The impact of XBRL adoption in PR China

EXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) is expected to develop into the global data standard for business financial reporting with the potential to change the way that decisions are made. Thus, understanding its value realization in the proper business context is a vitally important issue. This study examines the impact of initial mandatory adoption of XBRL on organizations' cost of capital and transaction costs in PR China. As transaction cost theory predicts, the uncertainty related to the unproven technology increases transaction costs and the cost of capital during the early adoption period. Implications have immediate benefits for regulators, filing organizations, information consumers, the accounting profession, and other stakeholders. •We examine the impact of initial mandatory adoption of XBRL on organizations' cost of capital.•Value realization of new information technology takes time due to necessary adjustments and fine-tuning.•XBRL taxonomy should be improved to minimize the need for taxonomy extensions.•Regulators should implement mandatory XBRL adoption with stricter policy on quality assurance.