IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/jfr/afr111/v5y2016i4p30.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

IFRS Adoption, Legal Systems and the Voluntary Disclosure of Human Capital: Cross-country Evidence from the Banking Industry

Author

Listed:
  • Mohamed A. Elbannan

Abstract

This study examines the value relevance of voluntary human capital disclosures by banks and the effect of the adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) on the value relevance of these disclosures. Human capital disclosures allow capital market participants to evaluate the intellectual capital of the disclosing banks, which in theory may enable market participants to assess the competitiveness of the bank’s human resource strategy and the productivity of the workforce vis-à -vis benchmark performance. While IFRS does not mandate particular form of voluntary human capital disclosures (VHCD), VHCD is expected to possess information content that is useful to market participants in their equity pricing decisions. The study is conducted using a cross-country sample of 10,199 bank-years that reported labor costs. Market participants, however, are found to relate VHCD negatively to prices and returns in common and civil law countries alike. Results also suggest that IFRS adoption reduces the value relevance of VHCD due to the abundance of alternative information provided under the more comprehensive IFRS framework that helps in the prediction of future cash flows. Finally, market participants find VHCD value relevant after IFRS adoption in common law countries potentially because it reduces uncertainty about an important determinant of the bank’s future performance. On the other hand, market participants in civil law countries view VHCD as value relevant but coming at added time and financial investment. As an application of the results to an emerging economy, the implications for the Egyptian accounting profession, banking sector and capital markets are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Mohamed A. Elbannan, 2016. "IFRS Adoption, Legal Systems and the Voluntary Disclosure of Human Capital: Cross-country Evidence from the Banking Industry," Accounting and Finance Research, Sciedu Press, vol. 5(4), pages 1-30, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:jfr:afr111:v:5:y:2016:i:4:p:30
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.sciedupress.com/journal/index.php/afr/article/download/9896/6852
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.sciedupress.com/journal/index.php/afr/article/view/9896
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. World Bank, 2004. "India - Report on the Observance of Standards and Codes (ROSC) : Corporate Governance Country Assessment," World Bank Publications - Reports 14465, The World Bank Group.
    2. Core, John E. & Guay, Wayne R. & Buskirk, Andrew Van, 2003. "Market valuations in the New Economy: an investigation of what has changed," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(1-3), pages 43-67, January.
    3. Ball, Ray & Kothari, S. P. & Robin, Ashok, 2000. "The effect of international institutional factors on properties of accounting earnings," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 1-51, February.
    4. World Bank, 2004. "Report on the Observance of Standards and Codes : Corporate Governance Country Assessment, Panama," World Bank Publications - Reports 14460, The World Bank Group.
    5. Oliveira, Lídia & Rodrigues, Lúcia Lima & Craig, Russell, 2010. "Intangible assets and value relevance: Evidence from the Portuguese stock exchange," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 42(4), pages 241-252.
    6. Leuz, C & Verrecchia, RE, 2000. "The economic consequences of increased disclosure," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38, pages 91-124.
    7. Ding, Yuan & Hope, Ole-Kristian & Jeanjean, Thomas & Stolowy, Herve, 2007. "Differences between domestic accounting standards and IAS: Measurement, determinants and implications," Journal of Accounting and Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 1-38.
    8. Basu, Sudipta, 1997. "The conservatism principle and the asymmetric timeliness of earnings," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(1), pages 3-37, December.
    9. Mary E. Barth & Greg Clinch, 2009. "Scale Effects in Capital Markets‐Based Accounting Research," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(3‐4), pages 253-288, April.
    10. Mary E. Barth & Greg Clinch, 2009. "Scale Effects in Capital Markets-Based Accounting Research," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(3-4), pages 253-288.
    11. World Bank, 2004. "Report on the Observance of Standards and Codes : Corporate Governance Country Assessment, Republic of Indonesia," World Bank Publications - Reports 14463, The World Bank Group.
    12. Jesper Banghøj & Thomas Plenborg, 2008. "Value relevance of voluntary disclosure in the annual report," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 48(2), pages 159-180, June.
    13. Lev, Baruch & Sougiannis, Theodore, 1996. "The capitalization, amortization, and value-relevance of R&D," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(1), pages 107-138, February.
    14. Christine A. Botosan & Marlene A. Plumlee, 2002. "A Re‐examination of Disclosure Level and the Expected Cost of Equity Capital," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(1), pages 21-40, March.
    15. Vicentiu M. Covrig & Mark L. Defond & Mingyi Hung, 2007. "Home Bias, Foreign Mutual Fund Holdings, and the Voluntary Adoption of International Accounting Standards," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 45(1), pages 41-70, March.
    16. World Bank, 2004. "Corporate Governance Country Assessment : Egypt," World Bank Publications - Reports 14549, The World Bank Group.
    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. Tsalavoutas, Ioannis & André, Paul & Evans, Lisa, 2012. "The transition to IFRS and the value relevance of financial statements in Greece," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 44(4), pages 262-277.
    2. 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.
    3. Habib, Ahsan, 2011. "Audit firm industry specialization and audit outcomes: Insights from academic literature," Research in Accounting Regulation, Elsevier, vol. 23(2), pages 114-129.
    4. Irene Karamanou & George P. Nishiotis, 2009. "Disclosure and the Cost of Capital: Evidence from the Market's Reaction to Firm Voluntary Adoption of IAS," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(7‐8), pages 793-821, September.
    5. Butler, Marty & Kraft, Arthur & Weiss, Ira S., 2007. "The effect of reporting frequency on the timeliness of earnings: The cases of voluntary and mandatory interim reports," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(2-3), pages 181-217, July.
    6. Oxelheim, Lars, 2019. "Optimal vs satisfactory transparency: The impact of global macroeconomic fluctuations on corporate competitiveness," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 190-206.
    7. Iatridis, George Emmanuel, 2012. "Audit quality in common-law and code-law emerging markets: Evidence on earnings conservatism, agency costs and cost of equity," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 13(2), pages 101-117.
    8. De George, Emmanuel T. & Li, Xi & Shivakumar, Lakshmanan, 2016. "A review of the IFRS adoption literature," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 67599, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    9. Holger Daske & Luzi Hail & Christian Leuz & Rodrigo Verdi, 2008. "Mandatory IFRS Reporting around the World: Early Evidence on the Economic Consequences," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 46(5), pages 1085-1142, December.
    10. Palea Vera, 2013. "The Effect of the European Regulation 1606/2002 on Market Efficiency: Early Empirical Evidence and Some Suggestions for Future Research and Policy-Making Discussion," Department of Economics and Statistics Cognetti de Martiis. Working Papers 201310, University of Turin.
    11. Irene Karamanou & George P. Nishiotis, 2009. "Disclosure and the Cost of Capital: Evidence from the Market's Reaction to Firm Voluntary Adoption of IAS," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(7‐8), pages 793-821, September.
    12. Mohamed Elbannan, 2011. "Accounting and stock market effects of international accounting standards adoption in an emerging economy," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 36(2), pages 207-245, February.
    13. Emmanuel T. De George & Xi Li & Lakshmanan Shivakumar, 2016. "A review of the IFRS adoption literature," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 21(3), pages 898-1004, September.
    14. Oliveira, Lídia & Rodrigues, Lúcia Lima & Craig, Russell, 2010. "Intangible assets and value relevance: Evidence from the Portuguese stock exchange," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 42(4), pages 241-252.
    15. Jeong-Bon Kim & Haina Shi & Jing Zhou, 2014. "International Financial Reporting Standards, institutional infrastructures, and implied cost of equity capital around the world," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 42(3), pages 469-507, April.
    16. Mirela Nichita & Carmen Turlea, 2015. "Approach Regarding a Framework for Risk Reporting in Order to Enhance the Related Good Practices," The AMFITEATRU ECONOMIC journal, Academy of Economic Studies - Bucharest, Romania, vol. 17(40), pages 1108-1108, August.
    17. Kim, Oksana, 2016. "The IFRS Adoption Reform through the Lens of Neoinstitutionalism: The Case of the Russian Federation," The International Journal of Accounting, Elsevier, vol. 51(3), pages 345-362.
    18. Ebrahim, Ahmed & Fattah, Tarek Abdel, 2015. "Corporate governance and initial compliance with IFRS in emerging markets: The case of income tax accounting in Egypt," Journal of International Accounting, Auditing and Taxation, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 46-60.
    19. Jannis Bischof & Ulf Brüggemann & Holger Daske, 2012. "Fair Value Reclassifications of Financial Assets during the Financial Crisis," SFB 649 Discussion Papers SFB649DP2012-010, Sonderforschungsbereich 649, Humboldt University, Berlin, Germany.
    20. Goncharov, Igor & Werner, Joerg R. & Zimmermann, Jochen, 2009. "Legislative demands and economic realities: Company and group accounts compared," The International Journal of Accounting, Elsevier, vol. 44(4), pages 334-362, December.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • R00 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General - - - General
    • Z0 - Other Special Topics - - General

    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:jfr:afr111:v:5:y:2016:i:4:p:30. 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: Sciedu Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cepflch.html .

    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.