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This study aims to examine the influence of tax avoidance and green accounting on earnings persistence and its impact on stock prices. The research uses a quantitative approach with an associative method to determine the relationships between the variables studied. The data source for this study is secondary data obtained from the financial statements of palm oil plantation companies listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX) during the period 2019-2022. Data were collected from the IDX website (www.idx.co.id) and www.investing.com, as well as through related literature and scientific journals. The study population consists of 24 palm oil plantation companies listed on the IDX that disclosed financial statements for four consecutive years from 2019 to 2022. The data analysis method used is multiple linear regression analysis with the help of Eviews 12 software. The results show that tax avoidance and green accounting significantly influence the earnings persistence of companies. Additionally, earnings persistence is proven to have a positive impact on stock prices. The conclusion of this study is that tax avoidance practices and the implementation of green accounting can affect the quality of a company's earnings, which in turn impacts investor perceptions of the company's stock value. The implications of this research are the need for companies to be more transparent in tax management and to integrate environmentally friendly accounting practices to enhance investor trust and corporate sustainability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper aimed to compare the Quality of Accounting Information (QAI) of publicly traded companies in markets with distinct levels of economic development, represented by France, Brazil and other Latin American countries (the latter together). Methodology: The methodological approach was quantitative, with the use of descriptive and exploratory statistics, and regression with unbalanced panel data. The data used involved the following periods: French market, from 1987 to 2017; Brazilian, from 1995 to 2017 and Latin American, from 1989 to 2015. Results: The results pointed out structural differences of QAI in financial statements between the analyzed markets, indicating that the more developed one presents better QAI. Contributions of the Study: The practical contribution of this research can subsidize investor decisions, while the academic knowledge generated reveals that markets in diverse economic contexts present different levels of QAI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines whether future stock returns and earnings persistence decline when a firm has issued equity within 1 month of its earnings announcement (post‐EA equity financing), considering managerial ability and overconfidence. The results show that when overconfident managers engage in post‐EA equity financing, buy‐and‐hold returns significantly decrease in the subsequent month and earnings persistence is low within the subsequent year. However, firms with overconfident, high‐ability managers do not experience lower returns following post‐EA equity financing and have larger earnings variability within the subsequent 3 years. The decline in returns in the month during post‐EA equity financing is more pronounced for firms with high financial constraints or low financial flexibility with overconfident managers. Overall, our results highlight the managerial traits of firms that engage in equity issuance after information release. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Corruption within corporate entities continues to be a relatively overlooked yet significant issue to date. This study seeks to investigate the impact of corruption on the quality of earnings. The sample comprises 846 firm-years listed on the Indonesian Stock Exchange. Earnings quality encompasses factors such as earnings persistence, earnings value relevance, and earnings predictability. Corruption is gauged by the corruption per capita in the region where the firms are headquartered. The data analysis employs regression models incorporating firm and province effects. Broadly, the findings of this study indicate that corruption diminishes earnings quality. Heightened corruption is associated with weakened controlling and monitoring functions, increased information asymmetry, and diminished managerial quality, all contributing to a decline in earnings quality. This research not only expands upon previous studies but also reaffirms the relevance of the social capital concept while presenting new empirical evidence within a context of a country with a higher corruption perception index, such as Indonesia.

Based on the background of investor sentiment volatility in the capital market, this article empirically examines the relationship between investor sentiment and corporate earnings persistence and its impact mechanism using a first-order autoregressive model with a sample of Chinese A-share non-financial listed companies from 2007 to 2019. It is found that rising investor sentiment helps improve corporate earnings persistence when investor sentiment is moderate, with financing constraints playing a part in mediating the effect. The test of heterogeneity in corporate life cycle and nature of ownership found that rising investor sentiment significantly mitigates the financing constraints in growth stage and non-state enterprises, which in turn improves their earnings persistence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates institutional distance as a factor of investors' monitoring of corporate earnings attributes. We analyze the US cross‐listing market to determine whether institutional monitoring depends on geographic or market proximity. We find that shareholdings of non‐US institutions headquartered in the same country as the investee firm are significantly and positively related to earnings quality. However, we do not find such a monitoring role in the United States, or in institutions not incorporated in the investee firm's home country. Our findings support a geographic proximity advantage over market proximity, which is more pronounced when firms' information opacity is more severe; the results are not altered by the choice of earnings attribute variables. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, we find that relative to firms with less media coverage, stock price sensitivity to positive (negative) earnings surprises in earnings announcements of firms with greater media coverage is stronger (weaker). This asymmetry in the effect of media coverage on stock price sensitivity to positive versus negative earnings surprises suggests that greater media coverage of earnings announcements intensifies stock price reactions to positive earnings surprises but attenuates reactions to negative earnings surprises. Moreover, we find that negative earnings news is less persistent for firms with greater media coverage. Overall, our findings support the conjecture that greater media coverage increases managers’ incentive to avoid future negative news, thereby reducing the persistence of poor financial performance and weakening price reactions to negative earnings news.

Corruption within corporate entities continues to be a relatively overlooked yet significant issue to date. This study seeks to investigate the impact of corruption on the quality of earnings. The sample comprises 846 firm-years listed on the Indonesian Stock Exchange. Earnings quality encompasses factors such as earnings persistence, earnings value relevance, and earnings predictability. Corruption is gauged by the corruption per capita in the region where the firms are headquartered. The data analysis employs regression models incorporating firm and province effects. Broadly, the findings of this study indicate that corruption diminishes earnings quality. Heightened corruption is associated with weakened controlling and monitoring functions, increased information asymmetry, and diminished managerial quality, all contributing to a decline in earnings quality. This research not only expands upon previous studies but also reaffirms the relevance of the social capital concept while presenting new empirical evidence within a context of a country with a higher corruption perception index, such as Indonesia. IMPACT STATEMENT: The relationship between corruption and earnings quality becomes a new insight for public. Regulator and society can maintain the good norm and value to reduce the bad impact of corruption into social capital. Indonesia has an increasing corruption perception so regulator, society, and business participants can improve the controlling and monitoring function to avoid misbehavior. Specifically, business participants can avoid misbehavior of report the lower quality earnings. It is new evidence in Indonesia and expected to be a consideration to formulate public and business policy in Indonesia [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Brazilian Business Law Journal / Administração de Empresas em Revista is the property of Administracao de Empresas em Revista and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This study examines the effect of real earnings management (REM) on earnings persistence and informativeness and also considered in the context of the COVID‐19 pandemic. REM is quantified by two aggregate metrics. The sample consists of 2256 firm‐year observations of listed companies in Vietnam from 2016 to 2021. We find evidence that REM is negatively associated with the persistence of earnings and its components, with REM affecting cash flows more strongly than accruals. We also find that REM limits the relationship between current earnings and future cash flows. Furthermore, when confronted with the COVID‐19 pandemic, the effect of REM on earnings quality does not improve. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Do the persistence-predictability of earnings and reputation, affects dividend policy? This study provides new elements to enrich the debate around the question. To this end, a data panel of companies listed in Latin America is structured with financial information obtained in the Datastream database and a corporate reputation ranking known as MERCO during the period between 2008 and 2016. Subsequently, the hypotheses are tested with an econometric study. Our econometric study is based on the model which Lipe (1990) estimates the return of a stock through the properties of the time series of profits, the interest rate used to discount expected future earnings, and the relative ability of earnings compared to alternative information to predict future earnings. Among the main findings we find that the measure of persistence increases the ratio of dividends on assets, but when you are in MERCO the result is negative. It is as if companies take advantage of appearing in the ranking to pay less dividends. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With reference to Ohlson' model, we optimise earnings persistence model and express earnings persistence measure as a function of return on equity (R.O.E.), dividends payout ratio and other factors. Our theoretical model reveals that dividends payout ratio has little effect on the earnings persistence, while R.O.E. has a decisive effect on earnings persistence. Using quarterly earnings data of 872 listed firms in China over 2011–2020, we calculate the Revised Persistence value of earnings (RPer value) of our earnings persistence model, and find that the Rper value of our model have more explanatory power than that of Kormendi and Lipe' model. Our study also suggest that quarterly earnings are useful and have information content. Both the theoretical model and empirical results of our research are of great significance to understand and support the implementation of semi-compulsory cash dividends rules in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using a hand-collected sample of U.S. multinational firms' foreign and domestic cash holdings, we evaluate the earnings persistence implications of changes in foreign and domestic cash and whether stock prices reflect these implications. Building on the earnings decomposition approach in Dechow, Richardson, and Sloan 2008 Journal of Accounting Research, 46 (3): 537–566, we find that, in the overall sample, changes in foreign cash are as persistent for future earnings as changes in domestic cash. In the cross-section, we find that foreign cash changes have higher persistence when foreign operations offer better growth opportunities and when repatriation taxes are lower. We then examine whether investors correctly price the persistence implications of foreign and domestic cash changes. We find a positive association between current foreign cash changes and one-year-ahead stock returns, suggesting that investors underreact to foreign cash changes or equivalently underestimate the earnings persistence of foreign cash changes. We further document that investors are more likely to misprice foreign cash changes when information processing costs are higher and when firms have poorer information environments. Our study sheds light on a recent paper by Harford, Wang, and Zhang 2017 The Review of Financial Studies 30 (5): 1490–1538, who find that investors discount foreign cash changes, which they attribute to agency costs and investment inefficiencies. Our findings suggest that the discount is more likely due to investor mispricing of foreign cash changes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Equity method investments are commonly a material component of a firm's corporate structure, yet these investments are presented to financial statement users through opaque financial reporting. This study demonstrates that the link between equity method earnings and future earnings is stronger than the link between consolidated earnings and future earnings, consistent with the synergistic and diversification benefits of equity method investments. Next, this study demonstrates a limitation in the opaque reporting of equity method investments by revealing that the market fails to fully incorporate into prices the link between equity method earnings and future earnings. Further, this study contributes to the active debate among practitioners and regulators about the usefulness of supplemental disclosure requirements related to equity method investments. Results indicate that supplemental equity method investment disclosures aid the market in impounding the persistence of equity method earnings into share price. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Contemporary Accounting Research is the property of Canadian Academic Accounting Association and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This study investigates the use of earnings components in setting CEO compensation and explores how persistence and controllability affect it. The results indicate that compensation committees do accord differential treatment to earnings components based on their persistence and controllability. Among above the line items, income from continuing items, the most persistent item, also receives the most weight, followed by special items, which have smaller persistence. Furthermore, these weights vary across firms in different stages of life cycle in a manner that mirrors variations in their informativeness and persistence. Weights on special items also exhibit contextual sensitivity based on their type and frequency. Among below the line items, discontinued items, which are at least under partial control of the CEO, receive a positive weight. Except extraordinary items, which are largely uncontrollable, we find no evidence that CEOs are shielded from the income-decreasing effects of any of the earnings components. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to investigate the effect of various financial factors that affect the consumer product sectors in the Indonesia Stock Exchange earnings persistence. The study employed purposive sampling, the data were collected from the 2011-2020 annual financial statements, and analyzed by utilizing panel data regression. In the consumer cyclical industry, firm size and accrual amount negatively influence earnings persistence. In contrast, the impact of fluctuating cash flow, volatile sales, and debt levels was negligible. In the non-cyclical consumer sector, cash flow volatility positively influenced earnings persistence. However, debt levels and accrual amounts had a negative influence, while sales volatility and firm size had no effect. These findings suggest that the determinants of earnings persistence vary by industry and that different financial factors may affect earnings persistence differently. The results may help Indonesian stakeholders in comprehending the factors that affect the sustainability of revenues in the consumer products industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While transfer price affects the allocation of profit among subunits of an organization and the information contained in earnings, little is known about how it affects investors' pricing of stocks. Research evidence on transfer pricing is rather limited due to lack of data, which is proprietary in nature. With reference to the arm's length principle under the tax regulations, this paper empirically explores the association between a firm's transfer pricing strategy and earnings informativeness, i.e., the degree to which information contained in earnings is reflected in stock price. Using data on related party transactions and controlling for firm characteristics, the results show that abnormal transfer price is negatively associated with earnings informativeness and earnings persistence. Additionally, firms with higher abnormal transfer price have greater discretionary accruals. The evidence suggests that managers manipulate transfer price through accrual earnings management, which reduces earnings informativeness and persistence, and that the enhancement of the tax regulations in transfer pricing contributes a decline in the informativeness of earnings. Our findings provide policy implication with respect to the tax regulations on transfer pricing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research analyzes and determines the effect of investment opportunity set, earnings persistence, and capital structure on earnings quality by making managerial ownership a moderating variable. This research is classified as a type of quantitative research with panel data obtained from secondary financial report data that has been published through Indonesian Stock Exchange website. Furthermore, the research sample was filtered using purposive sampling technique with several predetermined criteria to obtain 30 manufacturing companies registered at ISSI for 2019-2021 that met the criteria with a 3-year observation span. So, the total sample used was 90. Data analysis in this study used Moderated Regression Analysis. After testing with the Eviews 9 tools, the results show that the IOS variable has a positive and significant effect on earnings quality, earnings persistence has a negative but significant effect, while earnings persistence has no effect on earnings quality. Managerial ownership can only moderate the IOS’ relationship to earnings quality, however earnings persistence and capital structure variables cannot be moderated by managerial ownership in influencing earnings quality

This study aims to investigate the effect of various financial factors that affect the consumer product sectors in the Indonesia Stock Exchange earnings persistence. The study employed purposive sampling, the data were collected from the 2011-2020 annual financial statements, and analyzed by utilizing panel data regression. In the consumer cyclical industry, firm size and accrual amount negatively influence earnings persistence. In contrast, the impact of fluctuating cash flow, volatile sales, and debt levels was negligible. In the non-cyclical consumer sector, cash flow volatility positively influenced earnings persistence. However, debt levels and accrual amounts had a negative influence, while sales volatility and firm size had no effect. These findings suggest that the determinants of earnings persistence vary by industry and that different financial factors may affect earnings persistence differently. The results may help Indonesian stakeholders in comprehending the factors that affect the sustainability of revenues in the consumer products industry.

Copyright of Cracow Review of Economics & Management / Zeszyty Naukowe Uniwersytetu Ekonomicznego w Krakowie is the property of Cracow University of Economics and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Previous research has found that, when firms engage in environmental sustainability practices, they tend to give a consistent signal to external stakeholders by acting in a more responsible, transparent, and ethical manner, and these firms tend to exhibit high earnings quality. However, other studies have found that those activities may mask a poor earnings quality. On the other hand, firms with high debt levels face constraints in raising funds. In this study, we expect these firms, when involved in environmental reporting practices, to reveal an increase in their earnings quality in order to improve their ability to capture financing. Thus, we analyze whether the level of environmental disclosure and a firm's debt increase earnings quality. To analyze the former association, we develop an environmental sustainability reporting index (ESReporting), based on GRI standards, using the content analysis for Portuguese firms from 2016 to 2020. We use earnings persistence as a proxy for earnings quality because it is a fundamental characteristic to determine firm value. Regarding debt, we include a financial indicator to analyze its effect on earnings persistence. To test the hypotheses, we estimate a multiple linear regression, applying panel data. Our results suggest that ESReporting and debt tend to positively affect earnings persistence. In addition, our evidence suggests that ESReporting produces a higher positive impact then debt. These results show that ESReporting and debt may be used as regulating mechanisms of earnings management. Besides, this article brings some insights to the improvement of earnings quality resulting from a higher commitment to environmental disclosure and contributing to monitoring managers' activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on the impact of audit quality on earnings persistence is of interest to managers, investors, and researchers. However, the results have been inconsistent. Therefore, this study was undertaken to examine the link between audit quality and earnings persistence with audit firm size as a measure of audit quality. Quantitative analysis was adopted to analyse a sample of 228 listed firms in the Vietnamese stock market between 2014 and 2017. Findings suggested that audit quality has a positive effect on earnings persistence. This trend was also true for firm size and cash ratio, while debt ratio and firm age negatively impacted earnings persistence. The research contributes to current literature by proposing viable solutions for functional government agencies, audit companies, and enterprise managers in improving the quality of auditing and information disclosed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT The aim of this article was to evaluate the effect of company earnings and of harmonization with IFRS on the readability of Management Reports in the Brazilian stock market. There is a gap to be filled both in the elaboration and adaptation of readability measures to the context studied, as the studies tend to replicate the original formulas, and in identifying the determinants of the readability of Brazilian company reports, as the research in this field remains in its infancy and the results are inconclusive. The results provide indications for investors to identify complex textual information and may help public policymakers to establish a simple writing manual, along the lines of the SEC’s 1998 Plain English Handbook. The modified metrics and the one developed overcome the criticisms regarding the use of readability formulas in accounting research and could be used in substitution of the original metrics in future studies. An econometric model was used that presents the determinants of readability. Readability was calculated for the Results Analysis section of the Management Report. The resulting construct is understood via three attributes: persistence, current performance, and the reference benchmark. Harmonization with IFRS is a dummy variable, which delimits the pre- and post-IFRS periods. The hypotheses were tested in a sample of Brazilian companies made up of 714 company-year observations covering the period from 2006 to 2019. The descriptive results show that there is an apparent improvement in the readability of the reports in the pre- and post-IFRS period comparison. The econometric evidence shows that, in general, companies with persistent and positive earnings present less complex reports and are more likely to have highly readable reports, because managers publish reports with better readability to signal positive results to the market.

ABSTRACT We investigate the relationship between dividend persistence and earnings management, considering the levels of economic performance and risk in emerging countries. Earnings are important for valuation models and dividends have evidence that suggests greater persistence, however, there is no evidence on the effect of earnings management on dividend persistence in emerging countries. Despite the substantial growth of emerging markets in the last decades, the degree of informational efficiency and the legal protection for investors is inferior to developed countries, and this is a potential risk for investors who prefer to receive dividends as a way of avoiding expropriation by managers who can manage the firms’ earnings. We show that the reduction in macroeconomic volatility and the uncertainties concerning a country’s performance and risk improve dividend persistence. Thus, even in the face of earnings manipulations, dividends are better inputs for valuation models. Using the persistence models of Dechow and Schrand (2004) and Lintner (1956), we interact the dividend persistence with firms’ earnings management and some indicators of a country’s economic performance and risk for 7,536 publicly traded firms from 20 countries, included in the Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) Emerging Markets Index from 2000 to 2016. We find that in emerging countries dividends are more persistent than earnings. If a company pays United States dollars (USD) 1.00 in dividends, then, on average, US$ 0.89 will persist into next year’s dividends (for earnings, only US$ 0.76 persists). We find that, in addition to the past dividends and current earnings presented by Lintner (1956), current dividends are a function of earnings management volume because this event reduces dividend persistence.

This paper studied the link of board independence, audit effectiveness and the quality of reported earnings in Nigeria. Using convenient sampling, 7 consumer-goods firms quoted in the Nigerian stock exchange (NSE) from 2016 to 2020 (5 years) were used in conducting the research. The data source was primarily obtained from firm’s annual report and analyzed by using Random Effect GLS in STATA 14. The findings show that board independence and expertise are statistically significant in affecting the quality of reported earnings. The result found board independence and audit expertise to be negatively affecting earnings quality in the Nigerian consumer goods firms. Considering the fact that the results found the characteristics of firms board – independence and expertise - to be significant in affecting earnings quality, the study recommended that the financial users should not over rely and have absolute confidence in using financial report. The monitoring mechanisms for shielding financial report may not be effective, and the final report can mislead the stakeholders in their various decisions. Thus, the regulatory bodies should focus more in revising it guides that will improve quality of earnings to restore stakeholder’s confidence in using financial reports.

We investigate the impact of the mixed attribute GAAP measurement model on accrual quality inferences. GAAP rules vary from an income statement "matching" focus to a balance sheet "fair-value" focus. Accrual properties are also affected by the business activity being measured and the activity's recurrence. Furthermore, accrual measurement is affected by managerial estimation error/manipulation. As a consequence, accruals are heterogeneous with predictably different statistical properties. We construct a dataset of more than 100,000 accrual items that Compustat aggregates into data item FOPO. We classify these accruals into 32 types over a 21-year span. We show that variation in persistence for the 32 accrual types is consistent with our predictions concerning GAAP rules. We provide a model of accruals and show that it is implausible for estimation error of reasonable magnitudes to explain this variation. Finally, we develop a measure of reporting consistency and show its impact on accrual quality inferences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Social & Technology / Jurnal Sosial dan Teknologi (SOSTECH) is the property of Green Publisher and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper studies the influence of the annual cumulative earnings of Chinese listed TPA (targeted poverty alleviation) companies before 2004 on the companies' value using data from 2012 to 2019, measures the long-term earnings persistence of these companies with the variable of the cumulative earnings averaged by the market price of each company at the current year's end, and obtains a model of the company's value combined with each company's earnings persistence and the long-term competitive strength of its products. The cumulative data from 2004 to 2012, 2005 to 2013..., and 2011 to 2019 provide the data used for regression from 2012 to 2019. The TPA companies' value is affected by long-term cumulative net profits and long-term competitive advantage. The higher the company's accumulated net profit, the longer the duration of the long-term competitive advantage, the more stable the company's value increase, and the higher the quality of the value increase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the implications of sustainable management for the persistence of earnings and earnings components. This study also analyzes whether sustainable management influences investors' assessments of earnings persistence. According to previous studies, sustainable management activities ultimately have a positive effect on corporate financial performance and corporate value by satisfying the desires of not only shareholders, but also various actors concerned with social contributions and reduced information asymmetry. In addition, the transparency of financial reporting increases as earnings management decreases due to ethical management. So this study predicts that excellent sustainable management activities will improve earnings persistence and investors use as a signal to correctly price the persistence of earnings. This research uses the ESG ratings as a proxy for sustainable management and sample size is 3,247 in Korea securities market. The empirical results show that there is a significant positive relationship between higher ESG grades and earnings and earnings components. And by the method of Mishkin (1983), investors correctly price the persistence of earnings and earnings components based upon sustainable management activities. The results in this study helps to improve our understanding of the impact of sustainable management for earnings quality and investors' evaluation of earnings quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, we find that relative to firms with less media coverage, stock price sensitivity to positive (negative) earnings surprises in earnings announcements of firms with greater media coverage is stronger (weaker). This asymmetry in the effect of media coverage on stock price sensitivity to positive versus negative earnings surprises suggests that greater media coverage of earnings announcements intensifies stock price reactions to positive earnings surprises but attenuates reactions to negative earnings surprises. Moreover, we find that negative earnings news is less persistent for firms with greater media coverage. Overall, our findings support the conjecture that greater media coverage increases managers' incentive to avoid future negative news, thereby reducing the persistence of poor financial performance and weakening price reactions to negative earnings news. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigate whether information transparency at the industry level is associated with the sustainability of within-industry differences in profitability. Since competition leads to the elimination of intra-industry profitability differences, this investigation provides evidence on whether competitors act on information about rivals. Using an industry-level transparency measure that integrates corporate reporting by firm managers, private information search and communication by analysts, and information dissemination by the media, we find that transparency is associated with faster reductions in within-industry profitability differences. Using aggregate financial statement data for public and private firms provided by the U.S. Census Bureau, we further find that differences in profitability between public and private firms are less persistent when public firms' profitability exceeds private firms' profitability, consistent with theoretical and anecdotal arguments that public firms are at a competitive disadvantage because they are required to be more transparent than private counterparts. Our results are robust to the use of local newspaper closures and mergers as exogenous shocks to transparency. Collectively, these findings indicate that information transparency facilitates competition, leading to the erosion of profitability differences within an industry. We further demonstrate that information transparency is positively associated with the degree to which competitors enter or exit an industry in anticipation of changes in the industry's profitability outlook. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: this paper analyses the earnings persistence and market reaction to earnings in the international insurance industry. Methods: the analysis considers a sample of 307 listed international insurance companies from 2004 to 2019 and assesses several quantitative empirical models and estimations, including panel fixed effects and pooled OLS. Results: results indicate that operating cash flows are highly and strongly persistent when compared to the accruals component of earnings and that reported earnings are informative about companies' performance. However, these findings vary significantly across insurance sub-segments. Additionally, the association between earnings and returns is significantly affected by specific companies' performances in the sense that market agents review their expectation in a higher level when a reduction in earnings (bad news) is reported. Results also show that market risk patterns are positively associated with earnings response coefficient, suggesting a numerator effect of risk. Conclusions: overall, this paper provides evidence that economic analysis and scrutiny of earnings persistence and the market reaction to earnings announcements in insurance industry, and its insurance sub-segments, can provide superior assessment of future outcomes by investors, regulators, and academics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista de Contabilidade do Mestrado em Ciências Contábeis da UERJ is the property of Editora da Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (EdUERJ) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The persistence and predictive ability are extensively requested as desirable attributes of earnings quality in the literature. The paper aims at investigating the persistence and predictive ability of earnings in French and UK companies. The study included a panel data of 1035 firm-year observations for 115 French listed companies from the CAC All-Tradable and 900 firm-year observations for 100 UK listed companies from the FTSE All-Share, during the period of 2011–2019. The research design was based on two equations starting from Sloan (1996) that were estimated using Fixed Effects Method. The study showed that earnings were persistent but they had no predictive ability regarding the future cash flows whether in French or UK companies and that earnings of UK companies were more persistent than those of the French companies. We argue that the persistence of earnings and the inability to predict future cash flows can be evidence of earnings management. The study contributes to the literature about earnings quality by studying earnings persistence and earnings predictive ability together in two different environments. The results require that users must take into consideration the illusory persistence of earnings, auditors must be cautious regarding the manipulation of earnings by managers, and accounting standard setters must review the reporting guidelines of cash flows to enhance their predictability by earnings.