I have been researching in the area of risk for some years now. I was initially drawn to the area because of events such as the demise of Barings Bank (this was some time ago in 1995!) brought about by the rogue trader Nick Leeson and, unsurprisingly, we have witnessed other rogue trading incidents in finance since then. The (not always rational) actions of people are inherently fascinating and can lead to significant and unforeseen risks. This lead me to start reading…

Corporate disclosure regulation traditionally intends to enhance firms’ information environments, render capital markets more efficient, and improve resource allocation. Recent years have brought many examples of additional or tightening disclosure requirements – but also some rare instances of de-regulation. However, some of these new regulatory initiatives appear different in two important respects: First, some address the needs of audiences other than capital market participants. For example, corporate social responsibility reporting targets NGOs, consumers, and the…

Risk is a fundamental concept in finance and finance research. However, there has been less discussion of the relevance of risk to accounting and accounting research. My perspective is there is considerable for scope risk-related accounting research to be undertaken that can be academically valuable and have the potential for impact.  This short blog post is the first in a series and my hope is to encourage wide discussions of risk that result in more risk research in the field of accounting.