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/ Ahsan Habib & Md. Borhan Uddin Bhuiyan // Acounting and business research 2016, Vol46, N.2

p121-p144

The objective of this paper is to examine empirically the consequences for financial reporting quality of having audit committees that include problem directors, that is, directors with prior involvement in corporate bankruptcies, major accounting restatements, or other accounting scandals. An ordinary least squares regression model is used to examine the association between problem directors on the audit committee and financial reporting quality as proxied by accruals and real earnings management. Results reveal that there is a positive association between the presence of problem directors on the audit committee and real earnings management, and this association is more pronounced in cases where those problem directors have been involved in prior instances of accounting restatements and fraudulent reporting practices
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Mandatory IFRS adoption: the trade-off between accrual-based and real earnings management / Elisabetta Ipino & Antonio Parbonetti. // Accounting and Business Research Volume 47, 2017
2017.
p. 91-121.

This paper examines whether firms substituted real earnings management for accrual-based earnings management after the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) became mandatory. Using a sample of 101,331 firm-year observations from 33 countries between 2000 and 2010, we show that IFRS adoption came with the unintended consequence of certain firms substituting real earnings management for accrual-based earnings management, especially among firms in countries with strict enforcement regimes. Furthermore, we document that the trade-off is confined to EU countries in which strong firm-level characteristics (i.e. the firm-level mechanism of control, the market’s level of scrutiny, and firm-specific incentives to provide transparency) are coupled with strong enforcement. We also show that IFRS had an effect in countries outside the EU, albeit at a different time. Overall, the results suggest that accounting regulators’ efforts to increase earnings quality might have had the unintended consequence of increasing real earnings management activities.
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Mandatory IFRS adoption: the trade-off between accrual-based and real earnings management/ Elisabetta Ipino, Antonio Parbonetti // Accounting and Business Research vol.47/2017
2017.
p. 91 -121.

This paper examines whether firms substituted real earnings management for accrual-based earnings management after the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) became mandatory. Using a sample of 101,331 firm-year observations from 33 countries between 2000 and 2010, we show that IFRS adoption came with the unintended consequence of certain firms substituting real earnings management for accrual-based earnings management, especially among firms in countries with strict enforcement regimes. Furthermore, we document that the trade-off is confined to EU countries in which strong firm-level characteristics (i.e. the firm-level mechanism of control, the market’s level of scrutiny, and firm-specific incentives to provide transparency) are coupled with strong enforcement. We also show that IFRS had an effect in countries outside the EU, albeit at a different time. Overall, the results suggest that accounting regulators’ efforts to increase earnings quality might have had the unintended consequence of increasing real earnings management activities.
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The effect of financial leverage on real and accrual-based earnings management / Seraina C. Anagnostopoulou, Andrianos E. Tsekrekos // Accounting and Business Research Volume 47, 2017 - Issue 2
2017.
p. 191-236.

Past research has documented a substitution effect between real earnings management (RM) and accrual-based earnings management (AM), depending on relative costs. This study contributes to this research by examining whether levels of (and changes in) financial leverage have an impact on this empirically documented trade-off. We hypothesise that in the presence of high leverage, firms that engage in earnings manipulation tactics will exhibit a preference for RM due to a lower possibility – and subsequent costs – of getting caught. We show that leverage levels and increases positively and significantly affect upward RM, with no significant effect on income-increasing AM, while our findings point towards a complementarity effect between unexpected levels of RM and AM for firms with very high leverage levels and changes. This is interpreted as an indication that high leverage could attract heavy outsider scrutiny, making it necessary for firms to use both forms of earnings management in order to achieve earnings targets. Furthermore, we document that equity investors exhibit a significantly stronger penalising reaction to AM vs. RM, indicating that leverage-induced RM is not as easily detectable by market participants as debt-induced AM, despite the fact that the former could imply deviation from optimal business practices.
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The effect of financial leverage on real and accrual-based earnings management/ Seraina C. Anagnostopoulou, Andrianos E. Tsekrekos // Accounting and Business Research vol.47/2017
2017.
p.191 - 236.

Past research has documented a substitution effect between real earnings management (RM) and accrual-based earnings management (AM), depending on relative costs. This study contributes to this research by examining whether levels of (and changes in) financial leverage have an impact on this empirically documented trade-off. We hypothesise that in the presence of high leverage, firms that engage in earnings manipulation tactics will exhibit a preference for RM due to a lower possibility – and subsequent costs – of getting caught. We show that leverage levels and increases positively and significantly affect upward RM, with no significant effect on income-increasing AM, while our findings point towards a complementarity effect between unexpected levels of RM and AM for firms with very high leverage levels and changes. This is interpreted as an indication that high leverage could attract heavy outsider scrutiny, making it necessary for firms to use both forms of earnings management in order to achieve earnings targets. Furthermore, we document that equity investors exhibit a significantly stronger penalising reaction to AM vs. RM, indicating that leverage-induced RM is not as easily detectable by market participants as debt-induced AM, despite the fact that the former could imply deviation from optimal business practices.