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Morten Seitz

Assistant Professor

Subjects
Budget Key figure Accounting Valuation Annual reports SME

Primary research areas

The zero-earn­ings bench­mark
In vari­ous ways, I study how and why man­agers fix­ate on the zero-earn­ings bench­mark, i.e., their tend­ency to re­port earn­ings that are at or above zero.
Aud­it­or part­ners’ im­pact on audit qual­ity
Us­ing hos­pit­al­iz­a­tion events – events that are plaus­ibly exo­gen­ous to the audit func­tion – I study wheth­er audit part­ners im­pact audit qual­ity
The value of re­l­at­ive in­form­a­tion
Us­ing field ex­per­i­ment­al meth­od­o­lo­gies, I study wheth­er com­pany man­agers can learn from their peers
Valu­ation in prac­tice
Sur­vey­ing pro­fes­sion­als, I study how valu­ation is con­duc­ted in prac­tice
Grad­ing bi­ases
I study wheth­er uni­ver­sity grad­ing is im­pacted (biased) by the se­quence in which exam sub­mis­sions are as­sessed.

I study in­di­vidu­als’ im­pact on com­pan­ies

I primarily conduct research on individuals' characteristics and firm outcomes. These individuals include rank-and-file employees, CEOs, and auditors. I study firm outcomes such as financial reporting quality, earnings management, bankruptcy likelihood, and firm performance. Most of my research exploits proprietary administrative datasets from Statistics Denmark, which allows me to investigate novel questions. 

Recent research projects

In­trins­ic bench­mark beat­ing

We study wheth­er own­er-man­agers beat earn­ings bench­marks due to in­trins­ic mo­tiv­a­tion

Do Sign­ing Audit Part­ners mat­ter? Evid­ence from Sud­den Hos­pit­al­iz­a­tion Events

We study wheth­er audit part­ners have a mean­ing­ful im­pact on audit qual­ity

Outside activities

Consultant, 2024–present

Leg­al case