This study examines the risk relevance of recognized versus disclosed finance leases in Japan. In particular, this study investigates whether and why equity investors treat recognized finance lease obligations differently from disclosed finance lease obligations when assessing firms’ equity risk. This study shows that recognized finance leases are associated with equity risk but that disclosed finance leases are not. Moreover, the relations between recognized versus disclosed finance leases and equity risk are substantially different. However, for firms with higher levels of institutional ownership, the risk relevance of disclosed finance leases is similar to the risk relevance of recognized finance leases. These results suggest that institutional investors are more sophisticated at processing disclosed finance leases and treat ing disclosed and recognized finance leases similarly when assessing firms’ equity risk. This study provides the evidence that investors’ information processing has significant effects on the risk relevan ce of lease arrangements. This study contributes to the accounting literature on recognition versus disclosure and to the discussions on the global convergence of accounting standards.

中文翻译：

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确认与披露是否会影响风险相关性？日本融资租赁的证据

本研究考察了日本已确认融资租赁与已披露融资租赁的风险相关性。特别是，本研究调查了股权投资者在评估公司股权风险时是否以及为何将已确认的融资租赁义务与已披露的融资租赁义务区别对待。本研究表明，已确认的融资租赁与股权风险相关，但已披露的融资租赁则不然。此外，已确认与已披露融资租赁与股权风险之间的关系也大不相同。然而，对于机构所有权水平较高的公司，已披露融资租赁的风险相关性与已确认融资租赁的风险相关性相似。这些结果表明，在评估公司股权风险时，机构投资者在处理已披露融资租赁和类似处理已披露和已确认融资租赁方面更为成熟。本研究提供的证据表明，投资者的信息处理对租赁安排的风险相关性具有显着影响。本研究有助于有关确认与披露的会计文献以及有关会计准则全球趋同的讨论。