Earnings Management Surrounding Seasoned Bond Offerings: Do Managers Mislead Ratings Agencies and the Bond Market?
研究公司在成熟债券发行前后通过操控应计利润进行盈余管理的行为，发现发行前公司倾向于夸大盈利，但激进盈余管理反而导致更低的初始评级和更高的发行收益率，且后续降级比例更低，表明这类努力适得其反。
We study earnings management (EM) efforts surrounding seasoned bond offerings using discretionary current accruals. We find that issuers tend to inflate earnings performance prior to an offering. In order for EM efforts to effectively mislead ratings agencies and the bond market, they must lead to inflated bond ratings and decreased offering yields. Regression results indicate the opposite; aggressive EM efforts are associated with lower initial ratings and higher offering yields. We also find a statistically lower proportion of subsequent downgrades for firms with the most aggressive EM efforts, which is inconsistent with these firms’ inflated initial ratings. While some firms may attempt to mislead ratings agencies and market participants by window-dressing earnings, these efforts appear to be counterproductive.