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SOX Costs

A new paper by Ivy Zhang reports:

Using concurrent stock returns of non-U.S.-traded foreign firms to estimate normal U.S. returns, I find that U.S. firms experienced a statistically significant negative cumulative abnormal return around key SOX events. I then examine the cross-sectional variation of U.S. firms’ returns around these events. Regression results are consistent with the nonaudit services and governance provisions imposing net costs. Additional tests show that deferring the compliance of Section 404, which mandates an internal control test, resulted in significant cost savings for nonaccelerated filers.