Negative Tone in Lobbying the International Accounting Standards Board

Abstract

With the aid of computerized sentiment analysis, this paper analyzes the role of constituents’ comment letters in the process of setting international financial reporting standards for financial instruments. Whilst explicit agreement in comment letters is associated with the board’s decision to proceed with its proposed course of action, we find no consistent evidence that explicitly stated disagreement has an impact on the resulting accounting standard. Using context-specific dictionaries, we find that increased levels of negative tone in comment letters increase the probability of the board subsequently abandoning a proposed course of action. Capturing dissent through negative tone facilitates large-scale analysis, and we show that the financial industry has been less successful than other constituents in its lobbying efforts through comment letters.