Audit Committee Stock Options and Financial Reporting Quality after the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002
研究了萨班斯-奥克斯利法案后审计委员会成员的股权激励与财务报告质量的关系，发现股票期权奖励与持有会增加公司达到或略超分析师盈利预测的可能性，表明激励可能降低报告质量。
SUMMARY The Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) and its associated regulations significantly expanded the oversight role of audit committees and improved independence, but regulators bypassed restrictions on audit committee equity incentives. We examine the association of audit committee members' equity incentives and financial reporting quality in the post-SOX time period. We find that audit committee members' stock-option awards and holdings are positively associated with the likelihood of meeting/beating analyst earnings forecasts. On average, a company whose audit committee holds the mean value of exercisable option holdings is associated with a 10.0 percent increase in the likelihood of meeting or just beating its consensus analyst forecast. This effect increases to 17.8 percent for companies with high-growth opportunities. These results suggest that—even in the post-SOX era—the stock-option incentives provided to independent audit committee members are associated with reduced financial reporting quality. JEL Classifications: M41, M42