This study analyzes the impact of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) on earnings quality of Brazilian companies qualified as ADR issuers before 2002. The accounting scandals involving firms like Enron and WorldCom reduced investors confidence in the reliability of financial statements. SOX arose to protect investors by mandating more precise and reliable financial disclosure by firms. To measure earnings quality, we used the models by Basu (1997) and Ball and Shivakumar (2005), estimated with panel data. We expected that the enhanced legal framework would imply greater earnings quality in the period after SOX. Although the results were not significant for the conservatism and cash flow models, the results for the Basu model suggest increased conservatism after SOX in Brazilian companies that had already traded ADRs before 2002. However, this increased conservatism according to the Basu model was also observed for all Brazilian companies. Therefore, the results presented here suggest this increased conservatism by Brazilian companies after 2002 cannot be directly linked to the effects of Sarbanes-Oxley.
Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX); conservatism; American Depositary Receipt (ADR)
