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impact of earnings management on profitability
impact of earnings management on profitability
importance of earnings management
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1.1 Earnings Management
Earnings management is “purposeful intervention by management in the earnings determination process usually to satisfy selfish objectives” (Subramanyam and Wild, 2009). Earnings management can be indicated by analyzing several indicators, such as, evaluating “the size and direction of discretionary accruals, reversals in subsequent accruals, the use of special items in the income statement, and adjustment of R&D spending” (Das, Shroff, and Zhang, 2007). There are still other indicators for doing earnings management, such as, using cash flow manipulation, big bath, or through companies’ real activities (e.g. boosting its year-end sales by offering discounts to meet its annual target revenue). Accruals are the most common tools to be used when companies do their earnings management since they will be easily affected by companies’ daily operations activities; hence, when management wants to engage in manipulating the earnings performance using accruals, they can just easily change their company’s daily operations toward the expected direction.
Firms that condu...
Management accounting in organisation is very important for decision-making and to make the business more efficient and therefore increasing its profits. Is the process of preparing accounts that can help managers to make day-to-day and short-term decisions, by providing them with accurate and timely key financial and statistical information...
DHALIWAL, D. S., GLEASON, C. A., & MILLS, L. F. (2004). Last-Chance Earnings Management: Using the Tax Expense to Meet Analysts' Forecasts. Contemporary Accounting Research, 21(2), 431-459.
Is the current economic environment forcing managers into a difficult position? The slowing of the general economy or industry-specific economic conditions decreases sales while increasing bad debts and obsolete inventory. The operating performance decline is amplified by the reversals of prior-period accruals based on recent experience. The original accounting estimates were made under very different economic conditions. As the economy or industry slows, managers may find it increasingly difficult to meet the earnings objectives set during the boom times.
... tempted to falsely inflate earnings is to take away their personal gains, if the company's stocks go up. I believe that when upper level management has too much incentive based on personal financial gain, which is directly based on the performance of the company; it compromises their judgments. I think that upper level management should not be allowed to receive stock options or to even own stock in the company as the financial statements would provide a neutral, bias-free report. Management would have no reason to "cook the books." I also feel that any management who still decides to falsify documents needs to be held more accountable for their actions and receive tougher punishments. I think that these strict guidelines would help the people in the United States and people all over the world feel more confident in investing their money into the stock market.
‘Beyond Budgeting is the set of guiding principles that, if followed, will enable an organization to manage its performance and decentralize its decision making process without the need for traditional budgets. Its purpose is to enable the organization to meet the success factors of the information economy (e.g. being adaptive in unpredictable conditions).’
With over twenty years of work experience I have witnessed managers at all levels utilize various tricks to manipulate short-term quarterly earnings. It seems like most managers have different views on what is ethical and unethical when it comes to managing short-term earnings and tend to use questionable practices to meet company numbers. This has been confirmed from The Dangerous Morality of Managing Earnings case study as according to Gibson the accounting practice of offering a fourth quarter sales incentive and allowing customers 120 days to pay in an attempt to increase fourth quarter sales numbers was posed to the managers in the case study and returned results indicating that the practice was viewed as ethical, questionable, and even unethical (1990/2013). Without a unanimous response for this practice it is confirmed that each manager views this practice differently and with so many ways for financial numbers to be manipulated it would be difficult at times to get an accurate picture of a company’s current financial well being.
Reichelstein, S. (2000). Providing Managerial Incentives: Cash Flows versus Accrual Accounting. Journal of Accounting Research, 38(2), 243.
Positive accounting theory is arguably an explanatory of accounting practice; economic based theory. RL Watts and JL Zimmerman developed positive accounting theory in 1980s at the William E School of Administration at the Rochester University. People do not know what they want at times. So there are different options available to accountants. There are some logical facts to choose one specific method. On choosing one specific method, accountants will maximize their own benefit first, and then company benefit, shareholder benefit and at last social benefits. A specific method will allow accountants to feel better to do their work as they like them the way they know and they way they are best at doing (Jayne Godfrey). For instance, accountant will write accumulated depreciation on asset value side for big company whereas when a poor balance sheet, it is better to put accumulated depreciation on credit side, so the company will have extra money in their debit (Ken Leo, John Hoggett, 2012). Accountants will use choice of accounting method depending on the situation. Positive accounting theory consists of different types of hypothesis such as bonus plan, political cost and debt hypothesis, which allow the managers to choose one specific method over another. It is accountants’ theory and it is descriptive and accountants will tell what to record.
Managerial accounting has changed over the years. Managerial accounting focuses on more than the financial aspect. We will be looking at how managerial accounting affects the business world today. Business also look to the economy, federal taxes, and the financial market so it can make the best decisions for their business.
Accounting dates back as far as first centuries, is the language of business. As everything has gone through many changes, accounting has also changed many times through out the centuries. It went from the use of abacus to the most advanced softwares, and computers. With these drastic improvements nowadays accounting, financial accounting and management are facing big challenges. From the presentation of the reports to communication to the users, investors, and owners, the accounting field has gained totally a new shape from two decades ago. Today with the dynamic change in every aspect of life, the accounting field has to act fast and be able to adapt these new changes and challenges in order to survive.
The accounting cycle is a series of steps starting with recording business transactions and leading up to the preparation of financial statements. This financial process demonstrates the purpose of financial accounting–to create useful financial information in the form of general-purpose financial statements. In other words, the sole purpose of recording transactions and keeping track of expenses and revenues is turn this data into meaning financial information by presenting it in the form of a balance sheet, income statement, statement of owner’s equity, and statement of cash flows.
Accounting aids the government and organisations in decision making for their financial stability. This numerical data helps solve real life problems and contributes to how the economy and businesses perform.
The accounting equation is the foundation or basic of accounting systems. The equation maintain for all transactions and business activities. Every asset that the company hold is always equal to the liabilities and equity. Therefore, the accounting equation is : ASSETS = LIABILITIES + EQUITY. For example, when we start a company, we must take a loan from investors or any of the institutions. Now, we take a look at each accounting equation starting with the asset.
Managing an organization’s financial operation requires a good understanding of the economy and ways to maximize revenue. For an organization to operate on a daily basis, adequate cash flow is required. Poor cash management within an organization might make it hard for the organization to function because there may be shortage of cash in case of inconsistences in the market. In most companies, management is interested in the company 's cash inflows and outflows because these determines the availability of cash necessary to pay its financial obligations. Management also uses this information to determine problems with company’s liquidity, a project’s rate of return or value and the timeliness of cash flows into and out of projects (used as inputs
Corporate governance is the set of guidelines that determines the control and organization of a particular company. The company’s board of directors is in charge of approving and reviewing changes to this set of formally established guidelines. Companies have to keep in mind the interests of multiple stakeholders, parties who have an interest in the company. Some of these stakeholders include customers, shareholders, management, and suppliers. Corporate governance’s focus is concentrated on the rights and obligations of three stakeholder groups in particular: the board of directors, management, and shareholders. Corporate governance determines how power is split between these three stakeholders. A company’s board of directors is the main stakeholder that influences the corporate governance of a company (Corporate Governance).