priced risk factor?," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 2-22, September.
    8. Jennifer Francis & Ryan Lafond & Per Olsson & Katherine Schipper, 2007. "Information Uncertainty and Post‐Earnings‐Announcement‐Drift," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 34(3‐4), pages 403-433, April.
    9. De Moor, Lieven & Sercu, Piet, 2013. "The smallest firm effect: An international study," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 129-155.
    10. Kothari, S. P., 2001. "Capital markets research in accounting," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1-3), pages 105-231, September.
    11. Philip Gray & Ping-Sheng Koh & Yen H Tong, 2009. "Accruals Quality, Information Risk and Cost of Capital: Evidence from Australia," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(1-2), pages 51-72.
    12. Nguyet T. M. Nguyen & Abdullah Iqbal & Radha K. Shiwakoti, 2022. "The context of earnings management and its ability to predict future stock returns," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 59(1), pages 123-169, July.
    13. Mashruwala, Christina & Rajgopal, Shivaram & Shevlin, Terry, 2006. "Why is the accrual anomaly not arbitraged away? The role of idiosyncratic risk and transaction costs," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(1-2), pages 3-33, October.
    14. Kang, Byoung Uk & In, Francis & Kim, Tong Suk, 2017. "Timescale betas and the cross section of equity returns: Framework, application, and implications for interpreting the Fama–French factors," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 15-39.
    15. DeLisle, R. Jared & Ferguson, Michael F. & Kassa, Haimanot & Zaynutdinova, Gulnara R., 2021. "Hazard stocks and expected returns," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).
    16. Artikis, Panagiotis G. & Papanastasopoulos, Georgios A., 2016. "Implications of the cash component of earnings for earnings persistence and stock returns," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 48(2), pages 117-133.
    17. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 2006. "Profitability, investment and average returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(3), pages 491-518, December.
    18. Andrew Detzel & Philipp Schaberl & Jack Strauss, 2018. "There are two very different accruals anomalies," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 24(4), pages 581-609, September.
    19. Liu, Chenxi & Kang, Mengyao, 2024. "Is the cash-returns relationship risk induced?," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 69(PA).
    20. Michael Dempsey, 2015. "Stock Markets, Investments and Corporate Behavior:A Conceptual Framework of Understanding," World Scientific Books, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., number p1007, August.

    More about this item

    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:una:unccee:wp0208. 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.unav.edu/web/facultad-de-ciencias-economicas-y-empresariales .

    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.