The Innovation and Reporting Consequences of Financial Regulation for Young Life‐Cycle Firms
研究发现，年轻生命周期企业在金融监管（如SOX法案）后显著减少研发投入和创新产出，且未获得财务报告质量提升的补偿，市场参与者预期并验证了这种负面影响。
ABSTRACT Firm life‐cycle stage reflects a firm's current strategic direction toward exploration independent of age or size. We provide evidence that young life‐cycle firms are particularly vulnerable to negative innovation consequences from financial regulation but do not appear to experience any compensating financial reporting quality (FRQ) benefits. Using a generalized difference‐in‐differences design around Sarbanes Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX), we document a significant reduction in both research and development (R&D) spending and innovation outputs for young life‐cycle stage firms after regulation. Declines in innovation manifest both from the diversion of scarce resources and from the imposition of an organizational culture mismatched to the pursuit of explorative innovation, resulting in a less generalizable and less diversified patent portfolio. However, we find no evidence that improvements to FRQ materialize to offset these costs. Event study analyses suggest that this negative impact was expected by market participants, and postregulation returns confirm this expectation.