Main areas of our research are business taxation, financial accounting and corporate governance.

1. Business Taxation

Business tax research investigates the incentives for tax planning, analyzes corporate tax planning and makes policy recommendations. According to the Scholes/Wolfson paradigma tax planning has to consider all parties, all costs and all taxes (including implicit taxes). 

The institute's research has a focus on the following subjects:

• tax planning of national and multinational firms,
• capital markets and tax avoidance,
• tax Information in financial statements.

Further, members of the institute contribute to current tax discussions.

2. Financial Accounting

Financial Accounting serves three purposes: the documentation of business transactions, the information of share- and stakeholders and the the assesment of distributable profits. We investigate these topics within the regulatory framework of the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS).

Our main research areas are:

• earnings management,
• capital market effects of accounting information,
• the role of auditors and other enforcement institutions.

Besides, we investigate the relation between financial and tax accounting (e.g. book-tax conformity). 

3. Corporate Governance

Again and again the independence of auditors and the quality of financial reporting has been subject to public discussion over the last decades. We contribute to these discussions by investigating the role of the auditor within the corporate governance system using a microeconomic approach.

If you have questions about our research, please do not hesitate to contact us.