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11 – 20 of over 6000Richard G. Brody, Christine M. Haynes and Craig G. White
– This research aims to explore whether recent audit reforms have improved auditor objectivity when performing non-audit services.
Abstract
Purpose
This research aims to explore whether recent audit reforms have improved auditor objectivity when performing non-audit services.
Design/methodology/approach
In two separate experiments, the authors tested whether external and internal auditors' inventory obsolescence judgments are influenced by their client's (or company's) role as the buyer or seller in an acquisition setting.
Findings
External auditors assessed the likelihood of inventory obsolescence objectively, regardless of their consulting role in the acquisition setting. Internal auditors assessed the likelihood of inventory obsolescence as higher when consulting for the buyer than when consulting for the seller, consistent with the supposition that the buyer would prefer to write-down inventory and negotiate a lower purchase price, whereas the seller would prefer the inventory not be written down.
Practical implications
From a regulatory perspective, external auditors may be relying too much on the work of internal auditors if internal auditors' lack of objectivity as consultants extends to their assurance role.
Originality/value
This paper extends prior research in the area of internal and external auditor objectivity and is the first paper to include both subject groups in the same experiment. It also addresses the current policy issues that may have a significant effect on audit quality and auditor liability.
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GREECE: Brinksmanship will see relief, not write-down
Details
DOI: 10.1108/OXAN-ES197418
ISSN: 2633-304X
Keywords
Geographic
Topical
ARGENTINA: Write-down rumours abound amid uncertainty
Viviane Frings-Hessami, Anindita Sarker, Gillian Oliver and Misita Anwar
The purpose of this paper is to discuss the creation and sharing of information by Bangladeshi women participants in a community informatics project and to assess to what extent…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to discuss the creation and sharing of information by Bangladeshi women participants in a community informatics project and to assess to what extent the information provided to them meets their short and longer-term needs.
Design/methodology/approach
The analysis is based on data collected during a workshop with village women in Dhaka and focus group discussions in rural Bangladesh in March and April 2019. The information continuum model is used as a framework to analyse the data.
Findings
The study shows that the women document their learning and share it with their families and communities and that they are very conscious of the importance of keeping analogue back-ups of the information provided to them in digital format. They use notebooks to write down information that they find useful and they copy information provided to them on brown paper sheets hung in the village community houses.
Practical implications
This paper raises questions about how information is communicated to village women, organised and integrated in a community informatics project, and more generally about the suitability and sustainability of providing information in digital formats in a developing country.
Originality/value
The paper shows how village women participants in a community informatics project in Bangladesh took the initiative to create and preserve the information that was useful to them in analogue formats to remedy the limitations of the digital formats and to keep the information accessible in the longer term.
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Mahmoud Fatouh and Ayowande A. McCunn
This paper aims to present a model of shareholders’ willingness to exert effort to reduce the likelihood of bank distress and the implications of the presence of contingent…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to present a model of shareholders’ willingness to exert effort to reduce the likelihood of bank distress and the implications of the presence of contingent convertible (CoCo) bonds in the liabilities structure of a bank.
Design/methodology/approach
This study presents a basic model about the moral hazard surrounding shareholders willingness to exert effort that increases the likelihood of a bank’s success. This study uses a one-shot game and so do not capture the effects of repeated interactions.
Findings
Consistent with the existing literature, this study shows that the direction of the wealth transfer at the conversion of CoCo bonds determines their impact on shareholder risk-taking incentives. This study also finds that “anytime” CoCos (CoCo bonds trigger-able anytime at the discretion of managers) have a minor advantage over regular CoCo bonds, and that quality of capital requirements can reduce the risk-taking incentives of shareholders.
Practical implications
This study argues that shareholders can also use manager-specific CoCo bonds to reduce the riskiness of the bank activities. The issuance of such bonds can increase the resilience of individual banks and the whole banking system. Regulators can use restrictions on conversion rates and/or requirements on the quality of capital to address the impact of CoCo bonds issuance on risk-taking incentives.
Originality/value
To model the risk-taking incentives, authors generally modify the asset processes to introduce components that reflect asymmetric information between CoCo holders and shareholders and/or managers. This paper follows a simpler method similar to that of Holmström and Tirole (1998).
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This article uses continuum theory to analyse how Bangladeshi rural women who participated in an information and communication technology for development (ICT4D) project accessed…
Abstract
Purpose
This article uses continuum theory to analyse how Bangladeshi rural women who participated in an information and communication technology for development (ICT4D) project accessed and preserved information during and after the end of the project.
Design/methodology/approach
Semi-structured interviews were conducted over the phone with a sample of the project participants two years after the end of the ICT4D project, and a survey of all the participants in one village was conducted face-to-face by one of the project participants using a questionnaire developed by the author.
Findings
The majority of the participants used paper notebooks to write down information that they received in digital format during the project as a guarantee against the fragility of digital data and continued to use them to access and preserve information after the end of the project.
Practical implications
The author suggests that the application of proactive appraisal during the planning stage and throughout ICT4D projects can ensure that the longer-term needs of the communities for information and their capacities to use specific formats will be considered.
Originality/value
The author applies the continuum theory concept of proactive appraisal to the use of information in an ICT4D context and argues that it can help with assessing the information needs of marginalised communities and the technologies and formats that should be used to ensure that the information provided to them will remain accessible for as long as they need it.
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This paper aims to identify conceptual changes in the practical application of asset impairment testing methods as required under IAS (International Accounting Standards) 36.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to identify conceptual changes in the practical application of asset impairment testing methods as required under IAS (International Accounting Standards) 36.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper explores general principles for an impairment testing framework, to address impairment issues that arise in valuation practice.
Findings
This paper shows that the way value in use is required to be assessed is technically flawed, prone to application error, and creates conceptual and financial mismatches with the requirements of other accounting standards.
Practical implications
From a practical perspective, the consequential scope for valuation errors is further exacerbated by the reluctance of company directors to accept the need for impairment and, in some cases, by gaming.
Originality/value
This paper provides a practitioner's viewpoint to impairment testing under the IAS, and identifies several inconsistencies with the application of the standard.
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Paolo Ferri, Shannon I.L. Sidaway and Garry D. Carnegie
The monetary valuation of cultural heritage of a selection of 16 major public, not-for-profit Australian cultural institutions is examined over a period of almost three decades…
Abstract
Purpose
The monetary valuation of cultural heritage of a selection of 16 major public, not-for-profit Australian cultural institutions is examined over a period of almost three decades (1992–2019) to understand how they have responded to the paradoxical tensions of heritage valuation for financial reporting purposes.
Design/methodology/approach
Accounting for cultural heritage is an intrinsically paradoxical practice; it involves a conflict of two opposite ways of attributing value: the traditional accounting and the heritage professionals (or curatorial) approaches. In analysing the annual reports and other documentary sources through qualitative content analysis, the study explores how different actors responded to the conceptual and technical contradictions posed by the monetary valuation of “heritage assets”, the accounting phraseology of accounting standards.
Findings
Four phases emerge from the analysis undertaken of the empirical material, each characterised by a distinctive nature of the paradox, the institutional responses discerned and the outcomes. Although a persisting heterogeneity in the practice of accounting for cultural heritage is evident, responses by cultural institutions are shown to have minimised, so far, the negative impacts of monetary valuation in terms of commercialisation of deaccessioning decisions and distorted accountability.
Originality/value
In applying the theoretical lens of paradox theory in the context of the financial reporting of heritage, as assets, the study enhances an understanding of the challenges and responses by major public cultural institutions in a country that has led this development globally, providing insights to accounting standard setters arising from the accounting practices observed.
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Pimpana Peetathawatchai and Kittima Acaranupong
The purpose of this research is to first examine whether the amount of impairment losses recognized by Thai listed firms is associated with the economic indicators suggested in…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this research is to first examine whether the amount of impairment losses recognized by Thai listed firms is associated with the economic indicators suggested in the relevant accounting standard. Second, the study investigates whether efficiency versus opportunism dominates accounting for impairment by Thai listed firms.
Design/methodology/approach
The multiple regression model is used to test whether impairment indicators and reporting incentives associate with impairment losses for a sample of 1,418 non‐financial listed Thai companies during 1999‐2004.
Findings
Impairment losses are associated with all three levels (macro, industry, and firm‐specific performance measures) of impairment indicators described in Thai Accounting Standard (TAS) No. 36 (which is in accordance with the IAS No. 36). The results also reveal that management opportunistically recognizes impairment losses to smooth earnings when earnings increase. Inconsistent with Francis et al. and Riedl, the association between impairment losses and economic factors is relatively greater than that between impairment losses and reporting incentives behaviors.
Originality/value
This is the first study that provides empirical evidence for the indicators of assets' impairment prescribed in TAS/IAS No. 36. The results support the pre‐condition indicators for measurement of impairment losses under TAS/IAS No. 36 in the emerging Thai capital market. Further, efficiency is documented to dominate opportunism as the principal of Thai firms' accounting policy with respect to asset impairment.
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Industrial profitability in Britain has suffered badly in recent years—and is still suffering—from the effects of rapid inflation coupled with rigorous price controls. This in…
Abstract
Industrial profitability in Britain has suffered badly in recent years—and is still suffering—from the effects of rapid inflation coupled with rigorous price controls. This in turn has led to widespread liquidity problems aggravated by increasing capital needs to meet the ever mounting costs of stock and plant replacement. The survival and growth of firms depend on the ability of management to adapt to the changing business environment. Under today's conditions an acquaintance with the various forms of assistance to industry offered by the Government, and their implications, is essential for those concerned with the financial aspect of management. Intelligently used, these incentives can increase the profitability, after tax, of investment in fixed assets, as well as reinforcing the cash flow needed to finance them. The available fiscal incentives fall into two main classes: those given by way of “capital allowances” on fixed assets in taxing profits; and the range of government grants and other help available to firms operating in, or moving into, the “areas for expansion”.