Smith Business Close-Up: Accounting Clues to the Financial Crisis

With the economy still recovering from the burst of the housing bubble and the financial crisis, experts are combing the period before the crisis and after for all the clues that could help avoid similar economic problems in the future. According to new research, accounting numbers hold big clues to how the credit default market functions – both before and after the crisis.

In this edition of Smith Business Close-Up with the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business, Michael Kimbrough, associate professor of accounting, shares his new research findings on how corporate accounting numbers predict spikes and dips in the credit default swap market, a major factor in the financial crisis.

Kimbrough recently joined the Smith School of after eight years as a faculty member at Harvard Business School. Prior to earning his doctorate, he worked as a certified public accountant with Price Waterhouse. Kimbrough’s research focuses on corporate financial reporting, with particular emphases on firms’ voluntary disclosure practices and on accounting for intangible investment. His research has been published in leading academic journals including.