ASPECTS REGARDING CORPORATE MANDATORY AND VOLUNTARY DISCLOSURE

The paper highlights theoretical aspects regarding corporate mandatory and voluntary disclosure. Since financial and business reporting are important information sources for different stakeholders, especially for publicly traded companies, the business reporting is increasingly oriented to the need of different users. In order to make rational investment decisions, users of corporate annual and interim reports require an extensive range of information. The increasing needs of the users persuade different international bodies and researchers to investigate the improvements that can be done in business reporting. The results of those studies usually were different reporting models. Because voluntary dimension of corporate disclosure involve the manifestation of free choice of the firm and its managers, we have considered as necessary to achieve a theoretical analysis of the main costs and profits of the voluntary disclosure policy.corporate disclosure, financial reporting, mandatory and voluntary disclosure

Trends in non-financial reporting

In the recent years more studies focus on the corporate disclosure, the determinants and consequences of disclosure. The mandatory disclosure of financial information was frequently integrated with non-financial information, often voluntary disclosed. The voluntary dimension of corporate disclosure involves the manifestation of free choice of the firm and its managers. In our paper we focus on the principal reporting demands that are not covered by traditional financial statements, voluntary disclosure, and how Romanian companies interested in the issue have been incorporating information about these aspects in their reporting. We also highlight the usefulness and the importance level which managers and stakeholders are giving to appreciate the non-financial performance of the Romanian listed companies they are manage or they are interested in

THE "CREDIBILITY CRISIS" OF AUDITING PROFFESION: AN EMPIRICAL STUDY IN ROMANIA

For decades the accountancy profession has responded to the "credibility crisis" by coining, reciting and hiding behind the phrase "audit expectation gap" - a phrase which denotes the differences between the public's and Auditors' perceptions of the role of an audit function. This paper reports the findings of a questionnaire survey on the audit expectation gap conducted in Romania. The aims of the study are to examine whether an expectation gap exists in Romania among the auditors, auditees and audit beneficiaries in relation to the auditors' duties The results proved the existence of an audit expectation gap in Romania. The study shows that the auditees and audit beneficiaries placed much higher expectations on the auditors' duties when compared with what auditors have perceived their duties to be. The analysis of the expectation gap indicated the existence of unreasonable expectations of the part of users.audit, audit expectation gap

CHALLENGES OF ENVIRONMENTAL ACCOUNTING AND TAXATION IN ROMANIA

Environmental problems that have arisen all over the world are concerning many controversial aspects that were created due to the advance of industrialization in tandem with scientific and technological development. For solving these problems, in the past 40 years many international and national organizations have adopted a substantial and diverse range of environmental measures aimed to improving the quality of the environment. Our research aims to highlight how Romanian authorities face the problems regarding environment. To accomplish our objective we trace two main directions of the study, firstly we conduct an analytical investigation of green accounting regulations and secondly we describe the environmental fiscal policy at national level and their impact on Romanian companies.environment, green accounting, fiscal policy, regulations

Transparency and disclosure between theory and practice. A case study of Romania

As a modern system by which companies are directed and controlled (The Cadbury Report, 1992) – corporate governance have became in the last years a system implemented by more and more companies from developed countries and recently from developing once. Having as starting point one of the principles of corporate governance – transparency – in this paper we focus on aspects that contribute to reach the transparency at corporate level, taking into consideration both regulation and practical issues in Romania, a developing country that have recently adopted the mechanisms of corporate governance. Corporate disclosure is the principal mean by which companies can become transparent, and is critical for the functioning of an efficient capital market (Healy & Palepu, 2001). For this reason we investigate several non-financial items that companies operating on international capital markets are usualy disclosing, looking for the extent to which Bucharest Stock Exchange listed companies are disclosing corporate social responsibility information. The results suggest that is a poor disclosure of social responsability information within the annual reports even the companies are activating in domains with great impact on the environmentcorporate governance, transparency, corporate disclosure, listed companies, corporate responsibility

Budgetary and accounting experience in public sector- comparative case study

During the last decade the public sector has been affected by the introduction of significant reforms in the public accounting system in the international context. During the reform process different countries have put into practice numerous intermediate variants between the extremes of cash and accrual budgeting and accounting. The reasons for the different national systems may be due to the culture, the historical background or the structural elements of these countries. Also the specific objectives and the principal users of the financial reporting, the financial resource suppliers and the influence of public accounting regulatory bodies imply different national accounting systems. In the Western democracies there are two main broad styles of public management: Anglo-American and European Continental types. The paper presents the United Kingdom accrual accounting model adopted in the public institutions (an Anglo-Saxon country) by comparison with the Romanian one (a Continental European country). In this paper there will be taken into account some case studies of two public institutions: one from United Kingdom and the other from Romania. The paper tries to emphasize the differences and the similarities between the two countries accounting systems as well as the lessons learned from the United Kingdom accounting system regarding the implementation of the accrual accounting in public sector.accrual accounting, public public sector, the United Kingdom, Romania, International Public Sector Accounting Standards.

Investor relations on the internet. An empirical study of Romanian listed companies

Corporate disclosure is critical for the functioning of an efficient capital market (Healy & Palepu, 2001) and investor relations has more and more importance in comunication between company and its investors. In recent years many publicly traded companies use internet as a new channel to inform current and potential investors about their financial performance. In this paper we investigate the extent to which Romanian listed companies use internet for investor relations purposes. To achieve this goal we carried out an investigation of the Romanian companies listed on Bucharest Stock Exchange (BSE) and data from all the listed companies have been collected. The objective of our paper is to identify the stage Romanian listed companies are as regarding the internet advantages they use for disclosing information for their investors. The results suggest that is a poor use of internet advantages for investor relations.investor relations, listed companies, corporate reporting, disclosure, internet.

FRAUD AND ERROR. AUDITORS' RESPONSIBILITY LEVELS

Are auditors responsible for detecting fraud in the companies they inspect? Most ofthe public thinks they are. Auditors often demur. The auditors' duties for the prevention, detectionand reporting of fraud, other illegal acts and errors is one of the most controversial issues inauditing. This paper reports the findings of a survey that explores the financial report users’perceptions on the extent of fraud in Romania and their perceptions of auditors’ responsibilities indetecting fraud and the related audit procedures. This study also finds that there is a widely heldmisperception of the objective of an audit. This is because, among respondents, a much higherexpectation has been placed on the auditors' duties in detecting and reporting fraud than statute oraudit standards require. The results of the study show unquestionably the existence, with respect todetection of fraud, of a gap between the perception of the respondents and the present statutoryrequirements of auditors.fraud; auditors’ responsibilities; audit expectation gap

The impact of ias/ifrs on the romanian accounting rules

The accounting standardization process is in progress at international regional level, more and more countries have reached the same conclusion of enforcing high quality accounting standards like IAS/IFRS. At international level, on one hand it is thought to implement IASB's international standards and on the other hand, to converge American standards with IASB standards. There are various reasons for Romania adopting the IASB reference system, but most of them are subordinated to the central aim, respectively EU accession. There are also some secondary reasons required by the IAS/IFRS transition, which in our country is less present than in more economic developed countries. In our country accountancy is subordinated to the taxation system, financing still comes prevalent from banks and very few Romanian companies are listed on foreign capital markets. According to this, starting with 2006 the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), as presented and published by the International Accounting Standards Board, shall be applied in Romania by the following categories of companies: trade companies applying OMF no. 94/2001, loan institutions, assurance and reassurance companies, institutions supervised by the National Commission for Movable Assets, independent public companies and other state owned companies, companies to be consolidated by a company applying IFRS standards, companies, which at the end of the previous year fulfilled two of the following three criteria: turnover exceeding EUR 7.3 Million, total assets over EUR 3.65 Million, average number of employees over 50, as well as other companies subject to the Finance Ministry’s approval.romanian accounting rules, IAS/IFRS, romanian accounting normalization body, capital market

Enterprise risk management and disclosure

Our paper deals with aspects regarding risk and uncertainty. Many risk management methods are today implemented in organizations. This perspective reveals that managers are linked in different forms to the activities they are managing, depending on the conditions and levels of uncertainty they are in. Actually, these multiple levels of uncertainty lead to the conclusion that any situation in an organizational system can be classified in two different models of organizational phenomena: the organizational phenomena that are putting managers and stakeholders in conditions of risk and the organizational phenomena that are putting them in condition of uncertainty. Using content analyze in this paper we survey the disclosure level of risk management information in the annual report of top Romanian listed companies