Taking the Oath: Investor Response to SEC Certification Under Sarbanes-Oxley

This study investigates the market response to the requirement that the principal executive and financial officer of an SEC registrant each state under oath that the firm's annual and quarterly financial reports are materially accurate and complete pursuant to the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. We hypothesise that investors should recognise the importance of these changes in financial reporting and, thus, respond at or around those events that should reveal the most information about those changes, specifically, the SEC order to certify (27 June 2002), the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (25 July 2002), and the first certification filing by a registrant. We find that investors did respond on the identified dates, and in the ways hypothesised. We conclude that investors responded to certification and / or Sarbanes-Oxley.