UNE Business School welcomes Professor Ellie Chapple to our 2017 Seminar Series

Company Secretaries, Board Practices and Financial Reporting

When: 11.00am – 12.30pm, Thursday 23 November 2017 – Add to my Calendar

Where: Lecture Theatre 2, EBL Building (W40)

This seminar presents how company secretaries influence board practices and financial reporting. It is proposed that joint company secretary/CFOs place more emphasis on financial reporting quality, joint company secretary/legal counsels place more emphasis on financial reporting compliance and company secretaries of multiple companies schedule fewer meetings. Using 4,997 firm-year observations of ASX-listed companies during 2004-2013, it was found that joint company secretary/CFOs hold more audit committee meetings and are associated with less earnings management and a greater likelihood of a clean audit opinion. Companies with joint company secretary/legal counsels are more timely filers and company secretaries of multiple companies schedule fewer committee meetings. These results indicate that company secretaries have a significant influence on board practices and financial reporting, with the type of influence dependent on the expertise and busyness of the company secretary.

Ellie (Larelle) Chapple is Professor of Accounting at Queensland University of Technology (QUT) Business School, where she is the research leader in Forensic Accounting and the chief investigator in the research program Accounting For Social Change. Ellie is a member of the Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand (AFAANZ), member of the Corporate Law Teachers Association and Legal practitioner admitted to the Supreme Court of Queensland. She holds a professional doctorate in Juridical Science from QUT and is the editor of the Accounting Research Journal.

Ellie’s teaching and research interests are primarily corporate law, corporate governance and capital market transactions. She has published the results of her research, including corporate disclosure issues in fundraising and takeovers and corporate governance, in journals such as Accounting and Finance, Company and Securities Law Journal, Australian Business Law Review, Australian Journal of Management and Australian Journal of Corporate Law. Ellie also maintains an interest in Insolvency Law and Trade Practices Law.