서술형 위험공시와 비대칭적 원가구조：경영진의 위험 인식 관점으로

[Purpose]Whether and how management understands and perceives business risk is critical to business operation since the management team is a final decision maker in a corporation. Thus, this study examines whether management risk perception affects resource allocation decision and so cost behavior.
[Methodology]This study uses risk－word based proxy from MD&A and analyzes non－financial firms listed in Korea Stock Exchange from 2010 to 2017.
[Findings]We find that the degree of cost stickiness decreases as managers concern more about downside risk. More specifically, we find that cost decrease in response to sales decrease is greater with high management risk perception, and costs increase in response to sales increase is less with high management risk perception. This indicates that stronger management risk perception attenuates cost asymmetry and converts cost structure in a symmetric way.
[Implications]This result shows that, given that the sticky cost structure causes risk due to high earnings volatility and high probability of huge loss, management perceiving high risk in their firm makes their cost structure more flexible and so causes less cost stickiness.