Seminar (Dept. of Finance)

Theme：Proprietary Information Cost of Contracting with the Government

Speaker：Ningzhong Li, Associate professor, University of Texas at Dallas

Time：2021-06-04 09:30

Address：Zoom Meeting

Language：English

Venue：Zoom Meeting

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84018204801?pwd=TVk4cnBwM3lGa1JNYWJRTWhNNEdrQT09 

Meeting ID：840 1820 4801

password：078952

ABSTRACT:

We argue that contracting with the federal government involves significant proprietary information cost due to regulations requiring contractors to provide confidential information, which may then become available to outsiders via Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. We provide evidence by showing that firms become more willing to bid for government contracts after a recent Supreme Court ruling on FOIA that improves information protection for contractors, and the effect is stronger when the contracts incur higher information cost for contractors. In addition, stock prices of firms with larger amounts of government contracts respond more positively to the ruling.

SHORT BIOGRAPHY:

Ningzhong Li is an associate professor of accounting at the Naveen Jindal School of Management of University of Texas at Dallas. His primary research interests lie in the fields of accounting and financial contracting, IO and accounting, corporate disclosure, and macro-economy and firm performance. In these areas, Professor Li has published many papers in top accounting and economics journals including The Accounting Review, Review of Accounting Studies, Contemporary Accounting Research, Journal of Accounting Research, and Journal of Accounting and Economics.