IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/abacus/v43y2007i3p271-296.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Earnings Behaviour of Financially Distressed Firms: The Role of Institutional Ownership

Author

Listed:
  • Andreas Charitou
  • Neophytos Lambertides
  • Lenos Trigeorgis

Abstract

Using a sample of 859 U.S. bankruptcy‐filing firms over the period 1986–2004, we examine the earnings behaviour of managers during the distressed period by looking at sources of abnormal accruals prior to the bankruptcy‐filing year. Results show that managers of highly distressed firms shift earnings downwards prior to the bankruptcy filing. We test and provide evidence in support of two potential contributing factors. First, top‐level management turnover among distressed firms leads new managers to earnings bath choices during the distressed period. Second, qualified audit opinions exert pressure on managers to follow more conservative earnings behaviour during the distressed period. Evidence is also provided that the management of distressed firms with lower (higher) institutional ownership has greater (lesser) tendency to manage earnings downwards. Results also show that higher institutional ownership mitigates the negative abnormal returns of firms with top management turnover. To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study that attempts to examine whether institutional ownership relates to market reaction in conjunction with a top management turnover or a qualified audit opinion during the distressed period. Prior studies focused on the investigation of earnings management or institutional ownership (separately) during the distressed period, but did not examine if the effect of institutional ownership on earnings behaviour also influences subsequent returns. Thus, the results of this study should be of interest to analysts, standard setters and regulatory bodies since our results show that management turnover, qualified audit opinions and firm governance mechanisms affect the quality of earnings and the level of abnormal returns.

Suggested Citation

  • Andreas Charitou & Neophytos Lambertides & Lenos Trigeorgis, 2007. "Earnings Behaviour of Financially Distressed Firms: The Role of Institutional Ownership," Abacus, Accounting Foundation, University of Sydney, vol. 43(3), pages 271-296, September.
  • Handle: RePEc:bla:abacus:v:43:y:2007:i:3:p:271-296
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-6281.2007.00230.x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-6281.2007.00230.x
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/j.1467-6281.2007.00230.x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Moore, Ml, 1973. "Management Changes And Discretionary Accounting Decisions," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 11(1), pages 100-107.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jun Hyeok Choi & Saerona Kim & Ayoung Lee, 2019. "CEO Tenure, Corporate Social Performance, and Corporate Governance: A Korean Study," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(1), pages 1-17, December.
    2. Jean-Louis Paré & Frédéric Demerens, 2011. "Détecter les manipulations financières en France : Le cas d'une PME cotée sur Alternext," Post-Print hal-00650559, HAL.
    3. May Huaxi Zhang & Stanley Iat-Meng Ko & Andreas Karathanasopoulos & Chia Chun Lo, 2022. "A two-step quantile regression method for discretionary accounting," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 59(1), pages 1-22, July.
    4. Renneboog, Luc, 2000. "Ownership, managerial control and the governance of companies listed on the Brussels stock exchange," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 24(12), pages 1959-1995, December.
    5. Jeffrey Ng & Walid Saffar & Janus Jian Zhang, 2020. "Policy uncertainty and loan loss provisions in the banking industry," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 25(2), pages 726-777, June.
    6. STOLOWY, Herve & BRETON, Gaetan, 2000. "A framework for the classification of accounts manipulations," HEC Research Papers Series 708, HEC Paris.
    7. Inès Bouden & Luc Paugam & Olivier J. Ramond, 2011. "Les déterminants de la dépréciation du goodwill : proposition d'un cadre d'analyse," Post-Print hal-00646810, HAL.
    8. Salomo, Sören & Leker, Jens, 1997. "The "financial bath" hypothesis: An empirical investigation," Manuskripte aus den Instituten für Betriebswirtschaftslehre der Universität Kiel 448, Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, Institut für Betriebswirtschaftslehre.
    9. Keune, Marsha B. & Keune, Timothy M. & Quick, Linda A., 2017. "Voluntary changes in accounting principle: Literature review, descriptive data, and opportunities for future research," Journal of Accounting Literature, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 52-81.
    10. Koon Boon Kee, 2011. "Why ‘Democracy’ anD ‘Drifter’ firms can have abnormal returns: the Joint importance of corporate Governance anD abnormal accruals in separatinG Winners from losers," Bogazici Journal, Review of Social, Economic and Administrative Studies, Bogazici University, Department of Economics, vol. 25(1), pages 3-55.
    11. Yakup Ergincan, 2011. "Mobile Corporate Governance: A Model Proposal For Modern Corporate Governance And Investor Relations," Bogazici Journal, Review of Social, Economic and Administrative Studies, Bogazici University, Department of Economics, vol. 25(1), pages 171-200.
    12. Saskia Kohlhase & Jochen Pierk, 2021. "Tax rule changes and the timing of asset write‐offs in loss firms," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48(5-6), pages 815-840, May.
    13. Yves Mard & Sylvain Marsat, 2009. "Earnings management surrounding CEO changes in France [La gestion du résultat comptable autour d'un changement de dirigeant en France]," Post-Print hal-02156582, HAL.
    14. Frerich Buchholz & Kerstin Lopatta & Karen Maas, 2020. "The Deliberate Engagement of Narcissistic CEOs in Earnings Management," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 167(4), pages 663-686, December.
    15. Norman Saleh & Kamran Ahmed, 2005. "Earnings management of distressed firms during debt renegotiation," Accounting and Business Research, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 35(1), pages 69-86.
    16. Dechow, Patricia & Ge, Weili & Schrand, Catherine, 2010. "Understanding earnings quality: A review of the proxies, their determinants and their consequences," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(2-3), pages 344-401, December.
    17. Ahmad Hussein Juma’h, 2014. "The Materiality Concept: Implications for Managers and Investors," Revista Finanzas y Politica Economica, Universidad Católica de Colombia, vol. 6(1), pages 159-168, April.
    18. Bornemann, Sven & Kick, Thomas & Pfingsten, Andreas & Schertler, Andrea, 2015. "Earnings baths by CEOs during turnovers: empirical evidence from German savings banks," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 188-201.
    19. Francis, Bill & Hasan, Iftekhar & Li, Lingxiang, 2015. "Evidence for the existence of downward real earnings management," Bank of Finland Research Discussion Papers 13/2015, Bank of Finland.
    20. Petra Nieken & Dirk Sliwka, 2015. "Management Changes, Reputation, and “Big Bath”—Earnings Management," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 24(3), pages 501-522, September.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:abacus:v:43:y:2007:i:3:p:271-296. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley-Blackwell Digital Licensing or Christopher F. Baum (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0001-3072 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.