Advances in Scientific and Applied Accounting

Related-party transactions: evidence of audit fees in publicly companies in the brazilian market

Thu, 31 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Purpose: The study aimed to identify the influence of related-party transactions (RPTs) on audit fees (AudFee) of publicly traded companies in the Brazilian market.

Method: AudFee measurement was performed using the natural logarithm, in agreement with the research by Habib et al. (2015) and Al-Dhamari et al. (2018). Regarding related-party transactions, we also chose to use RPTs in their logarithm form (Habib et al., 2015; Pratama, 2018; Ali et al., 2021). The collection of economic and financial data was carried out at Economática database and information on auditing was taken from the Reference Form, finally, data referring to TPRs were collected from the individual statements of the companies in the sample.

Results or Discussion: The results suggest that RPTs for sales, purchases and totals contribute to increased audit risk, possibly being more complex to verify. And, therefore, they are associated with higher amounts of audit fees charged when providing external audit services.

Contributions: The research has implications for investors, analysts and auditors, indicating that TPRs need to be analyzed with greater precision. Finally, the findings also provide a warning to standard-setters regarding the protection of minority shareholders, as related party transactions can be used to obscure accounting information.

Effects of Corporate Fraud on the Value Relevance of Brazilian Publicly-Held Companies

Henri Jordan Correa Costa Santos, Paulo Vitor Souza de Souza — Thu, 31 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Purpose: Relevant accounting information is that capable of influencing the decision making of a given user. However, if the information generated comes from fraudulent reports, it loses its relevance, that is, it is no longer useful for a decision maker. Therefore, this study aims to verify the relationship between fraud indicators and the relevance of accounting information in Brazilian publicly traded companies.

Method: For this purpose, the study used a sample composed of 126 publicly traded companies listed on B3, from 2011 to 2020, whether or not they were involved in different situations that indicate fraud. For the analysis of this interaction, the econometric model of value relevance, proposed by Collins, Maydew and Weiss (1997), was used, which complemented the model initially developed by Ohlson (1995).

Results: The results pointed to the understanding that companies that were indicated as "fraudulent" tend to lose the relevance of their accounting information, with emphasis on the relevance of the information of their equity before the capital market, which started to have “inverse relevance” of your information, as it presents the opposite signal to that obtained before interacting with the fraud proxy.

Objective: To verify the relationship between signs of corporate fraud and the relevance of accounting information in Brazilian publicly-held companies.
Method: A sample of 126 publicly traded companies listed on the B3 was used, from 2011 to 2020, whether they were involved in different situations that indicate fraud. Fraud was measured by a dummy variable that aimed to capture whether the company was involved in a case of fraud reported in the media or by the existence of a sanctioning administrative process. To analyze this interaction, the econometric model of value relevance, proposed by Collins et al. (1997), complemented Ohlson's model (1995).
Results: Generally, the results denote that profit and equity are relevant to their information. However, when analyzing companies with signs of fraud, the loss of relevance of net income is observed, while the relevance of shareholders' equity started to have "inverse relevance" of its information, as it presented a negative sign.
Contributions: The findings contribute by highlighting the importance of considering the occurrence of corporate fraud when interpreting accounting information. The loss of relevance of net income may indicate questionable accounting practices, which undermines investor confidence and negatively affects the ability to assess the performance and value of companies. In addition, the "inverse relevance" of equity suggests that corporate fraud can distort the financial reality of companies, making accounting information less reliable and valuable for users.

Board Gender Diversity and Low Carbon Initiatives: A Study of Women's Participation in the Board of IBrX100 Companies in Potentially Polluting Sectors

Anderson Luís Firmino, Fernanda Maciel Peixoto — Thu, 31 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Objectives: This study investigated the relationship between the presence of women in the Boards of Directors (BDs) and company adhesion to the Carbon Efficient Index (ICO2). As a complement, the study investigated whether company adhesion to the Corporate Sustainability Index (ISE) increases the likelihood of adhesion to the ICO2.

Method: The study adopted the logistic regression method, given that the dependent variable (ICO2) is binary. The sample involved Brazilian companies that are part of the IBrX100, and the study period was from 2011 to 2021.The study segmented the companies in two sub-samples: one group of potentially more polluting companies, and one group of potentially less polluting companies.

Results: We find a positive relationship between the presence of women in the BDs and adhesion to ICO2, for the group of more polluting companies, and when the BD is presided by a woman, this relationship happens in all subdivisions of the sample. The results also indicated that companies with greater liquidity, greater market value, more leveraged, and with more assets, have more probability to be part of the ICO2.

Contributions: The major contribution of this study is the classification of the sample into different groups of sectors related to gas emissions. This study is in line with three of the UN's Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): gender equality, innovation and action against climate change. In addition, the study is relevant because it showed that the protagonism of women in BDs leads to sustainable, environmentally efficient practices.

Impact of internationalization on the financial risk of companies listed on B3: analysis of the moderating effects of ESG performance and periods of crisis

Arthur Antonio Silva Rosa, Kárem Cristina de Sousa Ribeiro — Thu, 31 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Objective: Analyze the relationship between international expansion and financial risk of publicly traded non-financial Brazilian companies, considering the moderating effects of ESG performance and periods of crisis.

Method: Brazilian non-financial companies listed on B3 were used as a sample from 2010 to 2020. Multiple linear regressions were performed with fixed or random effects and panel data, and corporate and macroeconomic variables controlled the results.

Results: Companies with more international expansion tend to present a higher total risk but lower systematic risk. It was also found that ESG performance negatively moderates the relationship between international expansion and financial risk. Furthermore, more internationalized companies with higher ESG performance tend to reduce their total risk in times of crisis. Thus, although internationalization can increase financial risk, ESG performance can be used to mitigate it, especially in times of crisis.

Contributions: The study contributes to the theory by indicating that international expansion is distinctly related to total and systematic risks in the context of Brazilian companies. Furthermore, research indicates that ESG performance and periods of crisis have a moderating effect on the relationship between internationalization and financial risk. It also has practical implications, as it can help managers whose companies are in the process of internationalization to use ESG performance as a strategy to mitigate the financial risk of these companies, especially in times of crisis.

In Search of Social Acceptance: Self-Reported Academic Behaviors and Social Desirability in the Business Area

Alison Martins Meurer, Flaviano Costa — Thu, 31 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Aim: To understand the factors associated to the behavior of students in the academic environment in order to propose actions that can stimulate academic citizen behavior and inhibit counterproductive academic behavior. In this context, the research aimed at analyzing the association between self-reported academic behaviors and the social desirability of stricto sensu graduate students in the business area.

Method: For data collection, an online survey was carried out with Brazilian stricto sensu graduate students linked to courses in the business area, obtaining 1,816 valid participations that were analyzed using the Mann-Whitney test and the Spearman Correlation.

Results: The results found indicate that there is a positive association between academic citizen behaviors and social desirability and a negative association between counterproductive academic behaviors and social desirability.

Contributions: Encouraging a culture anchored in socially accepted norms of conduct can prove to be effective in directing students' behaviors, as fostering students' social desirability can encourage them to minimize counterproductive academic behaviors and maximize academic citizen behaviors. These behaviors are responsible for shaping the environment of higher education, being able to influence the development of scientific research and the context in which the training of future teachers takes place.

What is the role of ESG in value relevance? Evidence from Latin America in the pandemic period

Geovane Camilo dos Santos, Marcelo Tavares — Thu, 31 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Objective: to analyze the value relevance of environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) practices in the pandemic period.

Method: the sample consists of 1,937 observations from six Latin American countries. Data were collected in Refinitiv Eikon® and processed using a data panel. The value relevance model was adapted from Ohlson's (1995) study.

Results: they show that there is a positive and significant relationship between earnings per share and equity value per share, as expected. When analyzed without separation by the pandemic period, the ESG variable showed a significant and negative relationship with the stock price. When segregation was performed, it was found that there was no significant relationship. These results suggest that investors in companies in these countries are not yet considering ESG practices as a major factor in their decision-making.

Contribution: can contribute to investors, as the UN Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI) recommends that they consider ESG practices as an important factor in their investment decisions. The research can also contribute to managers, as they can observe how investment in ESG practices is beneficial to the company, since they represent a reduction in information asymmetry, increasing the visibility of the organization's business in the long term.