Debtholders’ Demand for Conservatism: Evidence from Changes in Directors’ Fiduciary Duties
利用特拉华州法院关于董事受托责任扩展至债权人的自然实验，发现受影响的濒临破产公司显著提高了会计稳健性，且董事会越强效果越明显，为债权人对稳健性的因果需求提供了实证证据。
ABSTRACT Debtholders’ demand has been widely discussed as a key determinant of conservatism but clear causal evidence is not yet established. Using a natural experiment setting, wherein a Delaware court ruled that the fiduciary duties of directors in near insolvent Delaware companies extend to creditors, we predict and find that firms subject to the ruling significantly increased their accounting conservatism. In addition, our results suggest that the increase in conservatism is more pronounced in near insolvent Delaware firms with stronger boards, confirming that the court ruling takes effect through the channel of the board of directors. Our results are robust to using alternative measures of conservatism and near insolvency status, and controlling for potential confounding factors and other stakeholders’ demand for conservatism. Overall, our study provides empirical evidence to support the causal relation between debtholders’ demand and accounting conservatism previously suggested in the literature, and offers some insights into the role of the board of directors in financial reporting.