Several prior studies explore segment reporting as a discretionary disclosure choice.
These studies generally find that segment reporting choices are influenced by proprietary
costs. Harris (1998) examines the relation between competition and disclosure of industry
segments and interprets her findings as evidence that operations in less competitive indus-
tries are less likely to be reported as industry segments. Botosan and Harris (2000) examine
the determinants of managers’ decisions to voluntarily increase segment disclosure fre-
quency and do not find any association with proprietary costs. Botosan and Stanford (2005)
interpret their results as evidence that, under SFAS No. 14, managers hide profitable seg-
ments operating in less competitive industries. Consistent with this line of research, our
first hypothesis predicts that managers face proprietary cost motives to withhold segment
data.