非标意见与债务融资——基于银行借款和债务期限结构的经验证据

Modified Audit Opinions and Debt Financing: Empirical Evidence Based on Bank Loans and Debt Maturity

理论上,年报被出具非标意见会降低企业的债务融资能力。但本文发现非标意见对企业新增银行借款和债务期限结构没有显著负面影响,不支持理论预期。我们认为,在中国,银行是一个并非完全以利润最大化为目标的独立市场主体,他们会为了地方社会稳定和经济发展向企业提供贷款;另外,企业有政府的隐性支持,银行不需要太关注企业的偿债风险。因此,虽然非标意见传递出会计信息质量低或未来经营风险高等问题,但它对银行借款的影响相当有限。本文的研究有助于我们理解中国上市公司会计造假盛行、非标意见比例过高的现象。

Theoretically, receiving modified audit opinions （MAOs） weakens firms＇ loan borrowing ability. However, we find firms＇ loans from bank and debt maturity are not adversely affected after receiving MAOs. We propose two reasons for this phenomenon： first, banks used to support local economic development by lending local firms and firms＇ repayment ability may no be a major concern to banks; second, firms are backed by local governments and banks don＇t face a lot of repayment risks when providing loans to firms that received MAOs. Therefore, Poor accounting information quality or high operation risks signaled by MAOs have no significant effects on firms＇ debt financings. This study helps us understand why accounting manipulation is so rampant and the proportion of firms that received MAOs is so high in China market.