Real earnings management and financial statement fraud: evidence from Malaysia
International Journal of Accounting & Information Management
ISSN: 1834-7649
Article publication date: 1 October 2018
Abstract
Purpose
We examine whether the fraud firms are engaged in real earnings management and accrual earnings management prior to the fraud year in the Malaysian context.
Design/methodology/approach
Our sample comprises of 65 financial statement fraud and 65 non-fraud firms over a period of eight years from 2001 to 2008.
Findings
Using the abnormal cash flow from operations (CFO) and abnormal production costs as the proxies for real earnings management, we find that financial statement fraud firms engage in manipulating production costs during preceding two years of the fraud event. However, our results show that financial fraud firms engage in manipulating CFO prior to the fraud event. Additionally, we find that financial statement fraud firms prefer to manipulate earnings using accruals relative to real earnings prior to the fraud year.
Originality/value
Our results demonstrate that real earnings management is more aggressive in financial statement fraud firms compared to the non-fraud firms in the four years prior to fraud.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The author would like to acknowledge helpful comments and suggestions from seminar participants of the Department of Accounting, La Trobe University. Any remaining errors are ours.
Citation
Md Nasir, N.A.b., Ali, M.J., Razzaque, R.M.R. and Ahmed, K. (2018), "Real earnings management and financial statement fraud: evidence from Malaysia", International Journal of Accounting & Information Management, Vol. 26 No. 4, pp. 508-526. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJAIM-03-2017-0039
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2018, Emerald Publishing Limited