会计稳健性、财务困境与公司风险转移

Accounting Conservatism, Financial Distress and Corporate Risk Transfer

会计稳健性作为财务报告的主要特征,对保障债权人的利益有着重要作用。文章以中国2001-2009年A股上市公司为样本的实证研究发现,当公司处于财务困境时,管理者会产生通过增加投资将风险转移给债权人的动机和行为,而会计稳健性则有着显著的抑制管理者通过投资将风险转移给债权人的作用。同时实证研究还发现,风险转移与产权性质相关,国有控股公司更可能产生风险转移行为,会计稳健性对国有控股公司的风险转移抑制作用也更显著,也表明会计稳健性能减轻债务软约束的问题。

As one of the main features of financial statements, accounting conservatism plays an important role in the protection of the interests of creditors. This paper conducts an empirical study with the A-share listed companies in China from 2001 to 2009 as samples. It is found that when a company is in financial difficulties, the managers will have the motives and actions to transfer risks to the creditors by increasing investment, while accounting conservatism will play a significant role in inhibiting the transfer of risks to the creditors through investment by the managers. Meanwhile the empirical study also finds that risk transfer is related with the nature of property rights, state-owned holding companies are more likely to have risk transfer behaviors, accounting conservatism can play an even significant role in inhibiting the transfer of risks by the state-owned holding companies, which also shows that accounting conservatism can ease the problems of soft constraints of debts.