JOURNAL OF ACCOUNTING KNOWLEDGE
Year:2010 | Volume:1 | Issue:2|Papers Count:8

According to the Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM), the only risk factor that investors should take into account in making their decisions is the systematic risk (b). Several studies have shown that the market risk (b) is not the only risk factor affecting the expected rate of return and there are other risk factors different to b. This paper analyzes the relevance of accounting fundamentals to inform about equity risk as measured by the cost of equity capital. Considering the cost of equity capital is a summary measure of how investors make decisions regarding the allocation of resources, the strength of the association between the cost of equity and accounting-based measures of risk, indicates how important these measures are for market participants when making economic decisions. In this study, for estimating the cost of equity, three models O' Hanlon and Steel, Gordon and Capital asset pricing are used. Also, to test assumptions, regression method has been employed. The sample refers to 66 firms accepted in Tehran Stock Exchange along the period 1997–2008. Research results support the association between the cost of equity capital and some accounting-based risk variables, thereby supporting the usefulness of fundamental analysis to determine the risk.

The main objective of this research is to identify the financial managers' ethical decision-making approaches of companies listed in Tehran Stock Exchange and different factors affecting them. To achieve this aim, 12 hypotheses have been developed. The aim of the first six hypotheses is to investigate different ethical decision-making approaches, namely utilitarianism, hermeneutical, nonethical, religious, deontological, and pragmatism. The next six hypotheses are to identify the probable factors affecting these approaches.The data required for the statistical analysis of research hypotheses was obtained from 63 companies using a 24-item questionnaire. The results from testing the first set of hypotheses indicated that financial managers of companies listed in Tehran Stock Exchange believed in utilitarian, religious, and deontological but they did not believe in hermeneutical, nonethical and pragmatic approaches.Moreover, in the opinion of financial managers, utilitarianism was the strongest ethical decision-making approach and pragmatism was the weakest one. Finally, the statistical analysis of the next six hypotheses showed that, except for the effect of variable ”age“ on the religious approach, the other hypothesized effects were statistically insignificant.

In this paper, we examine the effect of accounting conservatism on earnings persistence and pricing multiple on earnings. One of the most obvious factors, among those that cause accounting earnings to reverse over time, is accounting conservatism. By making more conservative accounting choices, a company faces mismatching between current-period revenues and future period expenses so that earnings have more temporary components and become less persistent. This implies that earnings are less persistent under more conservative accounting choices than under less conservative accounting choices. We hypothesize that more conservative earnings are less persistent than less conservative earnings. Moreover, according to Ohlson (1995) model, where price is expressed as a linear combination of equity book value and earnings, the more (less) persistent earnings obtain larger (smaller) pricing multiples. Thus, we hypothesize that the pricing multiple on more conservative earnings is smaller than that on less conservative earnings. Base on sample from 88 listed companies in Tehran stock exchange during the period of 1998-2007, our findings suggest more conservative earnings are less persistent than less conservative earnings and the pricing multiple on more conservative earnings is smaller than that on less conservative earnings.

This study investigates whether earnings management motivated by opportunistic behavior or efficient contracting, for this purpose we examine a relationship between discretionary accruals and future profitability. Based on the explanatory power (adjusted R2), one of models exist in literature is selected to decompose total accruals into discretionary and non-discretionary-accrual components. We measure future profitability by use of each of three variables include one-yearahead cash flows from operation, non-discretionary net income and change in earnings. Using multiple regressions, we find evidence that the type of earnings management selected by TSE listed firms tends toward efficient earnings management.

The aim of this study is to investigate the effect of gradual increasing of financial leverage, measure of free cash flow, and company’s growth as the proxies of opportunistic behaviors of managers on earnings management. In this research, three hypotheses were developed and for their validation, samples were selected among the listed companies on Tehran Stock Exchange.Research period was the years 1999 to 2007, which was divided to five three-year periods. Afterwards, the eligible companies according to their level of financial leverage changes were classified into two control and test groups. The test and control groups include the companies with an increasing financial leverage and those with a high and constant financial leverage during the research period, respectively.The research results show that there is no significant difference for the rate of earning management between companies with a constant financial leverage and those with a gradual increasing financial leverage. The further results show the effects of free cash flows and company growth on managers’ opportunistic behaviors which can be impressive on rate of earnings management.

The purpose of this research is to investigate the use of management accounting tools and also effectiveness of each tool. This study is a survey research and in order to collect data a reliable and valid questionnaire has been used. The result of this research showed that managers of the productive companies in Tehran stock exchange are using the following tools: budgeting, variance analysis and break-even analysis; and managers don' t use enough the following tools: balance score card, business process reengineering, responsibility accounting, Target costing and activity based costing. Also the results showed that budgeting, variance analysis and break-even analysis tools have the most effectiveness for access to goals and business Process reengineering, responsibility accounting and activity based costing tools are effectiveness too. The most important obstacles of using management accounting tools are: (1) cost-benefit constraint use of management accounting tools, (2) the lack of skillful personnel considering the scientific and experimental abilities, (3) sectional and short term policies by government.

Providence of companies financial situation is so valuable that it has attracted attention of many financial experts nowadays since prediction of the continuity of the enterprise in the upcoming periods is one of the most important factors in any investments decision making process. This research attempts to review the efficiency of financial distress prediction models in Iran‘s economic environment .six hypotheses were formed by reviewing the related literature. The statistical samples of these research includes 30 successful and companies listed in Tehran Stock Exchange from 1376-1385.The hypotheses of the first group were analyzed utilizing Logistic Analysis. The results have shown that the financial distress predation models are capable of predicting the continuity of the enterprises for a one to two year period before bankruptcy. The hypotheses of the second group were analyzed using correlation difference. The result has indicated that there is a meaningful is a meaningful difference between the models in predicting the continuity of the companies.