Observations on measuring the differences between domestic accounting standards and IAS: A reply

In the commentary that precedes this reply, Nobes makes several comments on our article published in this journal (Ding, Y., Hope, O.-K., Jeanjean, T., Stolowy, H., 2007. Differences between domestic accounting standards and IAS: measurement, determinants and implications. Journal of Accounting and Public Policy 26, 1–38). In our reply, we start with the key issue raised: the comment on the distinction between accounting practices (de facto) and accounting regulations (de jure). We then discuss the IAS bias in the “GAAP 2001” study, before presenting our reply on the endogeneity issue and on the robustness check for the “divergence” score. We conclude with a discussion of the separate dimensions of absence vs. divergence.