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Independent auditors play an important role in increasing the reliability of financial information by giving their professional opinion on the financial statements of business units. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between the audit adjustments and financing of companies.

The sample of the study includes 173 Iranian companies listed on the Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE) between 2010 and 2017.

There is no significant association between the profit incremental audit adjustments (Disagreement) and financing of companies in the current year and the following year through a loan. Furthermore, there is no meaningful relationship between the earnings downward/upward audit adjustments (Disagreement) and the financing of companies in the current year and the following year through ordinary stocks. However, there is a meaningful relationship between the profit downward audit adjustments (Disagreement) and the financing of firms in the current year through a loan. In general, as Iran's economy is facing severe economic sanctions, the existence of a high inflation rate has led to a steady increase in the stock prices of Iranian companies; hence, investors regardless of audit reports prefer to invest their money in the stock market so that it does not lose its purchasing power. Under these disaster economic circumstances, creditors are less willing to lend to companies with lower profits.

The results of the current study extend the knowledge of previous studies as financial pressures from economic sanctions have both positive and negative psychological effects on corporate financing.

The cost of equity (COE) and corporate governance structure are the most critical factors affecting competition among publicly held companies. Accordingly, the present paper aims to examine the relationship between corporate governance and the COE in the wake of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in Iraq.

Our statistical sample includes 34 companies listed on the Iraq Stock Exchange from 2012 to 2017. Board structure (i.e. board size, board independence, CEO tenure, board meetings frequency and CEO duality) and ownership structure (managerial ownership, institutional ownership and state ownership) are considered proxies for corporate governance structure. Besides, the authors employ the Capital Asset Pricing Model to measure the COE as our dependent variable. Multiple regression analysis and Exploratory Factor Analysis are also used to estimate the research models.

Our results suggest that corporate governance structure plays a significant role in reducing COE during the ISIS era. Furthermore, the authors find that corporate governance can be an alternative to COE reduction in Iraq’s absence of national security. Our findings also indicate that board size, board meeting frequency, managerial ownership and institutional ownership are negatively associated with COE.

Although this study has been thoroughly considered and cautiously planned, the specific period chosen to conduct the research (i.e. the ISIS era) could be a significant limitation since financial disclosure of listed companies may have been of lower quality during this period. However, to relatively alleviate this limitation and maintain the authenticity of the findings, the authors exclude low-quality financial statements, particularly non-audited financial reports, from the statistical sample. Furthermore, practitioners of emerging markets that are suffering from a weak external corporate governance combination can use the findings of this paper as a guideline to compensate the existing market deficiencies by improving internal corporate governance for observing further cash sources with lower cost. The findings also propose to international agencies that the business environment in Iraq is heavily affected by the ISIS phenomenon and needs financial aid to recover from its side effects. Furthermore, macroeconomists may use this paper to make more decisive macroeconomic indicators predictions.

This paper is among the pioneer investigations and elaborates on how the agency conflict is resolved effectively. The board and managerial characteristics and different forms of ownership might be applicable to provide cheaper funds for companies listed in emerging markets suffering from weak external corporate governance combinations.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of financial distress costs, corporate growth rate, and flexibility on the interaction between ownership structure and corporate debt policy.

The authors test the hypotheses by employing simultaneous equations system methodology with two-stage least squares regression and panel data technics on a sample of 786 listed companies on the Tehran Stock Exchange during 2010-2015.

The results indicate that there is a positive and significant relationship between corporate debt level and managerial ownership in the Iranian listed companies. The authors also find no convincing evidence that either the firm’s growth or financial health could influence or moderate this interrelationship.

The implications drawn from this study are constrained by two primary limitations. First, the present study is conducted in an Iranian setting; therefore, the data utilized for the study only contain companies listed on the Tehran Stock Exchange. The utilization of listed companies on the Tehran Stock exchange is likely to affect the generalizability of the study in a national context. Second, the authors were unable to extend the sample time period due to some major deficiencies in the Tehran Stock Exchange library and its supplementary software.

Since the fundamental institutional assumptions underpinning the western and even East Asia capital structure models are not valid in the institutional environment of Iran, the findings could provide substantial implications for our understanding of capital structures as well as debt policy literature.

This is an innovative research in terms of the mutual relationship between debt and ownership structure and the use of equations system to measure the interaction between them.

The present study aims to assess different intelligence types' effect on the auditor's organizational performance (OP) with the mediatory role of social capital (SC) in Iraq.

The study's statistical population includes 201 auditors in Iraq's audit firms, among whom 198 auditors are selected as the sample using the Cochran sampling method. Partial least squares (PLS) is used to assess the effect of independent variables on the dependent variable.

The results show a positive and significant association between different types of intelligence, including spiritual intelligence (SI), emotional intelligence (EI) and organizational intelligence (OI) and audit firms' OP. The enhancement of the desired organization can accelerate the organization's talent and capacity to reach its goals. Moreover, SC does not mediate the relationship between spiritual, emotional and organizational intelligence and OP.

Since no study has carried out so far on the effect of the different types of auditors' intelligence on Iraqi audit firms' performance, the study results can provide useful information and contribute to the development of knowledge in this field.

This paper aims to identify, classify and rank the contributing factors to financial resilience.

The present study is of a mixed-method and significant contributing factors have been identified after analyzing and reviewing the literature on resilience and financial resilience. These factors were classified and ranked using the analytic hierarchy process method. This paper operationalizes the concept of financial resilience.

The study results show that consistency in production and sales, access to a reliable supply chain, management ability to environmental adaptability, regional dimension and social support from the government’s side are among the determining factors in financial resilience at the market level. Some elements such as flexibility, risk identification, income, foreign exchange benefits, innovation in presenting goods and services, firm size and responsiveness of partners and beneficiaries inside and outside the organization are among the leading contributing factors at the organization level and management manner. Finally, the staff’s efficiency in using organization resources, shareholder staff and learning culture in the organization are among the main contributing factors to financial resilience under the staff’s influence.

The study results may give managers direction to evaluate companies’ resilience, especially in the emerging economy; besides, it improves the literature on the topic.

This study aims to concern about the relationship between management managerial attributes (management entrenchment, narcissism and overconfidence of the chief executive officer, board effort and real and accrual earnings management) and comparability of financial statements listed firms on the Tehran Stock Exchange. In other words, this paper aims to answer the question that “whether managerial attributes contribute significantly to the comparability of financial statements or not”.

The multivariate regression model is used for hypothesis testing. The hypotheses were examined using a sample of 768 listed observations on the Tehran Stock Exchange during 2012–2017 and by using from the multivariate regression pattern based on panel data techniques and the random-effects model.

The obtained results show a significant and negative relationship between management entrenchment, real and accrual earnings management, comparability and the relationship between management narcissism, overconfidence and board effort and comparability of financial statements is positive and significant.

As the present study is the pioneer study on such topics in the emerging markets, it provides valuable information concerning the intrinsic and acquired features of the management for users, analysts and legal institutions with a considerable impact on the comparability of financial statements. Moreover, this study’s results contribute significantly to the development of science and knowledge in this field and fill the gap in the literature.

Ethical concerns in the field of trade and business and research efforts in the area of management and implementation of ethical standards in the organizational chain in the current situation, mainly due to the impact on the performance and procedures of organizations, and, finally, the effect on the views and attitudes of stakeholders and users of corporate information have become critical. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the impact of business ethics on stress, anxiety and depression and the success of auditors in Iran and Iraq.

The study’s statistical population includes all partners, managers and auditors working in auditing firms. Three hundred sixty-five questionnaires were completed by Iranian respondents and 250 questionnaires by Iraqi respondents in 2021. Also, the analysis of variance and regression of ordinary least squares have been used for data analysis and testing of hypotheses.

The research results show a negative and significant relationship between the results of business ethics and stress, anxiety and depression of auditors in Iran and Iraq and a positive relationship between business ethics and auditors’ success in Iran and Iraq.

As the current research was conducted in emerging financial markets such as Iran and Iraq, which are highly competitive, along with special economic conditions, and as the occupation of the ISIS terrorist group, the civil wars in Iraq, the world’s severe economic sanctions against Iran and following the global crisis of COVID-19, both countries have had special conditions. Therefore, the current research can bring helpful information to the readers and help everyone develop science and knowledge in this field.

The purpose of this study is to assess the impact of nonfinancial sustainability reporting (NFSR) on enterprise value moderated by the management legitimate authority (MLA) for companies listed on the Tehran Stock Exchange.

To this aim, 190 firms were assessed during 2014–2019. This study used Arianpoor and Salehi’s indicators. The scoring method for NFSR, environmental sustainability reporting (ESR), social sustainability reporting (SSR) and governance sustainability reporting (GSR) was based on Zimon et al. Also, the CEO pay slice index was used to calculate the management’s legitimate authority. Tobin’s Q was used as a standard measure for the firm value, providing a suitable means of comparison.

The results revealed that NFSR affects enterprise value positively. In addition, ESR and SSR positively affect the enterprise value. However, GSR did not affect the enterprise value. MLA affects the relationship between NFSR/ESR/SSR/GSR and enterprise value, resulting from the effect of MLA on firm-related information quality and transparency.

Linking NFSR and management’s legitimate authority to firm value will enable managers to lead in helping firms enhance transparency and disclosure, improving their reporting standards and increasing the enterprise value. This, in turn, will ultimately result in better sustainability and governance practices.

The results can help understand that analysts and investors somehow consider discussions related to the NFSR in decisions related to the company’s value, and positive market reactions to these practices’ disclosures can motivate firms to improve value and performance.

The majority of prior research in this field has focused on developing countries. An international perspective is critical, and this study helps draw a more contextualized picture of sustainability than before. In addition, the present research explored the management’s legitimate authority role, which is considered an innovative aspect.

This study aims to investigate the impact tax shelters and cost of debt in Iran. It also aims determine methods to identify tax-aggressive policies through corporate structure and corporate policies, as well as various solutions to handle these issues.

For this purpose, the data of 155 listed companies on the Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE) during the years of 2008-2015 will be considered. The number of observations includes 1,085 companies. Data was analyzed using logistic panel regression with R software.

The results of the hypotheses show that financial leverage use is not inversely related to companies’ tax-aggressive policies. There is no direct relationship between sales and financial leverage. Overall, there is no inverse relationship between tax shelters and total debt.

The results extend the empirical findings of Graham and Tucker and Wilson. The authors also investigated the relationship between tax shelters and financing (total debt). These findings are crucial to the state; although several studies with similar subjects have been conducted in different countries, the current study is the first of its type in Iran.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of earnings quality (as a proxy for financial reporting quality) of companies listed on the Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE) and the quality of their financial information disclosure on stock returns.

The authors test the hypotheses by conducting panel data analysis on a sample of 1,680 firm-year observations from companies listed on the TSE during 2009-2014. The authors also conduct the variance inflation factor and unit root tests to control for the severity of multicollinearity in their ordinary least squares regression analysis and whether the time series variables are non-stationary and possess a unit root.

Using Francis et al. (2005) and modified Jones (1991) models as measures for earnings quality, the results are indicative of a significant and positive relationship between firms’ earnings quality and their stock returns. However, the research findings suggest that earnings management as well as disclosure quality (DQ) is not significantly associated with firms’ stock return.

Although the authors controlled for some of the factors affecting stock returns, there are still some other factors such as the operating environment, institutional setting and/or information uncertainty that could influence stock returns, and accordingly, the authors were not able to exclude their possibility and get the most robust results. Moreover, there are several models proposed in different studies for measuring earnings quality which have led to mixed results particularly without a general consensus on what a good model is, and whether earnings quality is a priced risk factor.

Taken as a whole, the paper could provide new insights into the determinants of stock returns which has rarely been considered by prior finance literature. Furthermore, the unique institutional context of the paper could contribute substantially to the literature on the relationship between financial reporting and DQ and stock returns.