Utilising a novel proxy for CEO religiosity that is based on graduation from a religious university, we document evidence that a CEO’s religiosity improves financial reporting quality. This effect is more pronounced when the firm is located in an area with higher geographical religiosity or more social capital, suggesting that a favourable environment facilitates the CEO religiosity effect. We also find that analyst forecasts are more accurate for firms led by a religious CEO, and that fewer analysts follow such firms, consistent with the view that there is less need for analyst service if the firm provides high-quality information. We develop a series of tests to alleviate endogeneity concerns, including a reverse causality test, a difference-in-differences test based on a sample of exogenous CEO turnovers, and a placebo test. Our evidence suggests a causal explanation of the effect of CEO religiosity on financial reporting quality.

中文翻译：

---

CEO宗教大学隶属关系和财务报告质量

利用基于宗教大学毕业的 CEO 虔诚度的新代理，我们记录了 CEO 的虔诚度提高了财务报告质量的证据。当公司位于具有较高地理宗教信仰或更多社会资本的地区时，这种效应更为明显，这表明有利的环境促进了 CEO 的宗教信仰效应。我们还发现，对于由宗教 CEO 领导的公司，分析师的预测更为准确，并且跟随此类公司的分析师较少，这与如果公司提供高质量信息，则对分析师服务的需求较少的观点一致。我们开发了一系列测试来缓解内生性问题，包括反向因果关系测试、基于外生 CEO 离职样本的差异测试和安慰剂测试。