1. Introduction
This paper re-examines the conservatism principle. I interpret conservatism as
capturing accountants' tendency to require a higher degree of verification for
recognizing good news than bad news in financial statements. Under my
interpretation of conservatism, earnings reflects bad news more quickly than
good news. For instance, unrealized losses are typically recognized earlier than
unrealized gains. This asymmetry in recognition leads to systematic differences
between bad news and good news periods in the timeliness and persistence of
earnings.
Fig. 1 illustrates the predictions tested in this paper. Consider a firm receiving
news that changes its estimate of the productive life of a fixed asset. Panel
A depicts the effects of the news on the reported book value of the asset, and
Panel B depicts the associated effect on the firm's earnings. If the new estimated
life is longer, the firm is economically better off, but under historical cost
accounting no gain is recorded currently. Instead, the depreciation charges that
1. IntroductionThis paper re-examines the conservatism principle. I interpret conservatism ascapturing accountants' tendency to require a higher degree of verification forrecognizing good news than bad news in financial statements. Under myinterpretation of conservatism, earnings reflects bad news more quickly thangood news. For instance, unrealized losses are typically recognized earlier thanunrealized gains. This asymmetry in recognition leads to systematic differencesbetween bad news and good news periods in the timeliness and persistence ofearnings.Fig. 1 illustrates the predictions tested in this paper. Consider a firm receivingnews that changes its estimate of the productive life of a fixed asset. PanelA depicts the effects of the news on the reported book value of the asset, andPanel B depicts the associated effect on the firm's earnings. If the new estimatedlife is longer, the firm is economically better off, but under historical costaccounting no gain is recorded currently. Instead, the depreciation charges that
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