Cette thèse de doctorat comprend trois essais portant sur plusieurs sujets dans le domaine de la finance d'entreprise empirique. L'essai 1 étudie l'avantage informationnel des administrateurs indépendants ayant une expertise de l'industrie par rapport aux administrateurs indépendants sans cette expertise. Pour le faire, je regarde les bénéfices des transactions dites « d'initiés » réalisés par des administrateurs indépendants. Je trouve que les administrateurs indépendants possédant une expertise sectorielle obtiennent des bénéfices significativement plus élevés que les administrateurs indépendants sans ladite expertise. De plus, une augmentation de la proportion d'administrateurs indépendants possédant une expertise sectorielle pertinente au sein du conseil est associée à une meilleure performance de l'alliance, à une plus grande probabilité d'accomplissement des opérations de fusions et acquisitions et à une sensibilité moindre des investissements faites par l’entreprise aux prix de marché. Les résultats dans son ensemble suggèrent que les administrateurs experts de l'industrie ont une connaissance supérieure de l'entreprise et pourraient améliorer l'efficacité du conseil d’administration dans l'exercice de ses fonctions de surveillance et de conseil. L'essai 2 étudie l'effet préjudiciable de l'activité de vente à découvert sur les relations entre clients et fournisseurs. Nous montrons que le montant de ventes à découvert des actions d'un fournisseur est positivement associé à une probabilité plus élevée qu'un client important du fournisseur mette fin à la relation commerciale entre les deux. Une telle interruption peut être partiellement prévenue par la présence de détenteurs de « blocs » d’actions dans l'entreprise du fournisseur, particulièrement si ces détenteurs ont une orientation à long terme. Nos résultats sont conformes à l'hypothèse selon laquelle les vendeurs à découvert peuvent perturber les relations d'une entreprise avec des contreparties commerciales grâce à l'effet dit de « rétroaction », c’est-à-dire, le fait que les prix de marché affectent les décisions de l’entreprise. Par contre la présence de détenteurs de « blocs » constitue un mécanisme efficace pour contrer cette perturbation. L'essai 3 examine les raisons possibles du taux croissant d'annonces d'offres d’acquisition « groupées », dans lequel le management de l’acquéreur annonce une acquisition imminente le jour même où l’acquéreur déclare ses résultats trimestriels au marché. Cette pratique semble étrange étant donné que les offres groupées présentent des rendements d'annonce des acquéreurs nettement inférieurs, quel que soit le statut de la cible. Nos résultats pointent vers l'hypothèse de « révélation stratégique d’information » comme la raison la plus probable pour laquelle les entreprises choisissent de regrouper les annonces d'acquisition et les annonces de bénéfices. Ces acquéreurs, confrontés à des faibles bénéfices, dirigés par des PDG récemment nommés, et dans une situation où les analystes les contestent et où l'incertitude est grande, utilisent les annonces groupées comme un outil pour influencer la réception du marché sur leur performance. / This doctoral thesis includes three essays investigating several topics in the area of empirical corporate finance. Essay 1 studies the informational advantage of independent directors with industry expertise over independent directors without such expertise. To do so, I look at insider trading returns earned by independent directors. I find that independent directors with industry expertise earn significantly higher insider trading returns than do independent directors without such expertise. Moreover, an increase in the proportion of independent directors with relevant industry expertise on the board is associated with better alliance performance, a higher probability of M&A deal completion, and a lower investment-to-price sensitivity. Overall, the results suggest that industry expert directors have superior knowledge about the firm and could enhance board effectiveness in performing both monitoring and advisory roles. Essay 2 studies the detrimental effect of short selling activity on product market relationships. We show that higher supplier’s short interest is associated with a higher likelihood that a major client of the supplier terminates an existing relationship. Such interruption can be partially prevented by the presence of long-term blockholders in the supplier firm. Our results are consistent with the hypothesis that short sellers can disrupt a firm’s relationships with business counterparties through the feedback effect, but informed block ownership serves as an effective mechanism to counteract this disruption. Essay 3 investigates possible explanations for the increasing rate of “bundled” bid announcements, in which managers of the bidder announce an impending acquisition on the same day that the bidder reports its quarterly earnings to the market. This practice seems puzzling given that bundled bids exhibit significantly lower bidder announcement returns regardless of the target status. Our results point towards the strategic disclosure hypothesis as the most likely reason why firms choose to bundle acquisition and earnings announcements. Confronted with low earnings news, led by recently-nominated CEOs, in a situation in which they are challenged by analysts and uncertainty is high, bidders use bundled announcements as a tool to influence the market’s reception to the earnings.

This study examines whether auditor industry expertise in private clients influences audit quality of public client engagements in the United States. Private companies are significant to the U.S. economy as well as audit firms. I hand-collect auditors' private client information and construct a national, city, and joint national/city specialist designation and document a 17.9 to 47.3 (12.9 to 25.8) percent decrease in a public client's likelihood to misstate their financial statements (net income earnings management) when an auditor is a private client industry specialist. I then construct and test a city specialist measure using both private and public client data and find that it is economically stronger and more robust than the public only measure commonly employed by audit researchers. This study provides evidence of the importance of private companies to an audit firm's industry expertise as well as to researchers' use of city specialist measure in audit studies. / Doctor of Philosophy / This study examines whether auditor industry expertise in private clients influences audit quality of public client engagements in the United States. Private companies are significant to the U.S. economy as well as audit firms. I hand-collect auditors' private client information and construct a national, city, and joint national/city specialist designation and find that audit quality is higher for the audit firm's public clients in the same industry. Next, I construct and test a city industry specialist measure using both private and public client data and find that it is economically stronger and more robust than the public only measure commonly employed by audit researchers. This study provides evidence of the importance of private companies to an audit firm's industry expertise as well as to researchers' use of city specialist measure in audit studies.

While the effect of auditor industry specialization is well documented in prior literature, it is unclear under what conditions or for which type of firms an auditor's industry expertise matters. I hypothesize that industry specialist auditors will provide higher quality audits in settings where the likelihood of revenue manipulation is greater. I use a firm's manipulation of revenues to measure audit quality because the revenue account is significant, requires in-depth industry specific knowledge, and is subject to frequent manipulation. The results suggest that the impact of industry specialists is concentrated among firms with complex revenue recognition standards, high growth, and low institutional monitoring. Overall, my findings highlight the importance for regulators, auditors, clients, and investors to consider the circumstances in which industry expertise improves the quality of an audit.

分析師扮演著公司與投資大眾之間的資訊中介者角色。本文旨在探討企業研發支出對分析師預測品質的影響，以及企業聘雇屬於產業專家會計師是否能夠緩和研發支出所引發的盈餘管理及代理問題，並進而改善分析師預測品質。本文援引Balsam (2003)之定義，計算會計師事務所於各產業之市場佔有率(auditor industry market share)。作為產業專家之代理變數。實證結果發現：(1)分析師離散性與整合分析師間私有利益的程度，與公司研發費用多寡有關。研發費用愈高的公司，分析師的離散程度及整合分析師間的私有利益也愈高；(2)透過產業專家查核，可以緩和研發費用支出所引發的盈餘操縱及代理問題，因此研究發展費用透過產業專家會計師查核，可以提升企業的會計盈餘資訊品質，以降低分析師盈餘預測的離散程度及降低分析師間整合私有資訊的利益。 / Analysts, as an informational intermediary, produce research reports that include forecasts of future earnings, thus fulfill an important role in capital market. The objective of this paper is to investigate the association between analyst forecast’s quality and firm’s R&D expenditure. Recent work has hypothesized that intangible assets affect analyst forecast’s quality. Extending this literature, we hypothesized that firm seek to reduce the degree of earnings’ management and agency’s cost from R&D expenditure by retaining high quality auditor firms, auditor industry expertise, and then increase analyst forecast’s quality. We measure auditor industry expertise based on Balsam (2003). We find that more R&D expenditure increases analyst forecast’s dispersion and enhances the benefits of aggregating individual analysts’ forecasts. Consistent with our hypothesis, we document that auditor industry expertise can mitigate the degree of earnings’ management and agency’s cost from R&D expenditure. We also find that firms retaining auditor industry expertise are more likely to enhance the accounting information quality, decrease analyst forecast’s dispersion, and eliminate the benefits of aggregating individual analysts’ forecasts.

This thesis examines the factors affecting audit and non-audit fees and the effects of the joint provision of audit and non-audit services on auditing. The first essay focuses on environmental factors. Using data for Swedish listed companies over a six year span, including pre-crisis, crisis and post-crisis periods, the essay investigates whether changing economic conditions affect the level of fees paid for audit and non-audit services. The finding suggests that auditors increase their risk premium for auditing during a financial crisis andtend to charge higher audit fees as a response to lower risk levels in the post-crisis period. On the other hand, a significant reduction in non-audit fees suggests that companies are less willing to invest in consulting services during thecrisis and post-crisis periods. The second essay also studies the effects of environmental factors on audit pricing. Using data for financial institutions in 24 European countries, the study examines whether the level of effort spent on the evaluation of fair values is higher for more uncertain fair values.The result suggests that an increasing level of complexity and risk requires greater audit effort. Furthermore, the results showthat the strength of a country’s institutional setting is positively associated with the effort spent on the evaluation of high uncertainty fair value estimates. The finding implies that auditors spend more effort in stronger regulated countries, possibly due to higher potential litigation costs. The third essay focuses on the factors related to an individual audit partner. Based on the data of publicly listed Swedish companies, it investigates whether partner special competencies are reflected in the prices charged for auditing. The findings show that partner industry expertise and client-specific expertise are associated with higher audit fees. A further finding isthat female partners are considerably under-represented among specialists. However,the under-representation of females among higher qualified partners does not seem to negatively affect their possibilities to earn higher fees. The fourth essay investigates how the joint provision of audit and non-audit services affects perceived knowledge spillover and audit efficiency. The essay makesuse of survey data from a large sample of Swedish auditors and finds that the levels of communication and trust are positively associated with knowledge spillover. The result further suggests that the information gained from the provision of non-audit services can reduce auditors’ effort (time) spent on different audit procedures, thereby increasing audit efficiency.