488 research outputs found
Earnings management of brazilian firms in the IFRS era: The role of economic and institutional factors
This study investigates whether accounting quality – more specifically regarding the level of earnings management by accruals – is associated with a country’s economic and institutional factors that change over time in IFRS era. Based on a sample of 1,387 Brazilian firm-year observations and data regarding 2011 to 2018, econometric models are estimated considering the absolute amount of discretionary accruals as proxy for earnings management and different aspects related to economic and institutional factors of preeminent importance to an emerging economy. We show that in general, high inflation, stock market volatility, and policy uncertainty rates, as well as lower regulatory quality, on average, are associated with a higher level of earnings management in Brazil. This study contributes to the accounting literature in emerging economies discussing the role of economic and institutional factors on accounting quality in the IFRS era in one of the largest developing country in the world. Compared to developed countries or even to other developing economies, Brazil stands out as an emerging economy of considerable economic and political instability, making it a valuable setting for this analysisinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Does national ethical judgment matter for earnings management?
This study analyses the effect of ethical judgment at country-level on earnings management. While previous literature document the role of ethical issues at personal- and organizational-level on earnings management practices, usually theoretically and through qualitative ways, we investigate that association in a large sample at international level taken a sample of 81,408 firm-year observations regarding 10,306 firms from 39 countries. Based on data from an international questionnaire developed by the World Values Survey, we construct a comprehensive index of ethical judgment of each country. Our empirical findings suggest that the level of ethical judgment of the countries are negative associated with accruals-based earnings management, suggesting that the manipulation of accounting amounts is lower in countries where ethically suspect behaviours are less acceptable. Additionally, we also provide empirical evidences that this phenomenon is verified both in developed and emerging countries, and that ethical judgment at country-level seem to moderate the association between IFRS adoption and earnings management practices.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio
National culture and earnings management in developed and emerging countries
Purpose
This study investigates how the association between national culture and earnings management compares between developed and emerging countries.
Design/methodology/approach
The empirical analysis relies on a sample of 6,313 firm-year observations from 11 emerging markets and 27,605 firm-year observations from 22 developed countries. The authors use ordinary least squares regression methods to test the hypotheses of the study.
Findings
Based on Hofstede's (2011) cultural dimensions, the authors find that firms from countries with a higher level of uncertainty avoidance and individualism are less likely to engage in earnings management, but the effect of uncertainty avoidance (individualism) is more (less) pronounced in the emerging countries. Moreover, the authors demonstrate that firms from emerging (developed) countries with higher levels of power distance and masculinity are less (more) likely to engage in earnings management. Finally, the authors find evidence of a trade-off between accruals-based and real earnings management in firms from countries with greater long-term orientation and an indulgence cultural dimension.
Originality/value
This paper adds to the literature by theoretically discussing and empirically analysing the role that developed and emerging countries' development plays on the effect of national culture on earnings management.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio
Retrieval behavior and thermodynamic properties of symmetrically diluted Q-Ising neural networks
The retrieval behavior and thermodynamic properties of symmetrically diluted
Q-Ising neural networks are derived and studied in replica-symmetric mean-field
theory generalizing earlier works on either the fully connected or the
symmetrical extremely diluted network. Capacity-gain parameter phase diagrams
are obtained for the Q=3, Q=4 and state networks with uniformly
distributed patterns of low activity in order to search for the effects of a
gradual dilution of the synapses. It is shown that enlarged regions of
continuous changeover into a region of optimal performance are obtained for
finite stochastic noise and small but finite connectivity. The de
Almeida-Thouless lines of stability are obtained for arbitrary connectivity,
and the resulting phase diagrams are used to draw conclusions on the behavior
of symmetrically diluted networks with other pattern distributions of either
high or low activity.Comment: 21 pages, revte
Phage inducible islands in the gram-positive cocci
The SaPIs are a cohesive subfamily of extremely common phage-inducible chromosomal islands (PICIs) that reside quiescently at specific att sites in the staphylococcal chromosome and are induced by helper phages to excise and replicate. They are usually packaged in small capsids composed of phage virion proteins, giving rise to very high transfer frequencies, which they enhance by interfering with helper phage reproduction. As the SaPIs represent a highly successful biological strategy, with many natural Staphylococcus aureus strains containing two or more, we assumed that similar elements would be widespread in the Gram-positive cocci. On the basis of resemblance to the paradigmatic SaPI genome, we have readily identified large cohesive families of similar elements in the lactococci and pneumococci/streptococci plus a few such elements in Enterococcus faecalis. Based on extensive ortholog analyses, we found that the PICI elements in the four different genera all represent distinct but parallel lineages, suggesting that they represent convergent evolution towards a highly successful lifestyle. We have characterized in depth the enterococcal element, EfCIV583, and have shown that it very closely resembles the SaPIs in functionality as well as in genome organization, setting the stage for expansion of the study of elements of this type. In summary, our findings greatly broaden the PICI family to include elements from at least three genera of cocci
Beyond the average: Detecting global singular nodes from local features in complex networks
Deviations from the average can provide valuable insights about the
organization of natural systems. The present article extends this important
principle to the systematic identification and analysis of singular motifs in
complex networks. Six measurements quantifying different and complementary
features of the connectivity around each node of a network were calculated, and
multivariate statistical methods applied to identify singular nodes. The
potential of the presented concepts and methodology was illustrated with
respect to different types of complex real-world networks, namely the US air
transportation network, the protein-protein interactions of the yeast
Saccharomyces cerevisiae and the Roget thesaurus networks. The obtained
singular motifs possessed unique functional roles in the networks. Three
classic theoretical network models were also investigated, with the
Barab\'asi-Albert model resulting in singular motifs corresponding to hubs,
confirming the potential of the approach. Interestingly, the number of
different types of singular node motifs as well as the number of their
instances were found to be considerably higher in the real-world networks than
in any of the benchmark networks
Observation of two new baryon resonances
Two structures are observed close to the kinematic threshold in the mass spectrum in a sample of proton-proton collision data, corresponding
to an integrated luminosity of 3.0 fb recorded by the LHCb experiment.
In the quark model, two baryonic resonances with quark content are
expected in this mass region: the spin-parity and
states, denoted and .
Interpreting the structures as these resonances, we measure the mass
differences and the width of the heavier state to be
MeV,
MeV,
MeV, where the first and second
uncertainties are statistical and systematic, respectively. The width of the
lighter state is consistent with zero, and we place an upper limit of
MeV at 95% confidence level. Relative
production rates of these states are also reported.Comment: 17 pages, 2 figure
Observation of the decay
The first observation of the decay is reported. The
study is based on a sample of proton-proton collisions corresponding to
of integrated luminosity collected with the LHCb detector. The
significance of the signal is standard deviations. The branching fraction
is measured to be , where the third uncertainty comes from the
branching fraction that is used as a normalisation.
In addition, the charge asymmetries of and
, which are control channels, are measured to be and , respectively. All results are consistent with
theoretical expectations
First observation and amplitude analysis of the decay
The decay is observed in a data sample
corresponding to of collision data recorded by the LHCb
experiment during 2011 and 2012. Its branching fraction is measured to be
where the uncertainties are statistical, systematic and from
the branching fraction of the normalisation channel , respectively. An amplitude analysis of the resonant
structure of the decay is used to measure the
contributions from quasi-two-body ,
, and
decays, as well as from nonresonant sources. The
resonance is determined to have spin~1.Comment: 39 pages, 10 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev. D. Updated following
erratum 10.1103/PhysRevD.93.11990
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