Does Enhanced Disclosure Curb CEO Pay?

By Ilona Babenko, Benjamin Bennett and Zexi Wang August 10, 2023 by renholding

High CEO pay in the United States has fueled repeated calls for enhanced disclosure of chief executives’ compensation. For example, in 2015 the SEC received over 285,000 comment letters supporting its proposed rule to require disclosure of CEO-employee pay ratios. …

The Dark Side of Information Dissemination

By Charles G. McClure, Shawn X. Shi and Edward M. Watts November 8, 2021 by renholding

For decades, there has been an important debate over how much securities regulators should focus on protecting small investors. The regulators themselves have generally aimed to create a level playing field among investors, and historically, new technology has been an …

Copycat Skills and Disclosure Costs

By Sean Cao, Kai Du, Alan L. Zhang and Baozhong Yang September 29, 2021 by renholding

Despite the benefits of greater transparency, public disclosures may reveal proprietary information that ultimately harms the disclosing firm by allowing competitors to view and imitate its strategies, an activity known as “copycatting.” An SEC proposal in July 2020 to increase …

How to Talk When a Machine is Listening: Corporate Disclosure in the Age of AI

By Sean Cao, Baozhong Yang and Alan L. Zhang October 1, 2020 by renholding

The annual report, like other regulatory filings, is more than a legal requirement; it provides an opportunity for public companies to communicate their financial health, promote their culture and brand, and engage with a full spectrum of stakeholders. How readers …

The Phenomenon of the Television Ad as Investment Tip

By Jura Liaukonyte and Alminas Zaldokas May 15, 2020 by renholding

Amid the turbulence in stock markets, retail investors continue to look for investment ideas. With thousands of publicly-traded stocks available, many retail investors often resort to their recent personal experiences when deciding on which stocks to buy or sell. Maybe …

The Impact of Information Technology on Stock Price Crash Risk

By Feng Guo, Ling Lei Lisic, Michael D. Stuart and Chong Wang September 25, 2019 by renholding

Advances in information technology have revolutionized the dissemination and acquisition of firm-specific information, allowing investors and other stakeholders to quickly assess firm performance and value and monitor management effectively. Our research examines the impact of information technology on the ability …

Is Positive Sentiment in Corporate Annual Reports Informative?

By Mehran Azimi and Anup Agrawal August 26, 2019 by renholding

Recent advances in machine learning and natural language processing (NLP) enable machines to better understand human languages. E-mail systems now routinely warn us when an email we receive may be a spam, suggest a quick response to an email, correct …

Fragmented Securities Regulation: Neglected Insider Trading in Stand-Alone Banks

By Sehwa Kim and Seil Kim July 17, 2019 by renholding

The financial regulatory structure in the U.S. is complex, consisting of multiple agencies with overlapping responsibilities. Regulators have raised concerns that regulatory fragmentation may undermine the stability and efficiency of the U.S. financial system (GAO 2016). In this paper, we …

SEC Chair Discusses EDGAR-Hacking Enforcement Action

By Jay Clayton January 16, 2019 by renholding

In August 2017, shortly after my arrival at the Commission, I was informed that an intrusion into the SEC’s Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis, and Retrieval (“EDGAR”) system took place in 2016. We immediately initiated a series of review and response

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Do SEC Comment Letters Provide Useful Information?

By Lauren M. Cunningham, Roy Schmardebeck and Wei Wang March 21, 2016 by ilyabeylin

To ensure compliance with disclosure and accounting requirements, the SEC periodically reviews reporting companies’ filings, including the Form 10-K. While the SEC is required to review the filings of every reporting company at least once every three years, it may …

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