Associate Professor of Accounting

Stanford University Graduate School of Business

John D. Kepler is an Associate Professor of Accounting at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. His research studies the interrelated role that firms’ explicit and implicit contracts play in shaping firms’ financial reporting and corporate governance practices. His recent work examines how companies use financial disclosures to strategically circumvent competition regulations and how disclosure regulations in the healthcare sector drive competitive behavior among firms.

Professor Kepler’s research has been published in leading accounting and finance academic journals, and he has been invited to present his work at numerous public policy forums including at the Federal Trade Commission, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board. His work has been cited by the Securities and Exchange Commission as well as in the Australian government’s updated merger guidelines, as well as featured in The Wall Street Journal, Business Insider, and Bloomberg.

Professor Kepler received his PhD in Accounting from the the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and a BA in Accounting and Finance from the Foster School of Business of the University of Washington. Prior to his studies at Wharton, he worked in Financial Planning and Analysis for Nordstrom. Originally from Seattle, Washington, John currently lives in Palo Alto, California with his wife, Victoria, and their daughter, Penelope.