The adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) has been a significant event in the accounting profession, as it provides a common language for financial reporting across the globe. The impact of IFRS adoption on earnings management practices in South Korean and Swedish manufacturing companies is studied in this research. The study aims to explore the influence of accounting regulation on companies' behavior towards earnings management practices. Applying insights from the Positive accounting theory (PAT) and Enforcement theory, the research provides a nuanced understanding of the role of regulations and enforcement in shaping corporate earnings management behaviors following the adoption of FRS. The study uses a comparative approach to examine the differences in IFRS adoption and earnings management practices in South Korea and Sweden. Data are collected from 21 manufacturing companies in each country, using secondary sources such as annual reports, financial statements, and other public records. South Korea shows the high frequency of manipulating income reports, while Sweden is among the countries with the lowest earning management level. Despite the difference in earnings management behavior, this study results indicate that after adoption of IFRS has reduced earnings management in both South Korean and Swedish manufacturing companies. The study concludes that the regulatory environment in each country had a bigger impact on Korean manufacturing companies on earnings management practices, compared to Sweden.

The top management team is important to understand as the executives within the top management team would have long-term implications for a firm's investment, operating and financing decisions which would affect the firm value. As these executives may have pre-existing connections outside the current firm, they are likely to be affected by these connections within the top management team. In this dissertation, I draw upon the literature in sociology that discusses different mechanisms of connections; 1) better information transfer, 2) cohesion and better coordination, and 3) favorable treatment to see how the connections within the top management team affects different decisions for the firm using data from 1999 to 2013. First, I find that the executives with connections to the CEO are less likely to be forced out and those with social connections to the CEO enjoy less sensitivity of involuntary turnover to performance. Notably, I find that this is consistent with CEOs favorably treating the connected executives rather than CEOs keeping connected executives for the benefits. Second, I find that firms with greater percentage of executives with connections to the CEO have greater accruals earnings management and lower likelihood of detection of accounting manipulations. I also show that the connections have an effect only when the joint tenure between the CEO and the executives are short. Finally, I document that firms with more closely connected top management team issue management earnings forecasts in a more precise form and issue more frequent and accurate forecasts. I show that this matters more when the top management team’s external network size is small. / Business Administration/Accounting

近幾年來，財務弊案層出不窮，管理當局參與創造性會計的情事日益嚴重，資本市場陷入紀律危機，徒增成本。為喚醒投資者對於盈餘品質的關注，以及對盈餘管理有更客觀的瞭解，本研究提出兩種不同基礎之盈餘品質分類法，並探討台灣上市公司在盈餘品質分類法下，財務特性與盈餘管理成分的差異。 以往國內文獻多個別探討盈餘品質的內涵，或盈餘管理的現象；將盈餘品質與盈餘管理兩大主題做結合，乃新嘗試。研究主要分為兩大部分，第一部份定義盈餘品質，而第二部分深入盈餘管理的課題。 研究以2002年第3季到2004年第3季，381家台灣上市公司，共3429個樣本點，進行迴歸模型分析。 首先將樣本以：一、盈餘對營運現金流量的關係，及二、應收帳款成長率對營收成長率的比較，共兩種基礎，區分盈餘品質。在區分盈餘品質後，以盈餘品質測試盈餘評價能力與持續性。發現以盈餘對營運現金流量關係作為基礎之盈餘品質，具有增額評價能力，而以應收帳款成長率對營收成長率的比較做為基礎者，無增額評價能力。而兩種盈餘品質對盈餘持續性有顯著貢獻。 第二部分將樣本分為盈餘平滑企業與非盈餘平滑企業，探討盈餘評價功能之強弱，發現在盈餘平滑與盈餘非平滑兩組別中，盈餘平滑化並不影響盈餘評價能力。接著導入盈餘品質，觀察在交叉分組下盈餘評價功能的差異，發現高盈餘品質結合盈餘非平滑化（Quality Non-Smoother）的組別中，有最高盈餘評價係數。盈餘進一步拆解成三個組成份子：營運現金流量，裁量性應計數，與非裁量性應計數。其中，觀察重點在於裁量性應計數，研究同樣加入盈餘品質，測試其評價能力與持續性。發現裁量性應計數具有評價功能，而在兩種盈餘品質指標分類下，高盈餘品質之裁量性應計數，並無增量評價貢獻；在持續性方面，兩種盈餘品質指標同樣對裁量性應計數有正向貢獻。 為測試盈餘品質在盈餘管理誘因下的反應，最後將盈餘管理誘因區分為達成損益兩平與超越前期盈餘兩項目標，並加入盈餘品質，觀察其交互作用。發現在「達成損益兩平」與「超越前期盈餘」兩種盈餘目標下，盈餘管理現象的確存在。加入盈餘品質變數後，在兩種盈餘品質變數之作用下，對「達成損益兩平」與「超越前期盈餘」兩項管理誘因均有抑制作用。 / During the last few years, there have been numerous cases of financial ma-nipulation and scandals of firms and the situation of the managing authority par-ticipating in creative accounting has become worsen which has posed enormous disciplinary risks and unnecessary costs on the entire capital market. In order to invoke the concern of investors towards earning quality and to objectively under-stand more broadly about earning management, this study focused on two dif-ferent earning quality categorization based on different basis. The other aim of this study was to discuss the differences of financial characteristics and earning management that arise under two different earning quality categorizations. Most of the local existing literature discussed separately on the essence of earning management or the phenomenon of earning management; this study would be a completely new attempt, which combined the above-mentioned two topics into one study. The first part of this study focused on the definition of earn-ing quality and the second part discussed in detail on issues concerning earning management. A regression analysis was conducted on 381 publicly listed firms in Taiwan during the period from the third quarter of 2002 to the third quarter of 2004 and the total sample points were 3429. Firstly, the samples were processed and the samples’ earning qualities were categorized based on: 1. the comparison between earning and operating cash flow; 2. the comparison between the growth rate of account receivables and the growth rate of revenue. After the categorization of earning qualities, earning qual-ity was used to test the ability of earning valuation and the persistence of the earning. It was revealed in this study that the earning quality based on the com-parison between earning and operating cash flow could greatly enhance the abil-ity of earning valuation. On other hand, the earning quality based on the compari-son between the growth rate of account receivables and the growth rate of reve-nue failed to enhance the earning valuation. However, both categories of earning qualities had significant contribution to the persistence of earning. The second part of the study separated the samples into earning smoothing firms and non-earning smoothing firms in order to discuss the power of the ability of earning valuation. The results showed that earning smoothing did not have any impact on ability of earning valuation. The next step was to introduce earning quality into this part of the study and to observe the differences in the ability of earning valuation that arise from cross grouping. It was revealed that the group of high earning quality combining non-smoother had the highest earning valuation coefficient. Earning was further decomposed into three components: operating cash flow, discretional accruals and non-discretional accruals. The focus was on the observation of discretional accruals, and in this part of the study, the earning quality was also introduced in order to test the ability to valuate and the persis-tence of earning. It was discovered that discretional accruals possessed the func-tion of valuation. Furthermore, under the categorization of earning quality indexes with two different bases, discretional accruals with high earning quality had no contribution toward the ability to enhance valuation; however, about the persis-tence, both earning quality indexes had positive contribution toward discretional accruals. Finally, in order to test the reactions of earning quality under the influence of the incentives of earning management, the incentives of earning management were categorized into two groups with two different goals: 1. to reach breakeven; 2. to exceed prior period earning. The earning quality was also introduced to ob-serve the interactions. It was observed that under the two different goals in earn-ing, the phenomenon of earning management did indeed exist. After including the variable of earning quality, under the influences of two different categories of earning quality variables, there was some kind of suppressive effects on the management incentives of “reaching breakeven” and “earning that surpasses the prior period earning”.

With the rapid development of economy, Taiwan¡¦s enterprises become bigger and bigger. Hence, the huge business groups play an important role in business environment of Taiwan. However, enterprises collectivization usually causes earning management by cross-shareholding and the related party transaction between group enterprises. In addition, former research which discussing business groups did not include the factor of financial operating. Therefore, in order to confirm if the financial operating is the key factor of earning management, the study separates the total samples into ¡§active financial operating business groups¡¨ and ¡§inactive financial operating business groups¡¨ according to the relevant financial ratio. The period of research contains 2000~2009, and the total effective research tests are 570 copies. Finally, the study develops eight hypotheses in a basis of four kinds of common related party transactions in Taiwan and two kinds of financial operating business groups. The empirical results show that the percentage of disposal assets in active financial operating business groups and the percentage of purchase and sales in inactive financial operating business groups have positive impact on earning management. However, the rest hypotheses have no obvious significance. Therefore, the rest hypotheses will not established.

Syfte: Större revisionsbolag har länge inom redovisningslitteraturen associerats med bättre revisionskvalitet jämfört med mindre revisionsbolag. På senare tid har frågan lyfts om större revisionsbolags höga revisionsarvoden beror på högre revisionskvalitet eller marknadsmakt. Denna studie bidrar med nya empiriska underlag inom jämförelsestudier mellan större och mindre revisionsbolag, där revisionsarvodet används som proxy för revisionskvalitet. Vidare tar denna studie, till skillnad från tidigare studier, även hänsyn till revisionskvalitet inom olika riskmiljöer.   Metod: Studien har använt sig av en kvantitativ metod med ett positivistiskt förhållningssätt genom arbetet. En deduktiv forskningsansats har tillämpats där tidigare forskning har legat som grund till studiens framförda hypoteser. Insamling av finansiella sekundärdata för totalt 2518 företag har utförts via databasen Thomson Reuters Datastream.   Resultat & slutsats: Studiens resultat påvisar signifikanta skillnader i revisionskvalitet mellan större och mindre revisionsbolag i studiens olika riskmiljöer. För studiens europeiska länder är förhållandet mellan större och mindre revisionsbolag likvärdiga medan de amerikanska revisionsbolagen skiljer sig signifikant revisionskvalitetsmässigt.   Förslag till fortsatt forskning: Studien har genomförts utan hänsyn tagen till kvalitativa faktorer som kan komma att påverka revisionskvalitet, vilket öppnar ett utrymme för komparativa studier med en kvalitativ inriktning. Det finns även möjlighet att utöka antalet börsmarknader för respektive land eller utvidga antalet länder i olika riskmiljöer.   Uppsatsens bidrag: Studien lämnar två bidrag till redovisningslitteraturen i form av nya empiriska bevis inom revisionskvalitet mellan större och mindre revisionsbolag samt unik forskning kring revisionskvalitetsstudier mellan riskmiljöer. Vidare lämnar studiens resultat incitament åt praktiker att granska revisionsmarknaden för eget vinstintresse samt svarar på normgivares funderingar kring marknadsbalansen mellan större och mindre revisionsbolag. / Aim: Big audit firms have long been associated with higher audit quality, compared to smaller audit firms. Recent studies suggest that the higher audit fees from bigger audit firm is affected by market misuse rather than better audit quality. This study provides new empirical evidence between the comparison of big vs small audit firm, where audit fees are used as proxy for audit quality. Furthermore, this study investigates different litigation environment that could affect audit quality.   Method: This study uses an quantitative based method with an positivist, deductive approach, were earlier studies have had an impact on our hypotheses. Financial information from 2518 companies has been collected from Thomson Reuters Datastream.   Result & Conclusions: This study's result provides significant differences of audit quality between big and small audit firms in different risk environments. For this study, the audit quality relationship between big and small audit firms are equivalent for the European countries while audit quality between big and small audit firms in the US differ significantly.   Contribution of the thesis: This study leaves two contributions to the extent audit literature, in terms of empirical evidence of audit quality between big and small audit firms and unique research results of audit quality in different litigation environments. Furthermore, the results of this study creates incentives for practitioners to review the audit market for self interests and answer legal setters concerns about unbalanced audit markets.   Suggestions for future research: The study has been carried out without consideration of qualitative factors that may affect audit quality. It’s opening a space for comparative studies with an qualitative approach. It is also possible to expand the number of stock exchanges for a country or expand the number of countries in different risk environments.

Syfte: Resultatmanipulering är ett opportunistiskt beteende som förekommer i samband med företagsförvärv. Incitament för förvärvande företag att resultatmanipulera kan variera beroende på om det finns motverkande mekanismer i bolagsstyrningen. Forskare har tidigare poängterat att ansvarstagande är en motsats till opportunistiskt beteende och att ansvarstagande är en utmärkande egenskap för kvinnor och något som karaktäriserar CSR-arbete. Syftet med aktuell studie är därför att undersöka om CSR-arbete i bolagsstyrningen och andelen kvinnor i styrelser minskar förekomsten av resultatmanipulering ett år innan ett företagsförvärv med stock swap. Metod: Studien antar ett positivistiskt perspektiv med en hypotetisk-deduktiv ansats. Sekundärdata har inhämtats från databasen Thomson Reuters Eikon och Thomson Reuters Datastream genom ett kvantitativt tillvägagångssätt. En tvärsnittsstudie har designats och urvalet har slutligen analyserats i multipla regressionsanalyser med hjälp av Excel och statistikprogrammet IBM SPSS. Resultat och slutsats: Studien visar att CSR-arbete minskar förekomsten av resultatmanipulering inför företagsförvärv, vilket studiens litteraturundersökning givit anledning att förvänta. Däremot finner vi inget signifikant samband mellan andelen kvinnor i styrelser och resultatmanipulering inför företagsförvärv. Förslag till fortsatt forskning: Studier som undersöker samband mellan CSR och andra opportunistiska beteenden än resultatmanipulering. Vi skulle även önska studier som till större grad tar hänsyn till vikten av antalet kvinnor närvarande i styrelser för att påvisa kvinnors utmärkande egenskaper. Allra helst i samband med incitament för resultatmanipulering. Uppsatsens bidrag: Ur ett teoretiskt perspektiv bidrar denna studie genom att diskutera och empiriskt undersöka samband mellan kvinnor, CSR och resultatmanipulering. Studien bidrar även med ett alternativt sätt att undersöka CSR i kontrast till tidigare forskning som främst använt ESG poäng. Ur ett praktiskt perspektiv bidrar studien med information som kan vara viktig för målföretag som står inför att bli uppköpta och intressenter i analyser av aktievärden. / Aim: Earning management is an opportunistic behavior that occurs in conjunction with acquisitions. Earnings management incentives for acquiring companies may vary depending on whether there are counteracting mechanisms in corporate governance. Researchers have previously pointed out that responsibility is a contradiction to opportunistic behavior and that responsibility is a distinctive feature of women and something that characterizes CSR work. The purpose of the current study is therefore to investigate whether CSR work in corporate governance and the proportion of women in boards reduces the incidence of earning management one year beforea company acquisition with stock swap. Method: The study is based on the philosophy of positivism with a hypothetical deductive approach. Secondary data have been retrieved from the Thomson Reuters Eikon database and Thomson Reuters DataStream database through a quantitative approach. A cross-sectional design isused and the sample has been analyzed in multiple regression using Excel and the IBM SPSS statistics program. Result & Conclusions: The study shows that CSR work reduces the incidence of earning manipulation prior to acquisitions, which the study's literature survey gave reason to expect. However, we do not find a significant relation between women in boards and earning management prior to company acquisitions. Suggestions for future research: Studies that investigate the relationship between CSR and other opportunistic behaviors than earning management. We would also liketo see studies that take greater account of the importance of the number of women presented in boards to show women's distinctive qualities. Mainly in connection with incentives for earning management. Contribution of the thesis: From a theoretical perspectivethis study contributes by discussing and empirically investigating relationships between women, CSR and earning management. The study also contributes with an alternative way of investigating CSR in contrast to previous researchthat is primarily using ESG points. From a practical perspective, the study contributes with information that may be important for target companies that are facing acquisitions and stakeholders in stock value analysis.

本研究目的在探討首度上市公司上市前，管理當局因存在達到上市審查條件與提高股票承銷價格的動機，使得首度上市公司上市前運用可能利用盈餘管理提高財務報表盈餘數字。本研究藉由選取民國82年初至民國86年底首度上市公司共136家，其中包括電子類股42家，非電子類股94家，以統計配對樣本Z檢定與複迴歸分析方法，進行首度上市公司之盈餘管理與股價關聯性實證研究。本研究獲得的結論如下： 1.就民國82年初至民國86年底間首次上市公司上市前應計項目呈正向增加的現象顯著，證實首次上市公司上市前有盈餘管理現象。 2.不論電子類股或非電子類股之首次上市公司上市前以增加應計項目，進行盈餘管理的現象並未呈顯著的不同。 3.股市多頭或空頭走勢，並未在首次上市公司於上市前增加應計項目變動的現象產生顯著的差異。 4.首次上市公司上市交易的前十個交易日股價累積報酬明顯為正值，同時又高於同期間大盤指數的累積報酬率。（本指數係採不含金融類股的加權股價指數作為比較基礎） 5.上市交易的前十個交易日股價累積報酬率，與上市前應計項目變動關係不顯著，而與上市前二年至上市前一年的現金流量變動呈正相關。

論文提要 本研究目的在於探討新上市公司在申請上市時所編製的強制性財務預測與上市後業績變動及盈餘管理的相關性。 本研究採實證之方式，選取民國80年6月到86年底之新上市公司曾在上市當年及上市後三年內公告或更新財務預測者。利用迴歸分析、卡方分析、T檢定及Wilcoxon Rank Sum 檢定，而研究結果如下： 1. 由於新上市申請的相關規定，若公司預期本身經營績效不佳時，會提出較為樂觀之財務預測，以利上市審查。 2. 新上市公司上市後的經營績效變異程度與財務預測的過度樂觀程度呈現正相關，但是當樂觀程度定義為來自營業活動的現金流量時，並不顯著，可能是公司僅需注意營業毛利與稅前淨利是否達成，對現金流量之預測較沒有達成的壓力所致。 3. 新上市公司提出之強制性財務預測過於樂觀者在上市前盈餘管理之現象並不顯著，其可能原因在於本研究採用之盈餘管理定義僅限於與營業有關之裁決性應計項目，而無法看出公司利用其他項目來進行盈餘管理。 4. 上市前從事盈餘管理之公司，除了現金流量之準確度不明顯外，業績衰退和業績成長公司在財務預測準確度上明顯不同，但是在財務預測更新行為上並無顯荖不同。 5. 新上市公司面臨更新財務預測時，會傾向利用應計項目操縱來規避調整。 / The Relationship among Change in Operating Perfomance, Earning Management and the Revision of Mandatory Forecasts Abstract This research aims to examine the relationship among change in initial public offering firms, earning management and the revision of mandatory forecasts. This study contends that the forecast revisions should significantly correlate with changes in IPO's performance. The samples of this study range from June 30th, 1991 to December 31st , 1997. The empirical results of this study can be summarized as follows: O Due to related regulations, if IPO firms predict its insufficient operation performance, the mandatory forecasts of IPO firms are usually optimistic, for the convenience of examination. O The IPO firms' variation degree of operation efficiency and the over-optimistic forecasts are correlated positively. O If IPO firms' mandatory forecasts are over-optimistic, the earning management is not correlated significantly. O Before public offering, among the firms which manipulate earnings, there is significant difference between firms with declining performance and firms with growing performance. O When the IPO firms face revisions of forecasts, the firms would tend to manipulate accruals to avoid revisions.

中華民國會計研究發展基金會於2004年7月發佈財務會計準則第35號公報：「資產減損之會計處理」並對會計年度結束日在2005年12月31日（含）以後之財務報表適用之，但得提前適用。35號公報規定企業資產發生減損時，須對資產認列減損損失，以反映企業資產之真實價值。然而，資產減損之認列可能對企業之會計盈餘、資產之帳面價值造成衝擊，本研究之主要目的係找出提前適用35號公報公司其公司特性，藉此瞭解其提前採用之動機與目的，並且檢視提前適用35號公報之公司是否同時進行盈餘管理之行為。 實證結果顯示：(1)提前適用35號公報公司，其公司特性為有著較低之負債比率、資產報酬率與股利支付率，且公司規模較大。此外，過去年度之公司特性並非影響公司是否提前適用35號公報之決定因素。(2) 提前適用35號公報公司確實有從事使淨利下降之盈餘管理之行為。 / In July 2004, Accounting Research and Development Foundation in Taiwan issued Statement No.35,“Accounting for the impairment of assets”. This accounting standard was effective for financial year ending after December 31, 2005, with early application encouraged. To reflect the true value of assets statement No.35 requires firm should recognize assets impairment loss when assets have impaired. However, assets impairment recognized may impact a firm’s accounting earnings and book value of long-term assets of the firm. This study investigates the main firm characteristics of early adoption of the new accounting standard and weather early adopters have earning management at the same time. Empirical results suggest that: (1) firms that early adopting statement No.35 are those with lower debt to asset ratio, return on asset ratio, dividend payout ratio and which are small sized. Besides, firm’s characteristics in past years are not determinant of early adoption of the new accounting standard. (2) Early adopters of the new accounting standard indeed use earnings management to lower the net income.

Globalization has led to the growth of international financial markets, as one of the results, the EU adopted IFRS in 2005 to meet the need of accounting globalization and harmonization. This action has triggered a debate about whether the adoption of IFRS is beneficial to accounting quality and information comparability. Meanwhile, China, playing a key role in the global economic development stage, realizes the importance of accounting harmonization and attempts to move towards the IFRS as well. However, to reach the goal that the Chinese companies produce financial statements that are the same as those that apply IFRS, there is still a long way to go. The purpose of this thesis is to examine whether the adoption of IFRS by EU has enhanced the quality of financial reporting and accounting information comparability. Additionally, the thesis further identified the seminal undertakings for the convergence of IFRS in Europe and pointed out the implication for China’s convergence with IFRS. The empirical findings in this thesis were obtained through qualitative interviews. The empirical findings suggest that accounting quality and information comparability has been enhanced with EU’s strong and full enforcement with IFRS. With the confidence in IFRS which is gained from the success of the EU’s adoption of IFRS, a coherent result was found that the convergence towards IFRS would also benefit China in accounting quality and information comparability, and further lead to more international investments. However, when it comes to the question whether China should emulate EU’s example to adopt IFRS directly or keep CAS (Chinese Accounting Standards) which is similar to IFRS, two mixed opinions were obtained basically from Europe side and China side. Through in-depth analysis with these empirical findings, the conclusion is that it is necessary for China to take steps to build intensive programs to enhance its capacity of the adoption of IFRS, so that it could adapt itself to the fact that the IFRS is already making its way around the world as a single set of high quality global accounting standards.