IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/mth/ajfa88/v10y2018i1p162177.html

Earnings Smoothing and Bankruptcy Risk in Liquidating Private Firms

Author

Listed:
  • Nor Afifah Shabani
  • Saudah Sofian

Abstract

Smooth earnings are preferred by managers and creditors because they represent a stable business operations as well as low loan default risks and thus creditors reward firms which have smooth earnings with better loan covenant terms and lower interest rates. Nonetheless, recent literature shows that earnings smoothing in public firms is associated with stock price crash risk. Using Altman Z†score to measure firm’s specific bankruptcy risk, this study examines the association between accrual earnings smoothing and bankruptcy risk in liquidating private firms in UK and finds that earnings smoothing significantly negatively affects those firms' bankruptcy risk. The finding implies that financially distressed firms engage with less earnings smoothing, possibly because they do not have the opportunity to engage in accrual earnings smoothing anymore. Nonetheless, further examination shows that these firms engage less with earnings smoothing because they are being monitored by external creditors, indicated by significantly high leverage during the last period before they are being liquidated.

Suggested Citation

  • Nor Afifah Shabani & Saudah Sofian, 2018. "Earnings Smoothing and Bankruptcy Risk in Liquidating Private Firms," Asian Journal of Finance & Accounting, Macrothink Institute, vol. 10(1), pages 162177-1621, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:mth:ajfa88:v:10:y:2018:i:1:p:162177
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.macrothink.org/journal/index.php/ajfa/article/download/12904/10294
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.macrothink.org/journal/index.php/ajfa/article/view/12904
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Boochun Jung & Naomi Soderstrom & Yanhua Sunny Yang, 2013. "Earnings Smoothing Activities of Firms to Manage Credit Ratings," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 30(2), pages 645-676, June.
    2. 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.
    3. Edward I. Altman & Gabriele Sabato, 2013. "MODELING CREDIT RISK FOR SMEs: EVIDENCE FROM THE US MARKET," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Oliviero Roggi & Edward I Altman (ed.), Managing and Measuring Risk Emerging Global Standards and Regulations After the Financial Crisis, chapter 9, pages 251-279, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    4. Nor Afifah Shabani & Saudah Sofian, 2018. "Earnings Smoothing as Information Signaling or Garbling: A Review of Literature," Asian Journal of Finance & Accounting, Macrothink Institute, vol. 10(1), pages 131142-1311, December.
    5. Akbar, Saeed & Rehman, Shafiq ur & Ormrod, Phillip, 2013. "The impact of recent financial shocks on the financing and investment policies of UK private firms," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 26(C), pages 59-70.
    6. Viral V. Acharya & Bart M. Lambrecht, 2015. "A Theory of Income Smoothing When Insiders Know More Than Outsiders," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 28(9), pages 2534-2574.
    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. Yiwei Li & Wei Song & Tingyu Sun & Qingjing Zhang, 2023. "The impact of shareholder litigation risk on income smoothing," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 61(4), pages 1379-1413, November.
    2. Peter Demerjian & John Donovan & Melissa F. Lewis‐Western, 2020. "Income Smoothing and the Usefulness of Earnings for Monitoring in Debt Contracting," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 37(2), pages 857-884, June.
    3. Modina, Michele & Pietrovito, Filomena & Gallucci, Carmen & Formisano, Vincenzo, 2023. "Predicting SMEs’ default risk: Evidence from bank-firm relationship data," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 254-268.
    4. Fernández de Guevara, Juan & Maudos, Joaquín & Salvador, Carlos, 2021. "Effects of the degree of financial constraint and excessive indebtedness on firms’ investment decisions," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 110(C).
    5. Lin, Hsiou-Wei William & Lo, Huai-Chun & Wu, Ruei-Shian, 2016. "Modeling default prediction with earnings management," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 40(PB), pages 306-322.
    6. Ryan Ball & Robert M. Bushman & Florin P. Vasvari, 2008. "The Debt‐Contracting Value of Accounting Information and Loan Syndicate Structure," Journal of Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 46(2), pages 247-287, May.
    7. Francesco Ciampi & Alessandro Giannozzi & Giacomo Marzi & Edward I. Altman, 2021. "Rethinking SME default prediction: a systematic literature review and future perspectives," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 126(3), pages 2141-2188, March.
    8. Koharki, Kevin & Watson, Luke, 2025. "Risk-taking incentives and firm credit risk11The authors thank Kristine W. Hankins (editor), the anonymous associate editor and two anonymous reviewers, workshop participants at Lehigh University, Northwestern University, Southern Methodist Universit," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    9. Chiara Pederzoli & Grid Thoma & Costanza Torricelli, 2013. "Modelling Credit Risk for Innovative SMEs: the Role of Innovation Measures," Journal of Financial Services Research, Springer;Western Finance Association, vol. 44(1), pages 111-129, August.
    10. Erika Urbankova & David Krizek, 2020. "Homogeneity of Determinants in the Financial Sector and Investment in EU Countries," Economies, MDPI, vol. 8(1), pages 1-17, February.
    11. Alaa Mansour Zalata & Collins Ntim & Ahmed Aboud & Ernest Gyapong, 2019. "Female CEOs and Core Earnings Quality: New Evidence on the Ethics Versus Risk-Aversion Puzzle," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 160(2), pages 515-534, December.
    12. Alzoubi, Ebraheem Saleem Salem, 2018. "Audit quality, debt financing, and earnings management: Evidence from Jordan," Journal of International Accounting, Auditing and Taxation, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 69-84.
    13. Ali Uyar & Simone Pizzi & Fabio Caputo & Cemil Kuzey & Abdullah S. Karaman, 2022. "Do shareholders reward or punish risky firms due to CSR reporting and assurance?," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 43(5), pages 1596-1620, July.
    14. Saiki Tsuchiya & Shinichi Nishioka, 2014. "Estimation of Firms' Default Rates in terms of Intangible Assets," Bank of Japan Working Paper Series 14-E-2, Bank of Japan.
    15. Tsoy Lyubov & Almas Heshmati, 2023. "Impact Of Financial Crises On The Dynamics Of Capital Structure: Evidence From Korean Listed Companies," The Singapore Economic Review (SER), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 68(03), pages 867-898, June.
    16. Serrano-Cinca, Carlos & Gutiérrez-Nieto, Begoña & Bernate-Valbuena, Martha, 2019. "The use of accounting anomalies indicators to predict business failure," European Management Journal, Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 353-375.
    17. Filipe, Sara Ferreira & Grammatikos, Theoharry & Michala, Dimitra, 2016. "Forecasting distress in European SME portfolios," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 112-135.
    18. Juraini Zainol Abidin & Nur Adiana Hiau Abdullah & Karren Lee-Hwei Khaw, 2020. "Predicting SMEs Failure: Logistic Regression vs Artificial Neural Network Models," Capital Markets Review, Malaysian Finance Association, vol. 28(2), pages 29-41.
    19. Chy, Mahfuz & Kyung, Hoyoun, 2023. "The effect of bond market transparency on bank loan contracting," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(2).
    20. Rasa Kanapickiene & Renatas Spicas, 2019. "Credit Risk Assessment Model for Small and Micro-Enterprises: The Case of Lithuania," Risks, MDPI, vol. 7(2), pages 1-23, June.

    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:mth:ajfa88:v:10:y:2018:i:1:p:162177. 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: Technical Support Office (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.macrothink.org/journal/index.php/ajfa .

    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.