Accounting Conservatism and Earnings Management in the Banking Industry

Executive summary Previous studies have examined the relation between accounting conservatism and earnings management. Those studies conclude that accounting conservatism reflected in earnings is explained mostly by the accrual component of earnings instead of the cash flow component (Roychowdhury and Watts, 2006 and Pae, 2007). To measure earnings management, the accrual component of earnings is often used. Because of the different nature of accruals at financial firms, in prior research, financial firms were not included into the samples (Pae, 2007, p. 688). This research introduces an approach to examine this relation for banks. The findings indicate that US bank managers use their discretion over loan loss provisions (large accruals for banks) to manage earnings and influence conditional accounting conservatism into the managements’ desired direction

Economic Sanctions Against the Russian Federation Are Illegal under Public International Law

In response to the Russian Federation’s purported ‘annexation’ of Crimea and the conflict between separatists in the Donbass region and the central government of Ukraine, the United States, the European Union, Japan, and Australia, the principal countries, have imposed economic sanctions upon Russian officials, firms, and private individuals. The economic sanctions imposed upon the Russian Federation violate public international law on three grounds: 1) lack of authorisation under the United Nations Charter; 2) inapplicability of Art. XXI GATT (‘Security Exceptions’); and 3) lack of legal authority based on the International Law Commission’s Draft Articles on Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts. Fidelity to the ‘rule of law’ requires an immediate withdrawal of all economic sanctions. By contrast, the international community ‘ought to’ condemn Ukraine’s indiscriminate killing of innocent citizens living in the Donbass region and support the efforts of the Russian Federation to provide humanitarian aid to the region

Eastern and Southern Ukraine’s Right to Secede and Join the Russian Federation

This article answers a multi-faceted question: do the people occupying the region of Eastern and Southern Ukraine have the right to secede from Ukraine and merge with the Russian Federation? It also evaluates the legal status of the economic sanctions imposed upon the Russian Federation for its alleged interference in the internal affairs of Ukraine.The argument proceeds from the assumption that the international legal system does not repose on a foundation of empirical validity, but rather upon sets of authoritative statements, insusceptible of verification. In this context, the article constructs an argument based upon relevant public international law texts, interpreted according to contemporary jurisprudential thought and principles of statutory construction partially embodied in the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties of 1969, the implied right of secession contained in the UN General Assembly’s Declaration on Friendly Relations of 1970, and the need to achieve pragmatic results to legal questions. The argument thus avoids traditional doctrinal analysis and the mud of history.In short, the people occupying the region of Eastern and Southern Ukraine have the right to secede from Ukraine and merge with the Russian Federation, and the economic sanctions imposed against the Russian Federation for its presumed interference in the internal affairs of Ukraine are illegal under the United Nations Charter and the World Trade Organisation.

Professor Elliott E. Cheatham

Professor Cheatham taught far more than legal rules. By imparting to his students a sense of his commitment to achieving excellence through self-education, he indeed prepared them well. Of course, the ideas and insights which he afforded them will continue to guide all students of the law. To those who follow to the classroom he now leaves behind, we offer on his behalf a thought which, more than any other, calls to mind both his teachings and the way he lives: The great lawyer has always been a great teacher and his best pupil is himself. \u2