Disclosure in financial statements in general has been the subject of many studies, yet disclosure in banks' financial statements has not yet been given the attention and research it deserves. Such a lack of attention might be due to the financial statements users themselves not paying enough attention to it, or due to the banks' management not being keen to practise more disclosure within their financial statements.In Kuwait, disclosure in general, and within the banking industry in particular, has been receiving more attention for the last ten years or so, but such attention has not been explained yet.International accounting standard No.30 forms the foundation of the disclosure in the banks financial statements and similar institutions, and as Kuwait implemented the International Accounting Standards in 1990, banks fell under the IAS 30 requirements regarding the disclosure in their financial statements. In this exploratory study, two avenues are investigated: first, users' evaluation of the disclosure level within the banks' financial statements in Kuwait; and second, the measurement of the actual disclosure in the banks' financial statements in Kuwait. Asurvey method is applied to evaluate the disclosure level in the banks' financial statements, while an index method is applied to for measuring the disclosure level in the banks' financial statements.

Published also as thesis (Ph. D.) Columbia University. / Also available in print.

No description available.

The main objective of this study is to investigate empirically users' perceptions of the usefulness of financial information that could be provided in corporate annual reports presented by listed companies in Egypt. This investigation is carried out, in the light of the requirements of the Egyptian Accounting Standards (EASs) issued in 1997, the new listing rules of the Cairo and Alexandria Stock Exchange (CASE) adopted in 2000 and the Capital Market Law (CML) No. 95/1992, using a set of eleven qualitative characteristics of accounting information (QCOAI) in a hierarchy, which should be possessed by financial information if it is to be useful to its users. Those characteristics are: understandability, relevance, reliability, comparability, predictive value, timeliness, faithful representation, neutrality, verifiability, consistency and materiality. A survey was carried out, based on a questionnaire, which was designed and pre-tested in two stages, as a basic data collection instrument supported by some semi-structured personal interviews. 320 questionnaires were personally distributed, and a total of 232 questionnaires were collected. Of them 222 were usable and analysable, representing about 69.38%. The survey was conducted to examine the perceptions of five groups of users of corporate annual reports, namely, financial analysts, decision makers, academics, stock brokers, and staff of the regulatory and observatory bodies, regarding the importance they attach to corporate annual reports and different sources of financial information, sections of corporate annual reports, each of the QCOAI selected earlier in the study, and some financial information items. The collected data were largely quantifiable and based on a five-point scale. The Statistical Package for Social Sciences — SPSS was used in analysing the collected data and the analysis was carried out for the overall sample and for the various sub-groups using the descriptive statistics and the statistical analysis (the non-parametric tests such as the Chi-square Test, the Kruskal-Wallis H Test and the Mann-Whitney U Test). A major finding is that "corporate annual reports" were perceived as the most important source of financial information by users in Egypt, followed by "newspapers and magazines" and "the direct contact with the company management". Also, there was a clear finding that "income statement" was considered as the most important section among the various sections of corporate annual reports followed by "balance sheet" and "cash flow statement". It was found that users as a whole, and as occupation, education and experience groups, considered the selected set of QCOAI to be suitable for use in the evaluation of the usefulness of financial information provided in corporate annual reports. All selected characteristics were perceived to be important or very important characteristics, to slightly different degrees. Furthermore, the study found that "timeliness" was considered as the most important characteristic. Lastly, the majority of financial information items that were perceived as the most important items, whether or not mandatorily required, are not disclosed by listed companies.

The objective of this research is to explore the area of financial accounting, international accounting, and accounting technology transfer, with emphasis on accounting for developing countries, specifically Indonesia. Confining itself to external financial reporting, the study explores the influence of environmental aspects on accounting standards and practices, institutionally and technically. Analysis of the role and needs of preparers, users, auditors and government agencies, and of the interaction between institutional and technical aspects, conducted to ascertain their implications for accounting development in Indonesia. The empirical research was conducted using hypotheses as catalysts, to test the characteristics, general opinions and attitudes of the interested parties toward accounting standards and practices, accounting education and development of the accounting profession. The findings of the research suggest that accounting technology cannot be successfully transferred from a developed to a developing country without considering the influence of environment, particularly the role of government. Indonesia, heavily influenced by the US accounting, needs to improve its accounting system in order to make it appropriate for its own environment. Many deficiencies were found in the areas of accounting theory, accounting standards and practice, accounting rules and regulations, accounting education, professional accounting and the role of government. In order to improve the existing conditions, it must be recognised that those aspects are closely related, and that the only way to develop the role of accounting is to adopt an integrated approach. The study provides a series of recommendations, based upon the findings of the empirical research, which should provide a useful starting point towards such an approach.

No description available.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Columbia University, 1916. / Vita. Pub. also as Studies in history, economics and public law, ed. by the Faculty of Political Science of Columbia University, vol. LXXX, whole no. 166. Bibliography: p. 157-196.

Inaug.-diss.--Giessen. / Lebenslauf.

Published also as Thesis (Ph. D.)--Columbia University. / Bibliography: p. 167-170.

In the mid-nineteenth century, the assessment of the income tax was entrusted to personnel who were independent of the Board of Inland Revenue and this constitutional division between local and central authority was the corner-stone of the Victorian income tax. It was envisaged that the punishment for evasion, too, should be dealt with essentially at a local level and the statute provided for several different means by which this could be achieved. It soon became clear, however, that such a system was ill-equipped to deal adequately with under- or non-assessment, because the sanctions by which penalties could be imposed were ineffectual both as a deterrent and as a punitive measure in instances of substantial and protracted evasion. In the third quarter of the nineteenth century, events occurred through which the Board was able, effectively, to seize the reins of assessment and to forge a method of punishment for evasion and it is this extra-statutory scheme which formed the nucleus of the modern system of punishing income tax evasion. The dissertation begins in 1842, the year in which the income tax was re-introduced as a temporary visitant and ends in 1880, the year in which the management of the income tax was mapped out as, more or less, a permanent feature of the fiscal scene. During this period, the method of dealing with tax evasion metamorphosed from one which was, in the main, in the grasp of the local administration to-one which was largely in the hands of the Inland Revenue Department. That this change took place without legislative intervention was the culmination of the social and administrative stresses and tensions that were tested by the operation of the income tax, which it is the purpose of this dissertation to explore.