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This study aims to examine the impact of corporate attributes on integrated reporting quality of top 100 listed firms in South Africa.

With a sample of the top 100 listed firms in South Africa, this paper drew insights from the legitimacy and stakeholder theory to examine the impact of corporate attributes on integrated reporting quality. This paper measured integrated reporting quality based on the International Integrated Reporting Council framework of 2013. Corporate attributes were determined taking into consideration three broad perspectives (board committee attributes, firm attributes and audit committee attributes). This paper analyzed the data using content analysis, ordered probit regression and logistic regression method.

Results indicate that board committee attributes, firm attributes and audit committee attributes have a positive and significant relationship with integrated reporting quality. Additional analysis reveals that external assurance contributes to the quality of integrated reporting. The findings empirically revealed that most South African firms have intensified efforts toward the quality and full disclosure of integrated reporting framework.

The study was limited to a sample size of 100 firms, which is country-specific, however, it sets the tone for future empirical research on the subject matter. This study provides an avenue for future research in the area of corporate attributes and integrated reporting quality in other emerging countries, especially other African countries.

The result of this study provides practical implications in the areas of good corporate governance, corporate reporting and integrated reporting. The empirical approach used in this study emphasizes the need for corporate organizations to introduce integrated reporting practices into their reporting cycle. The finding implies that non-compliance with integrated reporting by corporate organizations may have an adverse effect on corporate growth, corporate sustainability and corporate reputation in the long run.

The work extends prior research on the subject of integrated reporting in South Africa. Also, this study broadens the application of legitimacy and stakeholder theory in influencing corporate organizations to disclose relevant information that could aids stakeholders’ interest.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of audit committee (AC) attributes on the performance of finance companies in Malaysia in both period before and after the Malaysian Code on Corporate Governance (MCCG) was issued in order to determine which of the AC attributes enhances performance of finance companies in Malaysia.

The population of the study comprises firms listed under finance sector of the main market of Bursa Malaysia. The number of firms listed on the main market of Bursa Malaysia as at the time of data collection (2012) was 822, out of which 37 were finance firms. Since the number of finance companies listed on the main market was only 37, all companies were used as sample for this study. This comprises companies involved in commercial, investment and Islamic banking, insurance, Takaful and other finance-related services. The sample for the period prior to MCCG varies over the period of observation. The number of finance companies in 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995 and 1996 was 36, 40, 44, 47 and 54, respectively. The sample comprises companies in commercial banking, investment banking, Islamic banking, insurance, Takaful and other finance-related services. The sample comprises firms listed on the main board of Kuala Lumpur stock exchange as it was called before the name was changed to Bursa Malaysia. The companies listed under the Ace market are not included due to their small number and because they are subject to different listing requirements. The list of the finance companies for the period 2007-2011 is obtained from the web site of Bursa Malaysia while for the period 1992-1996, the list is obtained from Bursa Malaysia knowledge centre. The observation period for the study covers financial period from 2007 to 2011 which represents post MCCG period while period from 1992 to 1996 represents the period before MCCG.

The findings suggests a significant positive relationship between independent AC members and profitability while dual membership of directors on audit and nomination committee is significant and negatively related with profitability. The result supports agency theory which suggests that independent directors provide effective monitoring of the management thereby enhancing profitability and reducing possibility for opportunistic behavior by the management and ultimately enhancing performance. In addition, the result indicates that there was significant improvement in corporate governance in finance companies after the MCCG was issued compared to the period before it was issued.

The study focussed only on finance companies listed on Bursa Malaysia. The attributes examined include independence, expertise, experience, executive membership and interlock of directors, future studies could examine other attributes such as internal process of the committee and personal characteristics of the directors. Furthermore, the study used secondary data future studies could use primary data or a combination of primary and secondary data. The study only examined the period before MCCG and after the code was issued, future study could examine the impact of the first and second revision and compare it with period after the first and second revision.

The findings contribute to the literature and the understanding of the influence of AC attributes such as independence and experience of the directors on the committee by showing an association between director independence, expertise, experience and improved performance. Management and board of companies may use the findings to make appropriate choices about AC attributes and governance mechanisms to improve performance particularly with regards to independence, expertise, experience and interlock of the directors.

The study has provided policy makers with a better understanding of the various features a AC should have which could be incorporated in future policy formulation in order to safeguard investments of shareholders, protect the interest of various stakeholders and enhance the flow of capital and foreign direct investment into finance companies and the economy in general. Comparison of the result between the pre MCCG and post MCCG period shows an improvement in corporate governance in finance companies after the MCCG was issued. This implies that the initial issue of MCCG impacted positively on the governance of the finance companies.

To best of the authors knowledge the study is the first to examine the attributes of AC in finance sector as a whole and to examine the impact in the period before and after the MCCG was issued.

This study aims to examine the role of audit committee attributes in non-financial information releases, with a focus on intellectual capital (IC) disclosures, following significant policy changes, mandating the audit committee function in Malaysia. The study argues that, given the changing informational needs of stakeholders and the ongoing discussion on integrated reporting, the role of the audit committee should extend to ensuring the overall quality of corporate reporting.

The study draws evidence from a sample of leading Malaysian companies based on their market capitalisation over a three-year period (2008-2010), a period subsequent to the recent policy changes. The extent and quality of IC information, as a surrogate of non-financial information, was measured and regressed against several audit committee attributes, such as audit committee size, independence, financial expertise and meetings, controlling the overall governance and firm-specific variables.

The findings show a strong positive role of the audit committee function in the overall amount of IC information as well as all three subcomponents of IC information (internal, external and human capital). The results are robust to controls for the overall governance and firm-specific attributes as well as different measures of IC information.

The results suggest that the role of the audit committee function extends to non-financial information communication such as IC. Policymakers in Malaysia should, therefore, build on the recent regulatory changes and encourage audit committees to ensure that the overall quality of corporate reporting processes include social, environmental, intellectual as well as financial capital of a firm.

This study considers the role of the audit committee in the wider corporate reporting process – drawing attention to its potential role in the espoused integrated business reporting. It also challenges the taken-for-granted assumption that restricts the role of the audit committee function to the traditional financial reporting process.

This paper aims to shed light on the relationship between audit committee attributes and integrated reporting quality (IRQ).

Data on a sample of 360 European firms selected from the STOXX Europe 600 index between 2010 and 2021 were used to test the model based on multiple regression for panel data to analyze the effect of audit committee attributes on IRQ. This paper considers generalized least squares (GLS) estimation for panel data models.

The findings of this study confirm expectations concerning the impact of audit committee attributes on the IRQ. Indeed, audit committee independence and meetings have a significant positive impact on IRQ. However, no significant association is found between financial expertise and IRQ.

The findings of this paper have significant implications for policymakers, who, through proper legislation, should encourage the formation of larger audit committees and ones with a higher percentage of independent members. They should also establish a minimum number of audit committee meetings per year. These regulations, which aim to increase the efficacy of audit committees’ supervisory and monitoring tasks, would promote corporate transparency and improve IRQ.

This study supports the existing literature. First, it expands the scientific debate on IRQ. Second, unlike previous studies, which used more subjective methods to measure the degree of integrated reporting (IR), this study relied on the CGVS variable from the DataStream ASSET 4 Database. Third, the research is novel because it indicates the crucial role of internal assurance mechanisms in wide managerial reporting practices in European companies. The sample consisted of European firms only, whereas previous studies used a global sample. Finally, this study is based on recent data (2010–2021), while other studies covered the period between 2008 and 2013.

This study aims to examine the effects of audit committee attributes on corporate philanthropic donations before and during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The study targets Nigeria’s listed firms between 2019 and 2020. We hand-collected the data from the available published annual reports of 141 and 128 firms for 2019 and 2020, respectively. Therefore, the authors used a total of 269 firm-year observations for the study. The authors used ordinary least square regression to analyze the data and Tobit regression to establish the robustness of the results.

The results indicate that the frequency of audit committee meetings has a significant positive relationship with corporate philanthropic donations before and during COVID-19. In the case of audit committee independence, it has only a significant positive relationship with corporate philanthropic donations during the pandemic. However, the findings reveal that audit committee size and foreign directors on the audit committee do not influence corporate philanthropic donations before and during COVID-19.

The study considers audit committee characteristics out of the corporate governance mechanisms that can influence the philanthropic donations of the listed firms in Nigeria over two years from 2019 and 2020.

The findings have practical implications for encouraging the audit committee to support philanthropic donations for the welfare of the poor and the needy, particularly in difficult times like the COVID-19 period. The results could also help regulators and policymakers to provide regulations and policies that can encourage firms to participate actively in philanthropic activities to their best ability.

Motivating firms to provide philanthropic donations for the welfare of underprivileged persons could strongly support the government’s effort to minimize the socioeconomic problems caused by COVID-19.

The study contributes to the scant literature that establishes the impact of audit committee attributes on firm philanthropic donations toward helping the poor and the needy in difficult periods.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the association between female audit committee representation and audit fees, taking into account their demographic attributes.

Research hypotheses have been tested by performing both univariate and multivariate analyses based on a sample of 790 firm-year observations from Swedish listed firms, spanning the period 2013-2017.

Initial finding derived from the empirical analyses provides consistent evidence of a positive association between female audit committee representation and audit fees. Controlling for self-selection bias, this finding holds unchanged. Therefore, female directors are voluntarily appointed to the companies audit committees. Including demographic attributes of women directors sitting in audit committees in the audit fees, models show that increased audit fees is driven by the level of female directors’ professional experience rather than their mere representation. Results from supplementary analysis document that the positive relationship between female audit committee representation and audit fees is more pronounced when the partner in charge of the audit engagement is a female, indicating that women presence on both the demand and supply-side of audit pricing enhance audit quality more importantly than when women are present on only the demand-side position of audit fees.

This study extends beyond recently published literature on the relation between audit committee gender-diversity and audit fees by offering a novel insight on demographic attributes of female directors enabling them to demand higher quality audits, as reflected by increased audit fees.

This study aims mainly to test the effect of audit committee independence and expertise attributes on corporate social responsibility (CSR) reporting, assurance and global reporting initiative (GRI) framework adoption and to investigate how CSR committee existence moderates this main relationship.

The study uses a large global sample that includes all (59,172) firm-year observations having CSR-related data in the Thomson Reuters Eikon database for a period between 2002 and 2019. The empirical analyses are based on random-effects logistic panel regression and Hayes methodology for the moderation analysis.

The study finds that audit committee independence and expertise are significantly associated with CSR reporting, CSR report assurance and GRI framework adoption. Moderation analysis largely supports the existence of a substitution role between audit and CSR committees and implies that audit committees are significant predictors of CSR reporting, assurance and GRI framework adoption mostly in the absence of the CSR committee.

The findings propose audit committee members be extra-vigilant in CSR reporting and assurance practices arising from undertaking substitution roles with the CSR committee. Hence, firms may configure their corporate structure in line with the results such as augmenting the audit committee with independent and expert members if they do not constitute a CSR committee. If firms establish a CSR committee, audit committee members may allocate less time to CSR reporting and assurance and more time to financial reporting quality.

This is the first study, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, to investigate the direct and indirect effect of audit committees’ attributes not only on CSR disclosure but also on GRI implementation and CSR reporting external assurance, considering the CSR committee’s possible substitutability or complementarity moderating role. This research develops a deeper understanding of audit committees’ non-financial role.

This paper aims to investigate the compliance with IAS 24 and possible audit committee attributes that can influence companies in Ghana to disclose related party (RP) information in their annual reports.

Different univariate tests and multivariate regressions have been used to examine the hypotheses. The sample includes 120 firm-year observations for the period 2013-2016.

The findings of the paper reveal that related party disclosure compliance is influenced by audit committee gender, audit committee independence and ownership concentration.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, there are no empirical studies that have addressed the effect of audit committee attributes on IAS 24 in Ghana and the second of such study in sub-Saharan Africa.

This study is designed and directed to analyze the effect of board characteristics and audit committee attributes on the firm performance of publicly listed commercial banks of Bangladesh.

Thirty publicly listed commercial banks of Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) have been taken as sample for this study. Data have been collected from annual reports between 2011 and 2017 of the assessed banks. Pooled OLS model has been used for running regression model of this study.

Board independence has a negative and significant relationship with ROA and Tobin's Q. However, Board Independence has a positive and significant relationship with Stock Return. On the other hand, Board Diversity has a negative and significant relationship with ROA and ROE, which implies inefficiency of diversified board members in the context of Bangladesh. Family duality has a positive and significant relationship with ROA and a negative and significant relationship with Stock return. Board Meeting has a positive and significant relationship with ROA. Audit Committee Size has a negative and significant relationship with Tobins' Q. Independence of audit committee chairman has a negative and significant relationship with Tobin's Q and Stock Returns. Presence of non-executive directors and number of audit meetings have no significant relationship with any of the predicted variables.

Among all variables of the board characteristics, role of independent directors and participation of female directors have conflicting results in this study. This has raised a question about the fair appointment independent directors and their objective view on the board. Female directors' role is not convincing in the context of Bangladesh as most of the commercial banks are family-owned. Policymakers can tighten and supervise the appointment of independent directors to ensure good governance in the banking sector. Moreover, role of audit committee and independence of audit committee chairman have generated conflicting results in terms of market-based performance measure.

Banking sector of Bangladesh experiences huge corruption in the form of excessive NPLs and poor management quality which results in low profit for the firm. This study has explored the problems of management quality and flaws of audit committee which is hampering overall growth of banking industry. Improvement of independent directors' appointment and audit committee formation and reporting will certainly help banking industry of Bangladesh to improve overall performance.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the compliance of Saudi shareholding companies with the requirements of corporate governance issued by the Board of Capital Market Authority in the Kingdom and their impact on earnings management.

A questionnaire was used to collect data about the compliance of the Saudi shareholding companies with corporate governance requirements and discretionary accruals (DAs) were calculated from the financial statements of these companies using the modified Jones model, then multiple regression was used to test the relationship between the variables.

The results of the study revealed that there was no statistically significant linear dependence of the mean of DAs on corporate governance. Additionally, no statistically significant effect for internal audit, audit committee and board of directors on earnings management was detected. However, the results revealed that there was a slight negative effect for internal audit scope of work and independence and audit committee independence on DAs.

This research paper is applied on Saudi Arabia, a Middle East country with specific characteristics, that is, a specific context, and, therefore, the results must be interpreted within this context

Regulators of Saudi corporations may need to reassess the effectiveness of corporate governance requirements issued by the Capital Market Authority and the actual implementation of these requirements. Researchers also may need further investigation of this phenomenon within its context.

The results of the study are very important to the Saudi society because they put a big question mark on the relevance of corporate governance of the Saudi shareholding companies

The paper provides new evidence about the effect of corporate governance mechanisms on earnings management in a Middle East environment, which may suggest that there is a need to expand this study using other methodologies to delve into the depths and understand this phenomenon within its context.