Financial Restatement, Corporate Social Responsibility, and CEO Compensation

Abstract

Prior research shows that after financial restatement, firms' corporate governance practices are strengthened (Farber, 2005; LaGore, 2008) as firms respond by increasing their disclosure practices and making executives more accountable (Arthaud-Day, Certo, Dalton, & Dalton., 2006). Nevertheless, it has not been established whether the impact of restatement extends to the domain of voluntary corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosures. To address this question, we compare firms CSR scores and the association between executives' compensation and firms CSR scores before and after restatement. We use a sample of 44 U.S. firms in the two-year period before and after a financial restatement announcement. In firms that had undergone restatement, we found a significant increase in CSR strengths and CSR weaknesses that resulted in a net decrease in total CSR. In addition, we found a stronger association between bonus and CSR after restatement. This contributes by furthering our understanding by suggesting that voluntary CSR disclosures are indirectly impacted by restatement. Our findings are useful in understanding the pervasiveness of restatement on a firm's disclosures and operations and also in gaining insight into the comparability of CSR disclosures after restatement.