2019 Telfer Conference on Accounting and Finance: Once again a Great Success

On May 9^th and 10^th, more than 150 scholars from Harvard, MIT, Princeton, Queen’s University, McGill University, University of Toronto, and other top-notch universities from around the world joined members of the professional community to share their current research insights and advance research and practice on topics in accounting and finance, including behavioural finance, corporate governance, accounting and finance history, climate change and CSR reporting.

Opening the conference, the keynote speaker in Finance, B. Espen Eckbo (Dartmouth College) presented research into gender balancing of corporate boards in Norway. He questioned the view that quota policies could lead to a decline in firm value. The keynote speaker in Accounting, Baruch Lev (New York University), challenged standard setting and discussed alternative information that could be used by investors and finance professionals.

The conference included a CPA symposium organized by Walid Ben Amar (Telfer School), Director of the CPA-Canada Accounting and Governance Research Centre. Richard MacNeill opened the discussion highlighting the value of collaboration between the University of Ottawa and CPA Ontario. Panelists Dave Clarke (Baker Tilly Ottawa), Pamela Cross (Borden Ladner Gervais LLP), Jim McConnery (Welch LLP), Simon Couvrette (Bank of Montreal) and Peter Jaskiewicz (Telfer School) examined the financial and emotional issues that accountants and other professionals often encounter when advising family firms.