Scholars@Duke
Mohan Venkatachalam

Mohan Venkatachalam CV

R. J. Reynolds Distinguished Professor of Business Administration in the Fuqua School of Business
Fuqua School of Business
vmohan@duke.edu
Box 90120, Durham, NC 27708-0120
A439 Fuqua Sch of Bus, 1 Towerview Drive, Durham, NC 27708
CV

Selected Publications

The changing macroeconomic information content of aggregate earnings

Journal Article Review of Accounting Studies · December 1, 2025 We examine the dynamic nature of the information content of aggregate earnings. Specifically, we examine how changes in supply elasticity affect the relation between aggregate earnings and future inflation. Using total capacity utilization to capture suppl ... Full text Cite

The value of equal access to mandatory disclosure: evidence from the Great Postal Strike of 1970

Journal Article Review of Accounting Studies · June 1, 2025 How important is equal access to mandatory disclosures? We exploit the postal strike of 1970 that caused a delay in the delivery of annual reports via mail. This strike created unequal access because certain investors (e.g., institutions) had both the ince ... Full text Cite

In Some CEOs We Trust, All Others Must Disclose

Journal Article · March 11, 2025 Cite

Leasing Loses Altitude While Ownership Takes Off: Real Effects of the New Lease Standard

Journal Article Accounting Review · May 1, 2024 This paper evaluates the real effects of the new lease standard, ASC 842, on firms’ investment and operational outcomes. Using a sample of airline companies, we find that, subsequent to the promulgation of ASC 842 (2016–2018), public airlines reduce operat ... Full text Cite

Does differential taxation of short-term relative to long-term capital gains affect long-term investment?

Journal Article Journal of Accounting and Economics · August 1, 2022 Pressure from short-horizon investors can hurt investments in innovative, long-run value-increasing projects. We explore the efficacy of a commonly proposed tax-based policy tool to mitigate this problem: the imposition of differentially greater taxes on s ... Full text Cite

Leveraging Big Data to Study Information Dissemination of Material Firm Events

Journal Article Journal of Accounting Research · May 1, 2022 Could real-time big data help unravel material firm events? How would it compare with firm disclosure and traditional media in terms of timeliness and completeness? Could big data provide incremental value-relevant information for investors? With these que ... Full text Cite

Aggregate accruals and market returns: The role of aggregate M&A activity

Journal Article Journal of Accounting and Economics · November 1, 2021 Extant literature documents that aggregate accruals positively predict future market returns and attributes this relation to either changes in discount rates or systematic earnings management. We offer an alternative explanation: aggregate merger and acqui ... Full text Cite

Economic Consequences of IFRS Adoption: The Role of Changes in Disclosure Quality*

Journal Article Contemporary Accounting Research · March 1, 2021 This study adopts a two-step approach to highlight the disclosure quality channel that drives economic consequences of IFRS adoption. This approach helps address the identification challenge noted by prior research and offers direct evidence on the role of ... Full text Cite

Changes in accrual properties and operating environment: Implications for cash flow predictability

Journal Article Journal of Accounting and Economics · April 1, 2020 This paper reconciles conflicting evidence in prior literature on the relative ability of earnings and cash flows in predicting future cash flows. Further, we investigate the implications of temporal shifts in accrual properties and operating environment f ... Full text Cite

Individual analysts’ stock recommendations, earnings forecasts, and the informativeness of conference call question and answer sessions

Journal Article Accounting Review · February 17, 2020 This paper deepens our understanding of the anatomy of an earnings conference call. Prior research indicates that, on average, analysts providing bullish stock recommendations or beatable earnings forecasts benefit from greater access to corporate manageme ... Full text Cite

Mutual fund transparency and corporate myopia

Scholarly Edition · May 1, 2018 Pressure from institutional money managers to generate profits in the short run is often blamed for corporate myopia. Theoretical research suggests that money managers’ short-term focus stems from their career concerns and greater fund transparency can amp ... Full text Cite

Frequent financial reporting and managerial myopia

Journal Article Accounting Review · March 1, 2018 Using the transition of U.S. firms from annual reporting to semi-annual reporting and then to quarterly reporting over the period 1950-1970, we provide evidence on the effects of increased reporting frequency on firms' investment decisions. Estimates from ... Full text Cite

Do the FASB's standards add shareholder value?

Journal Article Accounting Review · March 1, 2018 We examine the cost-effectiveness, from the shareholders' perspective, of the accounting standards issued by the FASB during 1973-2009. We evaluate (1) the stock market reactions of firms affected by the standards surrounding events that changed the standa ... Full text Cite

Improving Experienced Auditors’ Detection of Deception in CEO Narratives

Journal Article Journal of Accounting Research · December 1, 2017 We experimentally study the deception detection capabilities of experienced auditors, using CEO narratives from earnings conference calls as case materials. We randomly assign narratives of fraud and nonfraud companies to auditors as well as the presence v ... Full text Cite

MD&A disclosure and the firm's ability to continue as a going concern

Journal Article Accounting Review · July 1, 2015 This paper explores the role of textual disclosures in the Management, Discussion, and Analysis (MD&A) section of a firm's SEC 10-K filing in predicting a firm's ability to continue as a going concern. Using a sample of firms that filed for bankruptcy betw ... Full text Cite

Financial fraud detection using vocal, linguistic and financial cues

Journal Article Decision Support Systems · June 1, 2015 Corporate financial fraud has a severe negative impact on investors and the capital market in general. The current resources committed to financial fraud detection (FFD), however, are insufficient to identify all occurrences in a timely fashion. Methods fo ... Full text Cite

Corporate general counsel and financial reporting quality

Journal Article Management Science · January 1, 2015 We examine the role of general counsel (GC) in firms' financial reporting quality. GCs have a broad oversight role within the firm, including keeping the firm in compliance with laws and regulations and dealing with potential violations with respect to fin ... Full text Cite

R2 and idiosyncratic risk are not interchangeable

Journal Article Accounting Review · November 1, 2014 A growing literature investigates the association between stock return variation and several aspects of information and governance structures, in both a crosscountry setting and a cross-firm setting within the U.S. Papers use either idiosyncratic stock ret ... Full text Cite

Is warren Buffett's commentary on accounting, governance, and investing practices reflected in the investment decisions and subsequent influence of Berkshire Hathaway?

Journal Article Accounting Review · September 1, 2014 We examine (1) whether the accounting, governance, and investing practices of Berkshire Hathaway investees are consistent with Warren Buffett's public statements on what constitutes good accounting, governance, and investing practices and (2) whether these ... Full text Cite

Vocal fry may undermine the success of young women in the labor market.

Journal Article PloS one · January 2014 Vocal fry is speech that is low pitched and creaky sounding, and is increasingly common among young American females. Some argue that vocal fry enhances speaker labor market perceptions while others argue that vocal fry is perceived negatively and can dama ... Full text Cite

Voice pitch and the labor market success of male chief executive officers

Journal Article Evolution and Human Behavior · July 1, 2013 A deep voice is evolutionarily advantageous for males, but does it confer benefit in competition for leadership positions? We study ecologically valid speech from 792 male public-company Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) and find that CEOs with deeper voices ... Full text Cite

Using earnings conference calls to identify analysts with superior private information

Journal Article Review of Accounting Studies · June 1, 2013 We examine the extent to which analysts who participate in earnings conference calls by asking questions possess superior private information relative to analysts who do not ask questions. Using a large sample of earnings conference call transcripts over t ... Full text Cite

Speech analysis in financial markets

Journal Article Foundations and Trends in Accounting · December 1, 2012 The ways in which managers communicate information to capital market participants go far beyond financial statements and accounting numbers. Managers communicate economically relevant information both verbally, in documents distributed and available to inv ... Full text Cite

Analyzing Speech to Detect Financial Misreporting

Journal Article Journal of Accounting Research · May 1, 2012 We examine whether vocal markers of cognitive dissonance are useful for detecting financial misreporting. We use speech samples of CEOs during earnings conference calls, and generate vocal dissonance markers using automated vocal emotion analysis software. ... Full text Cite

Frictions in the CEO Labor Market: The Role of Talent Agents in CEO Compensation

Journal Article Contemporary Accounting Research · March 1, 2012 Full text Cite

The power of voice: Managerial affective states and future firm performance

Journal Article Journal of Finance · January 1, 2012 We measure managerial affective states during earnings conference calls by analyzing conference call audio files using vocal emotion analysis software. We hypothesize and find that, when managers are scrutinized by analysts during conference calls, positiv ... Full text Cite

Are sin stocks paying the price for accounting sins?

Journal Article Journal of Accounting Auditing and Finance · April 1, 2011 Recent empirical evidence suggests that sin stocks-publicly traded stocks in the gaming, tobacco, alcohol, and adult entertainment industries-are neglected by stock market participants because of social norms, regulatory scrutiny, and litigation risk. Cons ... Full text Cite

Financial reporting quality and idiosyncratic return volatility

Journal Article Journal of Accounting and Economics · February 1, 2011 Campbell et al. (2001) document that firms' stock returns have become more volatile in the U.S. since 1960. We hypothesize and find that deteriorating earnings quality is associated with higher idiosyncratic return volatility over 1962-2001. These results ... Full text Cite

Accelerated vesting of employee stock options in anticipation of FAS 123-R

Journal Article Journal of Accounting Research · March 1, 2009 In December 2004, the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) mandated the use of a fair value-based measurement attribute to value employee stock options (ESOs) via Financial Accounting Standard (FAS) 123-R. In anticipation of FAS 123-R, between March ... Full text Cite

Accounting discretion, corporate governance, and firm performance

Journal Article Contemporary Accounting Research · June 1, 2008 Full text Cite

Earnings, cash flows, and ex post intrinsic value of equity

Journal Article Accounting Review · March 1, 2007 We reexamine the relative importance of earnings and operating cash flows in equity valuation. In contrast to previous studies that use stock returns (Dechow 1994) or future operating cash flows (Barth et al. 2001), we use ex post intrinsic value of equity ... Full text Cite

The accrual anomaly: International evidence

Journal Article Accounting Review · January 1, 2007 We consider stock markets in 20 countries to investigate whether the accrual anomaly (Sloan 1996), characterized by U.S. stock prices overweighting the role of accrual persistence, is a local manifestation of a global phenomenon. We explore whether the occ ... Full text Cite

Financial accounting and reporting standards for private entities

Journal Article Accounting Horizons · June 1, 2006 Full text Cite

Response to the FASB's exposure draft on fair value measurements

Journal Article Accounting Horizons · September 1, 2005 Full text Cite

Response to FASB exposure draft: Accounting changes and error corrections

Journal Article Accounting Horizons · December 1, 2004 Full text Cite

The relevance of non-financial performance measures for CEO compensation: Evidence from the airline industry

Journal Article Review of Accounting Studies · December 1, 2004 This paper investigates the role of non-financial performance measures in executive compensation. Using a sample of airline firms we document that passenger load factor, an important non-financial measure for firms in this industry, is positively associate ... Full text Cite

The role of online buying experience as a competitive advantage: Evidence from third-party ratings for e-commerce firms

Journal Article Journal of Business · April 1, 2004 Claims have often been made that the quality of online buying experience - Web site usability, product selection, the extent of customer confidence, and the quality of customer relationships - are crucial to the success of e-commerce firms. We posit that W ... Full text Cite

Commentary on the IASB's exposure draft on business combinations

Journal Article Accounting Horizons · March 1, 2004 Full text Cite

Value-glamour and accruals mispricing: One anomaly or two?

Journal Article Accounting Review · January 1, 2004 We investigate whether the accruals anomaly is a manifestation of the glamour stock phenomenon documented in the finance literature. Value (glamour) stocks, characterized by low (high) past sales growth, high (low) book-to-market (B/M), high (low) earnings ... Full text Cite

Does the stock market fully appreciate the implications of leading indicators for future earnings? Evidence from order backlog

Journal Article Review of Accounting Studies · December 1, 2003 Although leading indicators are becoming increasingly important for equity valuation, disclosures of such indicators suffer from the absence of GAAP related guidance on content and presentation. We explicitly examine (i) whether one leading indicator order ... Full text Cite

Differential Pricing of Components of Bank Loan Fair Values

Journal Article Journal of Accounting Auditing Finance · January 1, 2003 This paper examines the capital market pricing implications of nondiscretionary, discretionary, and noise components of loan fair values for a sample of commercial banks. We use a model to partition loan fair values into discretionary and nondiscretionary ... Full text Cite

The value relevance of network advantages: The case of e-commerce firms

Journal Article Journal of Accounting Research · January 1, 2003 We show that network advantages constitute an important intangible asset that goes unrecognized in the financial statements. For a sample of e-commerce firms, we find that network advantages created by Web site traffic have substantial explanatory power fo ... Full text Cite

Managerial actions, stock returns, and earnings: The case of business-to-business Internet firms

Journal Article Journal of Accounting Research · January 1, 2002 In this study we investigate the valuation implications of managerial actions undertaken by 57 Internet firms engaged in Business-to-Business (B2B) e-commerce. We classify 3,007 managerial actions undertaken by our sample firms between the firm's IPO date ... Full text Cite

The effect of mandated market risk disclosures on trading volume sensitivity to interest rate, exchange rate, and commodity price movements

Journal Article Accounting Review · January 1, 2002 We hypothesize that firms' 10-K market risk disclosures, recently mandated by SEC Financial Reporting Release No. 48 (FRR No. 48), reduce investors' uncertainty and diversity of opinion about the implications, for firm value, of changes in interest rates, ... Full text Cite

Institutional Ownership and the Extent to which Stock Prices Reflect Future Earnings

Journal Article Contemporary Accounting Research · January 1, 2002 Articles in the financial press suggest that institutional investors are overly focused on current profitability, which suggests that as institutional ownership increases, stock prices reflect less current period information that is predictive of future pe ... Full text Cite

Are 20-F reconciliations between IAS and US-GAAP value-relevant? A discussion

Journal Article Journal of Accounting and Economics · January 1, 1999 present some interesting evidence on the market valuation of accounting numbers under IAS and US-GAAP. I view this evidence as a first step in contributing to the debate on whether foreign firms following IAS should be allowed to list in the US without pro ... Full text Cite

Financial benefits from JIT adoption: Effects of customer concentration and cost structure

Journal Article Accounting Review · April 1, 1996 This paper examines whether firms exhibiting improved inventory utilization subsequent to JIT adoption achieve a corresponding increase in their Return on Assets (ROA) and whether firm-specific characteristics affect such ROA responses. On average, we do n ... Cite

Value-relevance of banks' derivatives disclosures

Journal Article Journal of Accounting and Economics · January 1, 1996 This paper investigates the value-relevance of banks' derivatives disclosures provided under SFAS 119. The findings suggest that the fair value estimates for derivatives help explain cross-sectional variation in bank share prices and that the fair values h ... Full text Cite