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The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between book‐tax differences and earnings quality for commercial banks in Taiwan. The paper focuses on the banking industry because industry‐specific accrual models of accounting discretion in the loan loss provisions are available to develop powerful tests of earnings management related to book‐tax differences. In addition, the paper replicates the analysis of book‐tax differences that previous studies conducted on a heterogeneous sample of nonfinancial firms, to ascertain whether prior inferences also hold in the study's sample of banks in an emerging economy.

This paper estimates the magnitude of discretionary loan loss provisions as a proxy for earnings quality (positively correlated with earnings management; therefore, inversely correlated with earnings quality). Then, the study partitions the sample into three subsamples (large positive book‐tax differences, large negative book‐tax differences, and small book‐tax differences) to set the regression models.

This paper finds that bank‐years with large positive or negative temporary book‐tax differences have discretionary loan loss provisions that are greater than bank‐years with small temporary book‐tax differences. The paper also finds that bank‐years with large temporary book‐tax differences have one‐year‐ahead persistence of current earnings and accruals that are less than those with small temporary book‐tax differences. Additionally, the study does not find a significant relation between permanent book‐tax differences and earnings quality. Overall, the evidence is consistent with the supposition that large temporary book‐tax differences are associated with lower earnings quality.

The study contributes to the literature on book‐tax differences and earnings quality in two ways. First, the paper provides evidence to ascertain prior inferences that the association between book‐tax differences and earnings quality also hold in the banking industry, it may generalize to the banking sector in other emerging countries. Second, the study utilizes a banking‐specific accrual model to construct more powerful tests of information in book‐tax differences for earnings quality. The study has an inherent limitation arising from small sample size of the banking industry in an emerging economy. Future tax accounting researchers should develop appropriate country‐specific measures of book‐tax differences.

The study focuses on the banking industry because industry‐specific accrual models of accounting discretion in the loan loss provisions are available to develop powerful tests of earnings management related to book‐tax differences. In addition, the study replicates the analysis of book‐tax differences that previous studies conducted on a heterogeneous sample of nonfinancial firms, to ascertain whether prior inferences also hold in the sample of banks in an emerging economy.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of financial derivatives usage and country’s tax environment characteristics on the relationship between financial derivatives and tax avoidance.

This study uses a cross-country analysis with the scope of ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) countries which consists of the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore.

The level of financial derivatives usage positively affects the level of tax avoidance. This finding indicates that financial derivatives can be used as tax avoidance tool. Furthermore, the positive effect of the level of financial derivatives usage on the level of tax avoidance is lower in countries with a competitive tax environment than in countries with an uncompetitive tax environment. This finding indicates that in country with a competitive tax environment, the use of financial derivatives as a tax avoidance tool can be replaced by the tax facilities provided by that country.

This study uses four countries in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations region and does not test the sample based on the financial derivative types.

Tax authorities need to establish a clear tax regulation in regard to the tax treatment of financial derivatives transactions, e.g. define the definition of financial derivatives for hedging purposes and financial derivatives for speculative purposes; and define specific criteria to separate financial derivatives for hedging purposes from financial derivatives for speculative purposes. It is necessary to determine whether losses arising from derivative transactions are classified as deductible expenses or non-deductible expenses.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is also the first that provide empirical evidence that the relationship between financial derivatives and tax avoidance activities depends on a country’s tax environment.

The purpose of this chapter is to discuss the relation between tax reporting and financial reporting, their influence on transparency, and empirical implications.

This study aims to examine the impact of different levels of required book-tax conformity (BTC) on audit clients' demand for auditor-provided tax services (APTS). In addition, the authors also investigate the effects of the European Union (EU) Regulation (2014).

This study utilizes a sample of listed companies from 10 EU countries between 2010 and 2019. The final sample consists of 16,049 firm-year observations from 2,515 unique firms, and the authors use both probit and ordinary least square (OLS) regression models in this study.

The main finding of this paper is that companies listed in countries with a higher level of BTC are less likely to purchase tax services from incumbent auditors and pay fewer auditor-provided tax service fees. Results from further analyses confirm that firms substantially reduced their purchase of APTS after the EU Regulation (2014) was implemented, but these reduced purchases were found to be more pronounced for firms located in countries with low BTC.

This study advances the understanding of the determinants of APTS and the consequences of BTC. Specifically, the authors report that variation in a country-specific feature (i.e. BTC) also affects firms' decision to purchase APTS. Moreover, this paper provides some preliminary evidence of the new regulation and contributes to the literature on APTS regulation. The findings of this study have important policy implications for regulators and are also relevant for various capital market participants.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of financial factors on firms’ financial and tax reporting decisions. Firms often face the difficulties of accomplishing both financial and reporting goals. The extent to which reporting they put more value depends on the differential weighting of firms’ financial reporting and tax costs. The authors incorporate various financial factors as a source of cross-sectional differences in the weighing of both financial reporting and tax costs.

To examine firms’ decisions when fulfilling both the purposes of financial and tax reporting is difficult, the authors use a large set of firms in Korea, where book-tax conformity is high and aggressive tax shelters are restricted. The authors develop a new measure that can specify firms’ decision making between financial and tax reporting by considering both earnings management and tax avoidance.

The findings show that debt ratio affects firms’ financial and tax reporting decisions non-monotonically depending on the level of the debt ratio. The authors also find that firms with more long-term debt financing are more likely to be aggressive in financial reporting, while firms with higher financing deficit or better access to the capital market are more likely to be aggressive in tax reporting.

Thus, the findings provide more compelling evidence of firms’ decision making between two conflicting strategies, particularly when fulfilling both the purposes of financial and tax reporting is difficult. The authors expect that the results provide practical implications to standard setters, auditors and financial statement users who are interested in the ongoing debate over book-tax tradeoffs.

This paper fulfills an identified need to study how firms’ decision making between two conflicting reporting strategies are affected by the various financial factors, which are closely linked to a firm’s financial reporting and tax costs.

This study investigates the gap between financial accounting income and taxable income (i.e. book‐tax difference) and the value relevance of corporate taxable income in providing information on the quality of reported earnings for Malaysian listed firms during the tax years 2000 to 2004. The large gap between the financial accounting income and taxable income resulting from tax planning activities is reflected in firms’ effective tax rates (ETRs), a proxy for firms’ actual tax burdens. Thus, lower ETRs indicate high tax planning activities undertaken by the sample firms, and vice‐versa for firms with higher ETRs. This study uses a tax‐based earnings quality indicator, that is, the ratio of after‐tax taxable income to reported income (ATTI) to investigate the quality of corporate earnings. The study provides empirical evidence that firms report higher financial accounting income to shareholders and lower taxable income to tax authorities during the years 2000 to 2004. The significant and positive relation statistical results between firms’ after‐tax taxable income (ATTI) and market value of equity provided indicate the value relevance of taxable income as both an earnings quality indicator and a performance measure. Thus, the empirical results suggest investors appear to fully comprehend the quality‐related information in taxable income. This study concludes that first, tax planning activities contribute to a large gap between financial accounting income and taxable income; and second, taxable income contains useful information on the quality of reported earnings.

I reexamine the conflicting results in Frank, Lynch, and Rego (2009) and Lennox, Lisowsky, and Pittman (2013). Frank et al. (2009) conclude that firms can manage book income upward and taxable income downward in the same period, implying a positive relation between aggressive book and tax reporting. Lennox et al. (2013) conclude the relation is negative and aggressive book reporting informs users that aggressive tax reporting is less likely. I identify four key differences in the research designs across the two studies, including measures of aggressive book reporting, measures of aggressive tax reporting, sample time periods, and empirical models. I systematically examine whether each of these differences is responsible for the conflicting results by altering the key difference while holding other factors as constant as possible. I find the relation between aggressive book and tax reporting is driven by the measure of aggressive book reporting, as the relation is positive for some subsets of firms and negative for others. Firms accused of financial statement fraud have a negative relation while nonfraud firms exhibit a positive relation. Using discretionary accruals, I also look for, but do not find a “pivot point” in the relation between aggressive book and tax reporting. I provide a better understanding of the relation between aggressive book and tax reporting by identifying research design choices that are responsible for prior results. I show that measures of both discretionary accruals and financial statement fraud are necessary to gain a more complete picture of the relation between aggressive book and tax reporting.

The purpose of this paper is to examine three different responses to the Finnish 2005 tax reform that, among other things, reduced the corporate tax rate and hiked dividend taxation. Focus lies on the factors influencing the decision to change the fiscal year-end and whether earnings management is more prevalent when the decision is not taken.

This study uses the financial statement data of Finnish private firms and studies 350 fiscal year-end changing firms and 700 non-changing firms with logistic and linear regression analysis. Discretionary accruals are the proxy for earnings management.

The results suggest that firms seize the window of opportunity and extend fiscal years depending on the magnitude of the expected tax savings. Firms that do not change their fiscal year-end engage in more tax-induced earnings management. In terms of economic consequences, the earnings management approach is less economically significant.

This study only examines a limited number of firms that change their fiscal year-end, hence, care has been exercised in generalising the findings.

The findings may be considered when structuring future tax reforms, particularly when considering transition rules relating to changes in fiscal year-ends. The study may also have implications beyond tax reforms since the evidence of opportunistic changes in the fiscal year-end can be informative for tax authorities, independent auditors and creditors.

This study contributes to the relatively scarce literature on private firm responses to tax policy changes by analysing both upward and downward earnings management, as well as changes in the fiscal year-end. This is in contrast to previous research that mainly focusses on listed firms and absolute earnings management or earnings management in one direction.

This paper takes a unique approach to provide additional insight into the agency view of tax avoidance. We directly investigate the association between the presence of agency conflicts and corporate tax avoidance. Using a measure of CEO centrality, developed by Bebchuk, Cremers, and Peyer (2011), we identify settings in which agency conflicts are likely to be high. In contrast to prior literature, our primary tests do not rely on the inferences of market participants regarding tax avoidance. We find that CEO centrality is positively and significantly associated with tax avoidance. Additionally, we analyze the mediating role of monitoring by institutional investors in our setting. We find that the relation between tax avoidance and the existence of agency conflicts is strongest for firms with low levels of CEO monitoring. We also add to prior literature by investigating the implications of our setting on future accounting performance and future firm value.