Comparative Research on Earnings Management, Corporate Governance, and Economic Value


Book Description

"This book discusses the accounting policies firms use in different opportunistic circumstances in order to manage earnings, and to understand the corporate governance practices in different countries, and its relationship to firms' performance, and other dimensions of companies"--




Corporate Governance and Its Implications on Accounting and Finance


Book Description

After the global financial crisis, the topic of corporate governance has been gaining momentum in accounting and finance literature since it may influence firm and bank management in many countries. Corporate Governance and Its Implications on Accounting and Finance provides emerging research exploring the implications of a good corporate governance system after global financial crises. Corporate governance mechanisms may include board and audit committee characteristics, ownership structure, and internal and external auditing. This book is devoted to all topics dealing with corporate governance including corporate governance characteristics, board diversity, CSR, big data governance, bitcoin governance, IT governance, and governance disclosure, and is ideally designed for executives, BODs, financial analysts, government officials, researchers, policymakers, academicians, and students.




Earnings Quality


Book Description

This review lays out a research perspective on earnings quality. We provide an overview of alternative definitions and measures of earnings quality and a discussion of research design choices encountered in earnings quality research. Throughout, we focus on a capital markets setting, as opposed, for example, to a contracting or stewardship setting. Our reason for this choice stems from the view that the capital market uses of accounting information are fundamental, in the sense of providing a basis for other uses, such as stewardship. Because resource allocations are ex ante decisions while contracting/stewardship assessments are ex post evaluations of outcomes, evidence on whether, how and to what degree earnings quality influences capital market resource allocation decisions is fundamental to understanding why and how accounting matters to investors and others, including those charged with stewardship responsibilities. Demonstrating a link between earnings quality and, for example, the costs of equity and debt capital implies a basic economic role in capital allocation decisions for accounting information; this role has only recently been documented in the accounting literature. We focus on how the precision of financial information in capturing one or more underlying valuation-relevant constructs affects the assessment and use of that information by capital market participants. We emphasize that the choice of constructs to be measured is typically contextual. Our main focus is on the precision of earnings, which we view as a summary indicator of the overall quality of financial reporting. Our intent in discussing research that evaluates the capital market effects of earnings quality is both to stimulate further research in this area and to encourage research on related topics, including, for example, the role of earnings quality in contracting and stewardship.




The Audit Committee: Performing Corporate Governance


Book Description

Why do we need to understand audit committees? The Cadbury Committee recommended that UK companies should adopt them in response to financial scandals that have stemmed from dubious financial reporting practices. In other countries, similar commissions have made similar recommendations and audit committees are now a common institution. However, many practitioners doubt whether an audit committee really does much to ensure the integrity of a firm's financial statements because, as outsiders, members don't know enough to dig deeply beneath the numbers. The Audit Committee: Performing Corporate Governance argues that such criticism overlooks the ceremonial function of these committees. The audit committee is an arena where members can form and strengthen shifting and fragmentary networks with each other and with the external auditors. Within these networks, both consensus and independence are demonstrated, generating comfort, which legitimises the company and maintains its access to external sources of capital. The audit committee is a key part of the corporate governance structure within an organisation. Many in the UK have been patched together to meet regulatory requirements and their operation is poorly understood because few people other than their members have access to their deliberations. In this account of the world of audit committees the practitioner will find the ethnographical perspectives on ceremonial performance, consensus, independence, and comfort both familiar and different. It's like looking at a photograph of something commonplace from an unusual angle or through a strange-shaped lens.




Boards at Work : How Directors View their Roles and Responsibilities


Book Description

Boards of directors are coming under increasing scrutiny in terms of their contribution in monitoring and controlling management, particularly in the wake of high-profile corporate frauds and failures, and also their potential to add value to organizational performance through involvement in the strategy process and through building relationships with key investors. Despite the importance of these issues, not only to organizations but also arguably to national competitiveness, the nature of board activity remains largely a black box, clouded by prescriptions, prejudices, and half-truths. This book responds to calls for greater scrutiny of boards of directors with an in-depth examination of directors of UK organizations, drawing on the accounts of directors themselves as to their roles, influence, and the potential and limits to their power. Much work on boards of directors has labelled the board as a rubber stamp for dominant management, and non-executive directors in particular have been variously described as poodles, pet rocks, or parsley on the fish. Such accounts are rooted in assumptions of board activity that are essentially adversarial in nature, and that the solution to the 'problem' of reconciling the interests of managers with those of shareholders is to increase the checks and balances available to the board of directors. The findings of this study show that boards, in many cases, are far more than passive rubber stamps for management and that non-executives are encouraged to act as trusted advisers to the executives and the chief executive, rather than solely monitors of executive activity. Boards are important mechanisms in maintaining the strategic framework of the organization through setting the boundaries of organizational activity. The potential of the board members, in particular the non-executives, to fulfil such a mandate depends on a number of factors, including ability, willingness to engage with the organizational issues, and the degree of knowledge they have relevant to the host firm. Above all, the degree of trust built between members of the board, and between the board and key external constituencies, is at the heart of effective board behaviour.




Mandated Corporate Social Responsibility


Book Description

This book examines the Indian mandate for Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and its implementations in various individual organizations. Although the mandate is applicable only to certain large and stable companies, many believe that India is poised to become the birthplace of social, economic and environmental transformation, given the immense size of the Indian population and its challenging socio-economic index. The book explores the various facets of CSR investigation and places special emphasis on the Schedule VII of the Indian Companies Act of 2013, which defines specific areas of intervention for these companies. In addition, it provides a wealth of first-hand case studies that exemplify the ongoing developments and the fundamental challenges and opportunities of mandated CSR.




Corporate Governance, Value Creation and Growth The Bridge between Finance and Enterprise


Book Description

This publication examines the role of corporate governance arrangements in providing right incentives to contribute the value creation process within the private enterprises and the implications of the differences in ownership structures on corporate governance practices and frameworks.




Corporate Governance Around the World


Book Description

The last Asian financial crisis, coupled with the western series of corporate scandals, has caused investors and citizens to doubt mangers ability to guarantee credible financial information about organizations. Consequently, legislators all over the world have come to realise the necessity of legislating in the area of corporate governance.




Introduction to Earnings Management


Book Description

This book provides researchers and scholars with a comprehensive and up-to-date analysis of earnings management theory and literature. While it raises new questions for future research, the book can be also helpful to other parties who rely on financial reporting in making decisions like regulators, policy makers, shareholders, investors, and gatekeepers e.g., auditors and analysts. The book summarizes the existing literature and provides insight into new areas of research such as the differences between earnings management, fraud, earnings quality, impression management, and expectation management; the trade-off between earnings management activities; the special measures of earnings management; and the classification of earnings management motives based on a comprehensive theoretical framework.




Handbook of Research on Accounting and Financial Studies


Book Description

The competitive nature of organizations in today’s globalized world has led to the development of various approaches to increasing profitability and maintaining an advantage over rival companies. As technology continues to be integrated into business practices, specifically in the area of accounting and finance, professionals and educators need to be prepared for advancing economic techniques, and they need to maintain a high level of financial literacy. The Handbook of Research on Accounting and Financial Studies is a pivotal reference source that provides vital research on advanced knowledge and emerging business practices and teaching dynamics in the fields of accounting and finance. While highlighting topics such as cost-benefit analysis, risk management, and corporate governance, this publication explores new initiatives in entrepreneurship and performance management. This book is ideally designed for business managers, consultants, entrepreneurs, auditors, tax practitioners, economists, accountants, academicians, researchers, and students seeking current research on modern advancements and recent findings in accounting and financial studies.