Analysts' estimates: What they could be telling us about the impact of IFRS on earnings manipulation in Europe

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to examine whether mandatory adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) in the European Union reduced earnings manipulation, as proxied by the difference between a firm's reported earnings and ex post estimate of earnings by financial analysts.

Design/methodology/approach

Controlling for firm and institutional factors and drawing upon a sample of 15,034 firm‐year observations from 20 European countries, the research design entailed examining the change in the earnings manipulation proxy during pre‐ and post‐IFRS adoption periods.

Findings

The principal finding from this analysis was a decline in the magnitude of the proxy for earnings manipulation coincidental with IFRS adoption, which suggests that a uniform financial reporting regime may have contributed to exposing the use of temporary activities to manipulate earnings.

Originality/value

The results of this study make an important contribution to the extant literature on the outcomes of IFRS adoption, and should be of value to investors and standard setters, who want honest and comparable financial reporting but are opposed to regulatory intervention. Of equal significance is the innovative model introduced to proxy for earnings manipulation.

Citation

Aubert, F. and Grudnitski, G. (2012), "Analysts' estimates: What they could be telling us about the impact of IFRS on earnings manipulation in Europe", Review of Accounting and Finance, Vol. 11 No. 1, pp. 53-72. https://doi.org/10.1108/14757701211201821