Financial reporting

The Financial Reporting Group (FRG) conducts academic and policy-related research on financial reporting and auditing, with particular emphasis on the importance and limitations of corporate reporting in informing decisions and influencing behaviour. The group interacts with the accounting profession and with accounting policy-makers to help understand the ways in which accounting information can be used to aid decision making.

Research topics include:

  • the use of accounting information in capital markets;
  • sustainability accounting and reporting;
  • corporate cybersecurity;
  • accounting-based valuation methods;
  • accounting regulation;
  • equity analysts’ forecasts of earnings and stock prices;
  • the link between accounting information and executive compensation and retention; and
  • corporate audit practices and related aspects of corporate governance. The group also studies developments in financial reporting for government and public sector entities.

The FRG attracts high profile speakers and visitors from academia and from the professional accounting and regulatory communities. It organises seminars and workshops where the academic and professional accounting communities can exchange ideas. Members of the FRG also regularly present papers in other academic institutions around the world and attend leading international conferences to disseminate the results of their research.

Members of the group have published their research in high quality academic journals, such as The Accounting Review, Journal of Accounting and Economics, Accounting Organizations and Society, Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, European Accounting Review, Accounting and Business Research, Journal of Accounting & Public Policy and numerous other leading journals. The group’s research findings have fed into the deliberations of policy makers, professional accounting bodies and accounting regulators.

Members of the FRG serve as editors, editorial board members, and reviewers of leading international academic journals. They are also involved in external bodies (including the ACCA, EFRAG, European Accounting Association, ICAEW, and the UK Endorsement Board), and serve on scientific committees of international conferences.

FRG group members are also committed to high-quality PhD training and are interested in reviewing new applications from candidates with a strong academic background and promising research ideas in the topics listed above.

Does the financial media play a monitoring role around corporate disclosures?

Managers issue press releases to communicate information about their firms to investors and other market participants. They often choose to complement disclosures of quantitative performance with qualitative information; in fact, the use of optimistic or pessimistic language throughout financial disclosures can be a tool for managers to either improve investors’ perceptions of firm fundamentals or misinform them.

The financial media closely follows firms’ disclosures and could play an important role as an information intermediary by broadly disseminating the critical points of the news releases, packaging information together from multiple sources, and producing new information.

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Current members (updated October 2025)