Henock Louis

Color portrait of Henock Louis

Professor

Department Accounting
Office Address 354 Business Building
Phone Number 814-865-4160
Email Address hul4@psu.edu

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Henock Louis is the KPMG Professor and the Head of the Accounting Department at Penn State University. His work has been published in the top accounting and finance journals. He has conducted seminars at a host of major universities worldwide and received the 2005 Excellence in Research Award from the American Accounting Association Diversity Section. He is an editor for The Accounting Review, the Accounting Horizons, and the International Journal of Accounting. He has also served on the editorial boards of the Accounting Review and the Contemporary Accounting Research, and as an ad hoc reviewer for all the major accounting and finance journals. Professor Louis holds a Ph.D. in Accounting from Ohio State University and a Ph.D. in Finance and a master’s in accounting from the University of Mississippi.

Expertise

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=332332

Education

Ph D, Accounting, Ohio State University, 2001

Ph D, Finance, The University of Mississippi, 1998

MS, Accounting, The University of Mississippi, 1998

MBA, Business, Andrews University, 1992

Courses Taught

ACCTG 590 – Colloquium (1)

ACCTG 881 – Fin Stat Anlys (3)
Analysis of financial reports to identify business strategy, assess performance and economic standing, and value claims.

ACCTG 597 – Special Topics (Variable)

ACCTG 481 – Fin Anal Eval Dec (3)
An accounting based evaluation and decision making approach to analyzing financial statements by studying business and firm valuation.ACCTG 481 Financial Statement Analysis (3) The proposed course in financial statement analysis is structured to improve the student's ability to extract and interpret information from actual financial statements and to expose the student to how financial statement information is integrated into equity valuation and credit analysis. The course would not only rely upon textbook-based and lecture-based learning, but also emphasize case-based learning.The course will consist of two main sections. The first will deal with accounting and business analysis. This part will explore the types of financial information data typically available for publicly traded companies and introduce a model of the economic drivers of company performance. It would incorporate some technical accounting as well as some standards business economics/strategy concepts. Students will be forced to recast financial statements that they believe do not reflect the underlying economic state of the company. Financial reporting issues relating to revenue and expense recognition, leases and consolidations will be discussed.The other section of the course will deal with firm valuation. Students would be exposed to some standard approaches to equity valuation and the analysis activities underlying these approaches. Aspects of valuation that would be covered in this section of the course are financial ratio analysis, forecasting, pro-forma statements, cost of capital and valuation methods.The course will rely on lectures and extensive use of case studies.

ACCTG 496 – Indep Studies (1)
Creative projects, including research and design, which are supervised on an individual basis and which fall outside the scope of formal courses.

ACCTG 501 – Res Meth Acctg (3)

ACCTG 596 – Individual Studies (Variable)
Creative projects, including nonthesis research, which are supervised on an individual basis and which fall outside the scope of formal courses.

ACCTG 597D – Research Methods in Accounting (1)
Research methods in accounting.

ACCTG 560 – Accounting and Business Analysis (2)
Develop ability to assess the relation between accounting data in financial statements and the economic fundamentals represented.

ACCTG 471 – Intermediate Financial Accounting I (3)
Theory and practice issues in income concepts and value measurement; GAAP; revenues, costs, assets, liabilities, and equities.

B A 574 – Business Research (variable)
A project paper, comparable in quality and scope of work to a graduate thesis, on problems of a company.

Selected Publications

Green J., Louis H., Sani J., "Intangible investments, scaling, and the trend in the accruals-cash flows association." Journal of Accounting Research, 2022
Louis H., Ge R., Ji Y., "Accounting quality and alliance contract provisions." The Accounting Review, 2021
Chen Y., Ge R., Louis H., Zolotoy L., "Stock Liquidity and Corporate Tax Avoidance." Review of Accounting Studies, 2019
Louis H., Pearson T., Robinson D., Robinson M., Sun A., "The effects of the extant clauses limiting auditor liability on audit fees and overall reporting quality." Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, 2019
Chung S., Louis H., "Earnings announcements and the cross-section of option returns." Journal of Empirical Finance, 2017
Chung S., Chiang C., Louis H., "Insider trading, stock return volatility, and the option market's pricing of the information content of insider trading." Journal of Banking and Finance, 2017
Louis H., Sun A., "Abnormal accruals and managerial intent: Evidence from the timing of merger announcements and completions." Contemporary Accounting Research, 2016
Louis H., Urcan O., "Agency conflicts, dividend payout, and the direct benefits of conservatism to equity-holders." Contemporary Accounting Research, 2015
Louis H., "Are stock-for-stock acquirers of unlisted targets really less overvalued?." Financial Management, 2013
Louis H., Sun A., Urcan O., "Do Analysts Sacrifice Forecast Accuracy for Informativeness?." Management Science, 2013
Louis H., Sun X., Urcan O., "Value of Cash Holdings and Accounting Conservatism." Contemporary Accounting Research, 2013
Louis H., Sun A., "Growth in Housing Prices and Long-Term Abnormal Stock Returns." Real Estate Economics, 2013
Louis H., Kimbrough M., "Voluntary Disclosure to Influence Investor Reactions to Merger Announcements: An Examination of Conference Calls." The Accounting Review, vol. 86, 2011
Louis H., Sun A., "Earnings Management and the Post-Earnings Announcement Drift." Financial Management, vol. 40, 2011
Louis H., Sun A., White H., "Insider Trading After Repurchase Tender Offer Announcements: Timing Versus Informed Trading." Financial Management, vol. 39, 2010
Louis H., Sun A., "Investor Inattention and Market Reaction to Merger Announcements." Management Science, vol. 56, 2010
Louis H., Robinson D., "Managers' and Investors' Responses to Media Exposure of Board Ineffectiveness." Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, vol. 44, 2009
Louis H., Robinson D., Sbaraglia A., "An integrated analysis of the association between accrual disclosure and the abnormal accrual anomaly." Review of Accounting Studies, vol. 13, no. 1, 2008, pp. 23-34
Gong G., Louis H., Sun X., "Earnings management and firm performance following open-market repurchase." Journal of Finance, vol. 63, no. 2, 2008, pp. 947-986
Gong G., Louis H., Sun X., "Earnings management, lawsuits, and stock-for-stock acquirers' market performance." Journal of Accounting and Economics, vol. 46, no. 1, 2008, pp. 62-77
Louis H., Fischer P., "Financial Reporting and Conflicting Managerial Incentives: The Case of Management Buyouts." Management Science, vol. 54, no. 10, 2008, pp. 1700-1714
Louis H., White H., "Do managers intentionally use repurchase tender offers to signal private information? Evidence from firm financial reporting behavior." Journal of Financial Economics, vol. 85, no. 1, 2007, pp. 205-233
Louis H., "Acquirers’ abnormal returns and the non-Big 4 auditor clientele effect." Journal of Accounting and Economics, 2005
Louis H., "Do managers credibly use accruals to signal private information? Evidence from the pricing of discretionary accruals around stock splits." Journal of Accounting and Economics, 2005
Louis H., "Earnings management and the market performance of acquiring firms." Journal of Financial Economics, 2004
Louis H., "The cost of using bank mergers as defensive mechanisms against takeover threats." Journal of Business, 2004
Louis H., "The value relevance of the foreign translation adjustment." The Accounting Review, 2003

Editorships

Accounting Horizons, Co-Editor, January 2021 - Present
Accounting Review, Other, January 2020 - Present
Contemporary Accounting Research, Editorial Board, May 2014 - Present
The Accounting Review, Editorial Board, June 2011 - May 2017

Honors and Awards